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spiritual drink." Old holy uses, as well as abuses, are declared to be our examples for imitation or warning.

I proceed now to the illustration of the subject by a comparison of the Jewish rites with Christian ordinances. We mainly defend our threefold order of the sacred ministry by reference to the corresponding order in the Jewish Church. High-priest, Priest, and Levite, are the warrant as well as model of our Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. It is often objected to our positive rule on this subject, that little is positively said on it in the New Testament. There is no need. The positive rule is in the Old Testament. It is a mark of general truth "never to say too much." But in revealed truth, the reason of once, and once only, speaking is, that we may search the Scriptures for that one mention of a subject. It is to the searching, not to the careless, eye that Scripture truth is revealed. And it is worthy of remark, that when our LORD speaks of searching the Scriptures, he means the Old Testament, and that as testifying of Himself.

I could advance also much of the Jewish policy, which would suit any Christian nation, and could prove the Old Testament to be the best study and model for a Christian statesman; but I must condense my matter, though at much loss of point and expressiveness, and touch only on the more religious rites, as they typify and give meaning to our Christian Sacraments.

Circumcision and Baptism have been ranged by S. Paul in a most instructive parallel. The same requisites make both profitable, and the same defects make both unprofitable. The true Jew, like the true Christian, is one inwardly. But by our disconnecting way of reading Holy Writ, we have made the Jewish religion to consist altogether of outward observance; and Christianity altogether of inward feeling. Thus one becomes a body without a spirit; the other a spirit without a body. Now by keeping the whole Scripture entire, we see plainly the nature of both, by their affinity and their contrariety to each other. The spirit of the Jewish religion lies, if I may so say, underneath the body, the spirit of the Christian is in the body. It informs it, quickens it, runs all over and through it, through every pore, vein, and artery-the life of all holy forms, the leaven of every common outward duty, and of every inward secret thought. As to the Jewish letter, the spirit, on occasions, flashes up from underneath it in the form of visions, dreams, and angelic manifestations. In the Christian code, the Spirit is never seen, but always abiding, as the Third Person. Its operations were once by occasional miracles, now they are constant, and silent, and secret. These and larger inferences may be drawn from only extending S. Paul's two parallel lines of Baptism and Circumcision.

Even the many minute Levitical purifications may give much and full meaning to our own baptismal washing. Alas! how

vague and formal (yet with so little form) are the notions on this great subject!

Could we stand aloof from our brethren as we do, in silent, sullen, and unsocial separation, or else form close and exclusive associations, if we regarded our one catholic cleansing from our common leprosy? Brothers as we are, could the word "fraternity" ever have been so sacrilegiously used, if we duly remembered our one baptism. The Levitical rites never imported outside or trivial observances, but minute applications of the laver of regeneration. In ourselves, we may apply our baptismal principles to many very little matters—such as an appearance befitting our station, office, and character—a propriety in dress, and even cleanliness and seemliness in person. In education the gift of baptism is the purifying salt, and must pervade our public, aristocratical, no less than our national schools for the poor. Alas, some of our modern charters have been so lax, and our old charters of royally founded schools and colleges have been so misinterpreted or forgotten that the very washings of cups and pots might teach us a lesson of more faithful nicety. In the business of life, too, many of the little Jewish particularities teach us exactness in the least things, honesty in grains and scruples. This is derided, as the "tithing of mint, anise, and cummin." But these ought we to do, and not leave the other undone. The true comment of which is, "You ought to be particular, exact, and even scrupulous like the Jew-but liberal, unsuspicious, and nobly negligent, as a Christian."

In our greetings also in the market-place, that is, in our manners, if we multiplied many little courtesies and charities, we should be far from the hypocrisy of men of the world. Minute attention to others is no Pharisaical ceremony. Manners makyth Man was the apt motto of a mind magnificent and minute,-a mind instinct with all lofty and lowly moralities. Such the term manners implies. But we narrow the meaning of words according to the narrowness of our ideas.

Then, again, in religion the full and fine drawing out of the gift of baptism would lead us to the uses of rubrical restraints and external authority. It would teach us submission to little rules without loss of Christian liberty. A lesson much needed. For in avoiding the outside show of the Pharisee, we have got round, by the usual junction of extremes, into the very core of Pharisaism. Have we not lapsed into the most paradoxical and subtle formalism from abandoning forms? Have we not abused our spiritual liberty into a kind of disembodied religion, a phantom of vision for the eye, or a tinkling cymbal for the ear? Nay, have we not used our liberty for a cloke of maliciousness, and held up to scorn the least distrust of private judgment, or the least respect for ancient authority-or the least

obedience to prescribed regulations, as the Pharisaical washing of cups and cleansing of platters?

Dangerous mockery this! The ceremonial law is not wholly dead; but baptized into Christian love. It exists in the mystery of the new birth, and flourishes in the practice of the new life. The Old Testament shadows remain as shadows. And it is instructive to mark them melting into the purer light of the New; to mark the positive rules of the conscientious Jew regenerated into the unconscious instincts of the renewed Christian. The bodily acts of the one were many, the mental movements of the other are innumerable. Oh let us infuse the spirit of our baptismal sacrament into the body of the ceremonial law. So also with regard to the types and shadows of the Holy Supper, let us not be half but wholly scriptural.

When our LORD eat the last Passover, and instituted the first communion, it was a marked transition from the one to the other. Neither was complete. These were both cups of both Testaments. The shadowy lamb was not yet killed, and the real Lamb of GOD was then speaking. According to learned men,* the Paschal Lamb and the Christian Victim were both actually sacrificed, the one on the altar, the other on the cross the following evening.

The typical sacrifice ceased for ever then, because the substantial Sacrifice was once offered. But the type of the one, and the efficacy of the other still remain. And what a significance does the sign give to the thing signified. One great character of our sacraments is, "human significances of spiritual substances." We cannot imagine a mysterious and invisible substance without a simple and visible representation. The bread and wine are, however, more than significant symbols. Symbols they are, but when we eat them, we spiritually, but verily, eat the Body and Blood of CHRIST. The types of the Old Testament are mere types, and the type of the Lamb gives to an unbeliever an idea of a sacrifice in the LORD's Supper. To a believer it imparts-not an idea, but a faith in the One sufficient Sacrifice.

We have now the sacrificial feast in more actual fulness than when CHRIST Himself administered it. He was then the Priest, not the Victim. Now He is both. How is it that this feast of good things is made so bare and scant? It is, because not only is the Jewish sacrifice abolished, but the Jewish type is forgotten. It is indeed a feast of fat things upon the lees. It is commemorative, festive, eucharistic; but it is more-it is above all, sacrificial. It is a plain, simple supper of Christian love and communion. It is also a Divine Sacrifice of full and mysterious Atonement.

Nor only the Passover, but all the feasts of Pentecost, of Taber* Williams' Holy Week, p. 386.

nacles, and others, with all their accompaniments of sacrifices of blood, or of meat and drink-offerings, of sin and peace-offerings, are all emphatically significant of meanings, in that Sacrifice which is pre-eminently one, and stands alone.

This one Sacrifice is effectually what those many sacrifices were figuratively-a purifying, atoning, propitiating, and thanksgiving sacrifice. But we seem to abandon all notion of sacrifice; and have reduced the Holy Supper to a bare remembrance, while we rob it of what is most dear to memory. We make it quite human, not at all divine. We regard the Ruler of the feast merely as suchas mere Man, not as very GoD. But at His table He is especially both, combining the gentlest form of humanity with the highest form of Divinity; and whenever we approach that table, we must come with corresponding feelings, with the deepest reverence, and the fullest, freest, and most filial confidence.

Again, as we have light notions of the Sacrifice itself, so have we of its accompaniments, and from the same cause, a disregard of all typical significance. If we duly pondered upon the accompaniments of the Jewish sacrifice, namely, all kinds of holy offerings with all due solemnity, surely we could never make our offerings so parsimoniously and so irreverently as we do! Surely we should make them sacramental, and attach them to the altar, as in old times! In modern days our money offerings are money still. They are not offerings at all. They are made not at all in the Church, but in the secular character. They are made in all the mercenariness and luxury of it. There is a pomp and a display and a barter in the act. Great names are paraded in subscription lists. Widows' mites are held in contempt. Money is received for religious purposes at crowded doors, as at theatres; and it is money still with the world's image and superscription on it. There is no consecration, and therefore no transfiguration, by which its countenance is changed, and appears no longer as money the root of all evil, but as alms and oblations to cover a multitude .of sins.

As we are afraid of the terms Altar and Priest, so are we afraid of the terms Alms and Oblations. They are all in our Common Prayer Book, and though they have had exaggerated meanings given them, that is no reason why we should not give them their full meaning.

I trust I have shown some of the evils that have arisen from their misinterpretation, and shall pass on from the Old Dispensation to the New. Now mark again some fine transitions.

We see in the Acts of the Apostles, how the first Christians joined together altar and hearth. Their houses and bodies were temples of the New Testament, fashioned by the analogy of faith, after the exact proportions of Solomon's Temple in the Old Testament. Their property and worldly goods were oblations. Their

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whole lives were sacrifices. Their feasts were feasts of charity. All, though infinitely refined and renewed, were yet on the model of the ceremonial rites of the Law. They gave one emphatic name to the Holy Supper, not by word but deed. They had all things common, and therefore well is that concentrating act of eating bread and drinking wine, called, not by way of difference but of emphasis, The Communion. For every part of their lives was A communion. They not only continued daily with one accord in the temple, but went about breaking bread from house to house, and did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart. The ancient temple fitted the Christian worship. The daily service fulfilled and succeeded the daily sacrifice. The moral command of the Sabbath was still regarded as a duty, but the privilege of the LORD's Day was added. The positive day was changed, but the one hallowed day in seven still remained. They remembered the rest from creation, but they thought also of the joy of Easter.

It is beautiful to behold, not reformation, but this entire renovation, without any destruction. Like the rearing of the first temple without noise of axe or hammer, so was it beautiful to behold the second temple noiselessly dissolving, almost blending with the Christian Church. All was the same in type, but behold all become new in spirit. Last of all, and not least of all, it was beautiful to behold the fine transition from the primitive Christian Church to the primitive Christian House; to mark how each had its different administration, and how both had one and the selfsame spirit.

Alas! this was too primitive and pure to last. By and by we hear of murmurings. Widows were neglected in this daily administration of alms and prayers. Then was appointed the order of Deacons.

A little farther on, in S. Paul's time, we hear of the distinction of rich and poor, and of sad confusion both in the Church and in the house. One was drunken, and another hungry, even at the LORD'S Table. They discerned not the difference between the LORD'S Body and common meat. Wherefore the Apostle sharply asks them, "Have ye not houses to eat and drink in ?" Then he refers to the original institution-the evening when the Paschal Lamb ceased, not as a shadow, but as a sacrifice, and the LAMB of GOD became our Passover.

Farther on, when the difference of rich and poor continued, and the state of society more nearly resembled our own, then we read of that practice by which the distinctions of rank still remained, but by which all things were common, as at first. The practice is this: "Let every one of you, upon the first day of the week, lay by him in store, as God has prospered him." Here then we have our own rule. Here is the primitive Church modelled on the very frame and form of society in which we live. O that the modern

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