Forbes on Article XXV: Of the Sacraments

THE Article begins by stating that Sacraments or dained of Christ are something more than badges or tokens of Christian men’s profession. This was the miserable conception of Zwingli. He maintained Sa craments to be signs of covenant between man and man, external things in no wise affecting the con science, neither spiritual in themselves nor working anything spiritual in us, the tokens of those who are spiritual. Luther arid Melanchthon’s theory was also inadequate. They reduced the Sacraments to tokens

of a covenant between God and man, to pledges of the truth of the divine promises for the forgiveness of sins, to means of assurance that the debt of the sins of the faithful receiver is remitted, and of peace to comfort and console him. All this springs from the one-sided conceptions of the justification of man before God. The effects of the Sacraments were confined to the subjective acts of the individual at the moment of reception. In fact, the objective character of the means of grace was lost. Luther’s variations were endless. His permanent belief was, that they were a sort of visible preaching to kindle faith. But the Confession of Augsburg is not even fairly orthodox on this point.

Calvin’s teaching was in most respects similar to that of Luther, but he carefully points out all the parts of what is understood by a Sacrament, and recommends, with much urgency, its use, but then he divorces the inward grace from the outward sign. This is the neces sary result of his theory of election. If it is only to the elect that God’s grace is tendered, the rest being passed over by God, it follows that grace is by no means necessarily connected with the outward sign. Hence, in Baptism, those who are not elected are only outwardly washed, and in the Lord’s Supper re ceive mere bread and wine. According to him, Sacra ments are merely obsignatory.

Having thus cleared the way to a definition, the Article goes on to state that Sacraments ordained by Christ are ” certain sure witnesses and effectual si<ms

of grace and God’s goodwill towards us, by the which He doth work invisibly in us, and doth not only quicken, but strengthen and confirm our faith in Him.” Observe the singular strength of these words, in com parison with those of the Confession of Augsburg : ” Sacraments are the signs and testimonies of God’s goodwill towards us, bestowed for exciting and con firming the faith of those who use them.” Again, we call Sacraments rites, which have the commandment of God, and to which is added the promise of grace. Our Article makes five assertions with regard to them : they are — 1. sure witnesses of grace, and God’s good will towards us ; 2. effectual signs of grace, and God’s good-will towards us ; 3. by Sacraments God works in visibly in us ; 4. by Sacraments He quickens our faith in Him; 5. by Sacraments He strengthens and con firms that Faith. There is no point of Catholic teach ing on the subject which is not amply and explicitly contained in these words.

ward signs, and wonders, and tokens, to strengthen the trust of the Jews in the divine assurance, as in the words of Deut. vi. 20, ” And when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What mean the testi monies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the Lord our God hath commanded you ?” so our blessed Lord, the new Moses, the Legislator of a better cove nant, instituted these rites as pledges of the forgiveness of sin, of the bestowal of grace, of communion with God. A pledge to assure us of the inward and spiri tual grace given to us, is a necessary part of the defi nition. But this is not all.

2. The Article says further, that a Sacrament is an effectual sign of God’s grace. It not only typifies, it conveys. It is not a bare sign, but an effectual sign, a sign that carries its effect along with it. It is the means whereby we receive the same grace, of which it is the outward visible sign.

3. By Sacraments God works invisibly in us. All grace flows from the Humanity of Jesus Christ, and the Sacraments are main channels whereby that grace flows into the soul. Christ is the chief and principal worker in all Sacraments, as a function of His ever lasting priesthood. They work in us by means of the institution of Christ. He has merited for us all things necessary to salvation, and these are freely bestowed upon us by God, if our free-wills only consent to re ceive them. This consent to receive grace, in other words expresses itself as repentance and faith. Re pentance and faith make us susceptible of the grace

of the Sacrament, which, thus abide in the Absolute and the Objective.

4. Sacraments quicken or give life to faith. In the old rituals, the service of Baptism begins with this question to the sponsor in the name of the candidate, What seekest thou of the Church ? and the answer is, Faith.

5. Sacraments strengthen and confirm faith. As a means of grace, they strengthen the whole soul, in crease its spiritual capacities both as to the intellectual and the moral part of man’s being, and therefore in timately affect the faith, which, though dwelling in the intellectual part of the soul, is intimately in fluenced by the morals. The power of increase in faith is indicated by our Lord in the similitude of the mustard seed. Faith exists in the faintest recognition of a superior Being amid the fetich worship of the ignorant savage ; it rises to the keenest recognition of Divine truth in the perfected saint, and to the endurance of martyrdom for these holy convictions. A power so infinitely varying in degree must be pro foundly affected by the means which God gives us of advancing in righteousness and holiness, so that the Sacraments act directly according to their own nature, and for their appointed purpose, when they confirm and strengthen the faith.

The Article adds that ” the Sacraments were not ordained of Christ to be gazed upon, or to be carried about, but that we should duly use them.” In this sentence the stress is on the words, ” were not ordained

of Christ to be,” &c. The Article does not say, that the things spoken of may not be done, but that they were not the objects for which Christ ordained them. Had they been, they could not have been laid aside without sin. Being of ecclesiastical, not of Divine institution, they were mutable, not immutable. What it affirms is strictly historically true. By carrying the Sacraments about, we are probably to understand the Procession of the Corpus Domini. No person in his senses would say that this was ordained of Christ, but, though not actually ordained of Christ, the prac tice is not necessarily sinful, nay, if ordered by the Church, in accordance with His will, permissible and edifying. If ” gazing” be supposed to imply assisting at the Eucharistic celebration without communicating, it must be recollected that from the very beginning, the penitents called consistentes were required to be present without communicating; and as love waxed cold, the Church thought it better that men should be present at the great Eucharistic Service without communion, rather than turn their backs upon the holy mysteries. But it was distinctly an accommodation to weakness in the beginning, and the normal order of the Church is still, that all present should be in a fit state to par ticipate in the holy mysteries, and actually do so a.

As regards the circ urn gestation of the blessed Sa crament. From the beginning of the third century

a Both the Articles and jCouncil of Trent agree in considering that private masses are the result of the coldness of Christians. Both con demn it, but both have failed in enforcing universal participation.

we have evidence of its being reserved in the Church. It was sometimes carried home by the faithful for pri vate communion, but generally it rested in a ciborium, in the form of a dove hanging over the altar. It was then ready for the exigencies of the sick and dying, and Church history is full of records of the tremendous profanations it endured from the hands of the heathen, or even heretic Christians. At length, on the occasion of the upspring of a pantheistic school in Europe, headed by David de Dinant, and Amaury de Chartresb, the doctrine of the Sacrament received additional con sideration, and it was deemed expedient to carry the Sacrament through the streets, as a protest patent to every one against the dangerous errors of pantheism ; and since those days the devotional use of the Lord’s Body, as divorced from its Sacramental participation, has greatly increased in the Western Church, while the Greek Church and the English Church have re framed from developing in this direction.

It is observable that the framers of our present Article omitted a clause contained in the Forty-two Articles, founded upon a misconception, common at that time, of the theological meaning of the term, opus operatum. After the words, “in such only as worthily receive the same, they have a wholesome effect and operation ;” there followed, ” and yet that, not of this work wrought _ex opere opcrato] as some men speak ; which word, as it is strange and un known to Holy Scripture, so it engendereth no godly b Mohler, Symlolik, vol. i. p. 350.

but a very superstitious sense.” This supposed sense was, that the Sacraments conferred the benefits attached to them, to all who received them, without any good dispositions on their part, sine aliquo bono motu utentis, as people used to say. Such an opinion could not be too strongly condemned, but nothing could be more alien from the meaning of the term. It is a well- known distinction of the Schoolmen ; ” Some receive both the Sacrament and the substance of the Sacra ment” [viz. those who receive it worthily] ; ” some, the Sacrament and not the substance” [viz. those who receive it unworthily] ; “some, the substance and not the Sacramento” [viz. those who desire to receive it aright, but, in the ordering of God’s Providence, are prevented]. This distinction in itself excludes the imputation that, according to this doctrine, the Sacra ments benefited those who received them unworthily by their mere reception. Such, in the language of St. Augustine, ” placed a bar” to the reception of their grace. And so those alone universally received the benefits of a Sacrament, who could place no bar. ” The Sacrament and the substance together all, in fact, receive who in Baptism are cleansed from original sin.” The phrase, ex opere operate* , was devised in con trast with the ex opere operantis, and to distinguish the Sacraments of the new law from those of the old ; to ex dude human merits, not worthy reception ; to express that God’s gift in the Sacrament is a gift special to the Sacrament, ” a work worked” by God, beyond and

c P. Lomb., 1. iv. dist. iv.

above human co-operation. ” When Catholics say that Sacraments confer grace ex opere operato, they do not think that they confer it only from the merits of the receiver, either of condignity or impetratory, but by the virtue of the Sacrament itself, without which, even if such disposition preceded, it would not be given d.” “It is said that Sacraments justify men, ex opere operato, because they do not justify by reason of the merits of the work of the minister, who confers the Sacrament, as far as it is his, as operating [opus oper- antis], viz. in what way he may be worthy of praise or blame : but the work of the minister is considered only in itself, be it done well or ill, so that it be done according to the Divine institution, because it hath this power, not by the virtue or merits of the minister, but by the virtue of the Author who instituted it” [the doctrine of our Article XXVI.]. The Council of Trent guarded the meaning of the ex opere operato by the words : — ” If any one say that the Sacraments of the new law do not contain grace, or confer it to those tcho place no bar to it ;” and in their rejection of those who confined the grace of the Sacraments to the elect : — ” If any say that grace is not given through such Sacraments always to all, as far as relates to God’s part, although they duly receive them, but some times and to some6.” In which words they express the same limitation as our Article.

Of the number of the Sacraments little notice was taken in the Protestant confessions. Luther, regard- d Vazquez in 3, P. d. 131, q. 1. e Sess. vii. can. 6, 7.

ing them as symbols for the purpose of confirming a man’s faith in the forgiveness of sins, could neces sarily see no sacramental character in many of those rites which had long been esteemed such. He ad mitted three, — Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, Penitencef. Calvin also admitted only two Sacraments, in the sense in which he believed any Sacraments ; viz. ” outward symbols, whereby God seals to our consciences the promises of His good will towards us to support the weakness of our faith, and we, in turn, attest our piety towards Him, before Him, the angels, and men s.” “Baptism testifies that we have been cleansed and washed; the Eucharistic Supper, that we have been redeemed11.” The ” five falsely-named Sacraments” he rejected with much vehemence1, whence there is no allusion to them in any of the original reformed confessions j.

f The number is not denned in the Confession of Augsburg, but these are enumerated in Art. ix. — xii. The Apology, on Art. xiii., declares these three to be Sacraments, as “having the command of God and the promise of the grace of the New Testament. For in all three our hearts ought to settle, that God really forgives us for Christ’s sake. Confirmation and Extreme Unction, it says, are rites received from the fathers, which the Church, too, does not require as necessary to salva tion, because they have not the command of God.” ” If Orders be ac counted the ministry of the word [i.e. preaching], we should un deniably call ’ order’ a Sacrament. Matrimony/’ it says, ” if any one wills to call it a Sacrament, should be distinguished from the former, which are properly signs of the New Testament, and are testimonies of grace and of forgiveness of sins.” (p. 155, ed. Tittm.)

J The ” declaratio Thoruniensis,” the result of an attempt in Poland to unite Catholics, Lutherans, and Reformers, A.D. 1645, alone speak of them. It was received by the reformed in Brandenburg. — Aug. Diss. Sist. Lit., in his Corpus Libb. St/mb., pp. 642, 643.

The septenary number of the Sacraments had long been held both by the Greek and Latin Churches, and there is no ground to deprive of a sacramental cha racter the rites for which that character is claimed.

Peter Lombard is the first to formulize the number in the Latin Church. Before that nothing had been defined. Alexander Alensisk held that confirmation was not apostolic, but ordained by the Council of Meaux; Buonaventura1 denies that it was established by Christ; Cajetanm denies that extreme unction is the ceremony mentioned in St. James. Rupertus Tuicen- sis says, ” Sacred Baptism, the Holy Eucharist of His Body and Blood, the twin gift of the Holy Ghost… . These three Sacraments are the necessary instruments of our salvation n.”

The language of the Article is awkward and embar rassed, whether it be that the use of the word ” partly” did not at that time (as it certainly does not by the force of the word itself) imply a logical division into two classes, or that the framers of the Article used it illogically. But, certainly, the words could not have been intended to express any absolute division of the five Sacraments into the two classes spoken of, since, by no possibility, according to the principles of the framers, could Confirmation be classed in either. For the right interpretation of the Article, we need but these simple principles : 1. That the framers did not

k Alensis, p. 4, q. 9. l Buonaventura, Sent., 1. 4, dist. 7, q. 2.

m Cajetan, in Jac. 5, p. 419, ed. Lugd., 1556. n De Victoria

Verbi Dei, 1. xii. c. 11, cit. Owen.

mean to contradict the Homilies, which they praised ; 2. That the writers, both of the Articles and the Homi lies, did not use carefully guarded language without a meaning. The word ” Sacrament” has notoriously been used in a wider and a stricter sense. The Homi lies mention St. Augustine’s description, “a visible sign of an invisible grace.” In this respect they stand out from those other mysteries of the Christian life, which the fathers have here and there called Sacra ments, such as prayer °, or the Lord’s prayer p, or fast ing 1, or Holy Scripture1, or the Creed p, or Martyr dom s ; for although these are instruments of grace, through the blessing of God, they have not been marked out by any visible sign. Now, in this wider sense, ” this Article does not deny the five rites in question to be Sacraments ; it only denies them to be Sacraments in the same sense in which Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are Sacraments, — ’ Sacraments of the Gospel,’ ’ Sacraments with an outward sign ordained by God/ r’ ” If, then, a Sacrament be merely ’ an out ward sign of an invisible grace’ given under it, the five rites may be Sacraments ; but if it must be an outward sign ordained by God or Christ, then only Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are in this sense

p ” The Sacrament of the Creed, which they ought to believe ; the Sacrament of the Lord’s Piayer, how th«-y ought to ask.” — S.Aug., Serm. ‘228 fin.

• St. Jerome, Ep. ad Ocean., n. 6, p. 418, Vail.

’ Sacraments.’ ’ Now, in separating off these two Sacraments from the rest, the framers of the Article followed very high authority in the Latin, Greek, and Syriac-speaking Churches. To name no others now, St. Chrysostom, St. Augustine, and their con temporary St. Isaac the Great, gave special honour to those two Sacraments which flowed from the side of Christ4.

These two, the Article calls ” Sacraments of the Gospel,” as being, as the Catechism says, ” generally necessary to salvation;” or, according to the Homily, ” having annexed to the visible signs the promise of free forgiveness of sins, and of our holiness and joining to […] it has been said, ” gives power, yet without making the soul acceptable to God ; Con firmation gives light and strength, yet is the mere completion of Baptism ; and Absolution may be looked upon as a negative ordinance, removing the barrier which sin has raised between us and that grace which

1 St. Chrysos., ad loc. in Horn. 85 ; St. Aug., in Joan. 10. t. iii. tr. xlv. 9 ; de Luct. Jacob, Serm. 5, t. v. p. 30. ” Faith came to me, and called to me, and said to me, that the Sacraments of the Church came forth from the opened side of Christ.” (St. Isaac, Serm. de fide ap. Assem. Bibl. Or., t. i. p. 243.) See also Tertullian, de Bapt., c. 16, p. 263 ; St. Ambrose, in S. Luc., 1. x. § 135 ; St. Aug., in S. Joh., Tract. cxx. n. 2, ix. n. 10, xv. n. 8; de Civ. Dei, xv. 26, xxii. 17 ; c. Faust., xii. 39 ; St. Leo, Ep. xxviii. Flavian. ; S. Paulin. Nol., Ep. xlii. Florent., n. 4; Auct. de Symb., 1. ii. c. 6; de cataclysm., c. iv. ; in St. Aug. Opp. t. vi.; St. Cyril Al., and probably Apollinarius, in S. Joh. xix. 34; author of Testim. de Adv. Dom., in St. Greg. Nyss. ; St. John Damasc., de Fid. Orthod., iv. 9. See in Dr. Pusey’s Scriptural Doctrine of B<tpt., pp. 294—297.

is by inheritance ours. But the two Sacraments ’ of the Gospel/ as they may be emphatically styled, are the instruments of inward life, according to our Lord’s declaration, that Baptism is a new birth, and that in the Eucharist we eat the living bread u.”

But although these two great Sacraments are severed off from the other five, it has been observed, that so far from denying them to be Sacraments, the writers of all the formularies acknowledge or imply that they are in some sense ” Sacraments.” The Homilies directly call Marriage a ” Sacrament x ;” and of Orders they say, “neither it, nor any other Sacrament else be such Sacraments as Baptism and Communion are?.” So that we have two of the five expressly called ” Sacra ments,” besides the allusion to ” other Sacraments.” The Article could not say that the five have not ” like nature of Sacraments with Baptism and the Lord’s Supper,” unless the writers meant that they were in some sense ” Sacraments.” And the difference assigned (which is further remarkable) does not relate to the inward grace, but to the outward form. ” For that,” it continues, ” they have not any visible sign or cere mony ordained of God.” In the same way the Homi lies expressly say, that “absolution” has the inward grace, ” forgiveness of sins,” only ” not by express word of the New Testament, annexed and tied to the visible sign, which is imposition of hands.”

u Newman on “Justification,” Lee*;. 6, v.fin. x Sermon on

Swearing, pt. i. T Homily on Common Prayer and Sacra

ments, p. 298.

It was said that the language of the Article, on the number of the Sacraments, is defensible : —

1. To state that there are only seven Sacraments, neither more nor less, is a mode of speech unknown to antiquity. The word was used, if not loosely, in a very extended sense. Christianity, being a religion of mystery, was full of Sacraments. It was the great sacrament of godliness itself, testifying as it did to God manifest in the flesh.

2. The Sacraments of Baptism and the Holy Eucha rist are so pre-eminent over the other five, differ so in kind from them, and hang so closely together, that they may be bracketed off by themselves. What cir cumcision and the passover were to the Fathers, they are to the Israel of God. They alone are generally necessary to salvation.

3. Moreover, these two Sacraments alone have an out ward sign, instituted by Christ Himself, being the means of conveying the inward grace. There is a marked parallelism between them in their previous announce ment, actual institution, and subsequent administration.

4. As representing spiritual birth and spiritual food they are the very substance of the Church. All other blessings are subsidiary to these, both in the order of nature, and in the order of grace.

5. They stand also pre-eminent in that they and they alone, according to the Fathers, have flowed from the riven side of the Second Adam as He slept the sleep of death on the cross, and thus they constitute the mystic Eve, the bride, the Church.

The language of the Article is unfortunate, not in that it raised two Sacraments above the rest, but in tending to obscure the sacramental character of the other five rites by undue disparagement. Yet, happily, this Article is neither the exclusive, nor the main teacher of our people, according to the ancient principle, lex supplicandi, lex credcndi. And, upon the simple principle, that documents should not be inter preted so as to contradict one another, where they can be harmonized the one with the other, since, in regard to Orders and Confirmation, in the service for each an outward sign is prescribed and an inward grace spoken of; and in Matrimony the benediction of the priest is appointed for those who would be married according to the law of the Church ; and, in Penitence, there is a form appointed for conveying the grace of that Sacrament; it is clear that this Article must not be interpreted as denying that they are ordinances of God for the conveyance of spiritual grace. Of the fifth, the Anointing of the Sick, hereafter. It cannot be denied that seven ordinances have enclosed the whole Christian life in blessed bonds, not all necessary for all, — nay, in the highest form of Christian life there is no room for Matrimony ; and in the first fervour of Christian love, they were the exception who needed to be restored by the Sacrament of Penitence, — but con veying, according to men’s needs, the grace of which they are channels. They have ever been regarded to have a mystical significance of their own, and separately from the beginning have existed as practices in the

Church. To illustrate which truth, it may be well to dwell on each in order as follows : —

I. The Sacrament (in this inferior sense) by which the Holy Spirit is communicated to the faithful, to con firm and perfect in them faith and religion, is termed, on that account, the gift of the Holy Spirit ; Confirma tion ; perfection ; the seal ; also, the Sacrament of the Spirit, the symbol of the Spirit, the Sacrament of Unction, the imposition of hands, unction, the mystic unction, the unction of salvation. An outward sign and an inward grace are both assigned in Holy Scrip ture, in that Peter and John were sent by the Apostles to those baptized in Samaria, ” And they laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost2;” and that the Holy Ghost came on the baptized a, when Paul laid his hands on them. Baptism and Confirma tion standing thus distinct in Holy Scripture, the in timate relation between them, and the custom of ad ministering the one immediately upon the other, do not prove their identity. In matter, form, and cha racter they are entirely different. Confirmation Ter- tullian names with Baptism and the Eucharist b; St. Cyprian gives it the dignity of a Sacrament c ; St. Cyril, of Jerusalem, calls it ” the seal of the fellowship of the Holy Ghost d ;” the author of the de Sacramentis, a special ” spiritual seal,” speaking of it under ” Sa craments.” The Council of Elvira speaks of the bap tized as “perfected6” by it; that of Laodicea said the

z Acts viii. 17. • Ibid. xix. 6. b frees, xxxvi.

c 70 ad Januar. d Cat. xviii. n. 33. e c. 38, 77.

baptized ” ought after Baptism to be anointed with the heavenly chrism, and be partakers of the kingdom of Christ f;” the Apostolical Constitutions call the unc tion “the confirmation of the confession [in Baptism], the seal of the covenants s.” St. Cyril, of Alexandria, speaks of “the use of oil, contributing to perfection to those justified in Christ through holy Baptism/’ as a spiritual meaning of oilh; and says, “We are anointed with ointments, especially at the time of holy Baptism, making it a symbol of partaking the Holy Spirit1.”

The Fathers, both Greek and Latin, speak of Con firmation being given with the imposition of hands, or with Unction with the Holy Chrism, or with both k.

f c. 48. g iii. 16, 17. h In Joel ii. 23, t. iii. p. 224, Aub.

k Some Marcosian heretics, denying (St. Irenseus says) ” the Baptism of the regeneration to God,” said, “it was superfluous to bring persons to the water ; but, mingling oil and water with certain words, put it on the heads of those perfected. These, too, anoint with balsam.” (St. Iren., i. 10, 1 and 4.) Tertullian mentions both as following upon Baptism, and speaks of them as the complement of Baptism : — “Then, going forth from the laver, we are anointed with the blessed unction according to the ancient discipline, whereby they used to be anointed to the priesthood with oil from a horn. So in us, too, the anointing runneth corporally, but profiteth spiritually; as the carnal act of Bap tism itself, that we are immersed in water, is made spiritual that we are delivered from sins. Then the hand is imposed, calling and inviting by its benediction the Holy Spirit.” (De Bapt., c. 7.) Again, he places both between Baptism and the Holy Eucharist : — ” The flesh is washed, that the soul may be unbespotted ; the flesh is anointed, that the soul may be consecrated ; the flesh is sealed, that the soul, too, may be guarded ; the flesh is overshadowed by imposition of hands, that the soul, too, may be illumined by the Spirit ; the flesh is fed with the Body and

” In the oldest Latin Sacramentaries and Pontificals only the laying on of hands and its form is prescribed.”

Blood of Christ, that the soul, too, may be nourished from God.” (De Res. earn., c. 8.) St. Cyprian speaks of the sanctification of the oil wherewith the baptized are anointed. (Ep. Ixx. ad Jan.) In the Ep. Ixxiii., ad Jubaian., having spoken of Peter and John “supplying what was wanted, viz. that, prayers being made for them and hands imposed, the Holy Spirit might be invoked and poured upon them ;” he adds, “the like whereto is done among us, that they who are baptized in the Church are offered to those set over the Church, that by our prayers and the imposition of hands they may obtain the Holy Spirit, and be perfected with the seal of the Lord.” St. Firmilian speaks of the im position of hands alone, (Ep. ad S. Cypr., Ep. Ixxv.) ; as does the Council of Elvira (can. 38). The Luciferian in St. Jerome asks: — “Knowest thou not that this is the custom of the Churches, that on the baptized hands should afterwards be laid, and so the Holy Spirit invoked ? Askest thou where this is written? In the Acts of the Apostles. Even if it were not supported by the authority of Scripture, the agreement of the whole Church herein would have the weight of a precept.” St. Jerome answers thus far : — ” I deny not that this is the custom of the Churches, that to those who have been baptized by Presbyters and Deacons, at a distance from larger cities, the Bishop goes forth, to lay on hands for the invocation of the Holy Spirit.” (St. Jerome, adv. Lucif. n. 8, 9, Opp. ii. 180, 1, Vail.) St. Epiphanius mentions imposition of hands, yet speaking only of Acts viii. 17, 18, (Hcer. xxi., Simon, n. 1) ; and St. Chrysostom, speaking of Acts xix. 6 only. (In Actt. Horn, xl., n. 1.) On the other hand, St. Cyril of Jerusalem mentions the anoint ing only. (Cat. xxi.) St. Basil instances the anointing of the bap tized as an unwritten tradition. (De Sp. S., c. 27.) Theodoret (as a mystical exposition of Cant. i. 2) : — ” Remember the holy mysteries wherein those initiated [baptized], after denying the tyrant [Satan] and confessing the King, receive as the royal seal the Chrism of the spiritual ointment, receiving, as in the type, the ointment, the invisible grace of the Spirit.” (Opp. ii. 30.) St. Augustine, in his de Bapt. (iii. xvi. n. 21), speaks only of the imposition of hands ; on Ps. xxvi. (in explanation of the dum linitur in the title, n. 2), Cont. Litt. Petil., ii. n. 239 (in allusion to Ps. cxxxiii. 2), de Trin., xv. 26 (on Acts x. 38), of the anointing only. The Apostolic Constitutions mention both in

In the formula sent by Clement IY. to Palaeologus for the adoption of the Greeks, in view of union (in 1274), it is said of the Sacrament of Confirmation, ” which the Bishops confer through imposition of hands, chrisming the regenerate1.” The whole statement of faith was accepted in the letters sent to the second Council of Lyons, held in 1274m : — but the Greeks asked to use the creed and the rites which they had before the schism ; so that this is absolute evidence for the West only. The Synod of Mayence, in 1549, citing the Acts, states that ” the Catholic Church received from the Apostles the rule of giving the Holy Spirit to the faithful by the hands of the Bishops, and that this Sacrament was from the beginning given by the imposition of hands alone ; but that soon in the very time of the Apostles, by their tradition, it began to be conferred, with the use of unction.” The ground it assigns is, that the Holy Spirit first descended visibly; when this was withdrawn, “the anointing began to be employed to represent the internal spiritual unction n.”

A Confession of Faith published in 1662, by Nectarius

ii. 32, vii. 43, 44 ; unction only in iii. 16, vii. 22. St. Optatus (Sch. Don., iv. 7) alludes to both. Innocent I. (Ep. i. ad Decent. Eugub., n. 3) says that a Priest can seal only with oil consecrated by a Bishop. St. Leo (Serm. 24, [in Nat. Dom., iv.] c. 6) mentions Chrism only ; in regard to returning heretics, baptized out of the Church, imposition of hands only (Ep. clix. ad Nicet., c. 7), as being ” what was wanting there ;” (Ep. clxvi. ad Neon., n. 2) ” by imposition of hands, the power of the Holy Spirit invoked, which they could not receive from heretics.” (Ep. clxvii. Rust. Inq., 18.)

1 Baron., A. 1267, n. 77. m Cone. Lugd. ii., Lit.

Mich. Palatal, ad Greg. X. n Can. 17, 18.

of Jerusalem, says that Confirmation was originally given by imposition of hands, but now by unction.

The blow bestowed on the cheek of the newly-con firmed person, was a usage imported from chivalry. It is not mentioned before the tenth century.

II. The second inferior Sacrament mentioned in the Article is that of Penance. According to the ancient faith, for those who had fallen into deadly sin after Baptism, there was established a Sacrament to restore the soul to grace, which is variously called Penance, Confession, Absolution, Reconciliation, the second Bap tism, the Laborious Baptism, the second Repentance, the second raft after Shipwreck.

The inward grace, the forgiveness of sins, is promised in the most absolute terms by our Lord Himself, when He said to His Apostles, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost. Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them ; and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are re tamed.” This power was given in the Apostles to the Church, in the same way as the authority to baptize in the Name of the Holy Trinity, to preach the Gospel to all the world, to teach whatsoever Jesus had com manded, to celebrate the Holy Eucharist. All were primarily committed to the Apostles, to be transmitted by them to their successors. Since we continue to baptize, to teach, to celebrate the Holy Eucharist by virtue of a commission given to the Apostles pri marily, it would be in the last degree inconsistent to deny the Church’s power to absolve from sins in His Name.

There is absolutely no doubt that this mercy towards grievous sinners was exercised by the Church from the very first. The course of public penance, by which the soul was prepared for the grace of Christ in the Abso lution, is mentioned by St. Irenseus, who speaks of an adulteress, who ” having been converted, continued during the whole period [of her life] in a state of penitence” [_€%o^o\oyov/jievr), in exhomologesi, old Lat.], ” weeping and lamenting what she had undergone through the impostor0” Marcus the Gnostic, and of the women, who, having been led astray by him, had no courage to undertake the labours of penance P ; by Tertullian, who shews how, by the disposition of divine goodness, penance purifies the soul from all sins whatsoever, — how it is a plank which should bear those sunk beneath the waves of sin to the haven of Divine mercy, — and how sin must not be con cealed, but confessed sincerely <*; by Lactantius, who observes as a distinctive note of the Church Catholic the advantage she has in having confession and pe nance as the cure of sin and of the wounds of the soul r ; by Origen, who says the seventh means of ob taining the remission of sin, hard and laborious, is penance, when the sinner waters his couch with his tears, when his tears become his meat day and night, when he blushes not to discover his sin to the priest of the Lord, and seek a remedy for the ills of his

0 i. 13, n. 5. P Ib., n. 7. •» De Pan., ii., iv.,

ix., x. He asks : — ” Is it better to be damned in secret, than ab solved openly ?” r Instlt. JDiv., iv. 30.

soul8. The course of public penance was known by a technical Greek term, ” exomologesis.”

While the true dispenser of pardon is God in His Son Jesus Christ, our great High-Priest, the visible and earthly organ is the Christian Hierarchy ; but no absolution of theirs is valid, without a true repentance arising from the love of God, and a steady determina tion by His grace never to fall into deadly sin again. Furthermore, perfect contrition, in virtue of the ardor charitatisi which is its form, without the sacrament, effaces all sin ; yet no enlightened and instructed con science would venture into the presence of its Judge with any of those sins unconfessed and unabsolved, of which He saith : — ” They which do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of God u.”

8 In Lev. Horn. ii. n. 4.

1 Origen, in the same passage, in which he speaks of the remission of sins, according to the public penitential discipline of the Church, just quoted, sets, side by side with it, the remission, which is through abun dance of charity : — ” The sixth remission takes place through abundance of charity ; as the Lord Himself, too, says, ’ Verily, I say unto you, many sins are remitted to her, because she loved much ;’ and the Apostle sa} s, ’ For charity covereth a multitude of sins/ There is yet, too, a seventh, although hard and laborious, remission of sins through penance, when the sinner,” &c , (as above.) Origen then contrasts these modes of obtaining forgiveness with different sacrifices of the Mosaic law : — ” If that charity, which is greater than faith and hope, have abounded in thy heart, so that thou love thy neighbour, not only as th> self, but as He sheweth, Who said, ’ Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends ;’ know that thou hast offered bread, too, of fine flour, kneaded in the oil of charity, in the unleavened of sincerity and truth. But if in the bitterness of thy weeping thou art subdued by sorrow, tears, and lamentation, if thou have macerated thy flesh and dried it with fasting and much abstinence,” &c. (I. c., t. ii. p. 191.) u Ghil. v. 21.

Til. The rite whereby men were raised in the Church to the clerical state x, was early called ’ order/ the ’ lay ing on of hands/ ’ ordination/ the { sacrament of the pontiff/ the ’ priestly benediction/ the ’ Levitical bene diction/ Both the outward sign and the inward gift are named in Holy Scripture : — ” Stir up the gift of God, which is in thee, by the laying on of my hands V

From all antiquity the Church has firmly believed in a special and proper priesthood, having its un doubted title in the mission and authority it has re ceived from Jesus Christ, and has expressed this belief in its outward life and organization. It has never denied the universal priesthood of those who are the members of Jesus Christ, our great High-Priest, who have received the unction of the Spirit, and who should offer themselves ever a living sacrifice to God ; but this belief does not contradict the notion that our Lord has intrusted the ministry of the word and Sacra ments, not to all the faithful, but to certain delegated individuals. While in one sense acknowledging our Lord to be the One Priest, she has ever firmly held the existence of a proper Priesthood, having an un doubted title in the mission and authority received from Christ. “Bishops and presbyters are properly termed priests2.” That the right to administer the Sacraments is given to a corporation, and very strong language of a certain mediation between God and the people, is found through all the Fathers.

The Marcionites were the first to misconceive the universal priesthood of Christians. In the Middle ages the Cathafi and Flagellants denied the objective reality of the Christian Priesthood. “Wickliffe main tamed that a priest in mortal sin is thereby degraded from the priesthood, and loses the power of adminis tering the Sacraments; whence it would follow that, the inward state of priests being known only to Grod, the validity of their clerical acts would become radi cally doubtful and uncertain.

Luther, insisting on the universal priesthood of Christians, absolutely denied any grace of orders, yet, to avoid anarchy, he admitted, though inconsistently, the necessity of ordination ; yet by it he understood nothing else than an external delegation on the part of the Christian community, which can recall the power thus granted. Calvin allowed Ordination to be ” a cere mony, taken from Scripture, not empty or superflu ous, but a faithful symbol of spiritual grace.” He only did not class it with the other two, he says, ” because it is not ordinary nor common among all faithful, but a special rite to a certain function3.” But to him Sacraments were as outward things, as seals to a parchment, pictures visibly representing the promises of God b.

The Church has always recognised these orders in the dignity of the clerical state, — the Episcopate, the Priesthood, and the Diaconate.

St. Ignatius of Antioch is the earliest exponent of • Inst., pp. 19, 28. b Ibid., pp. 14, 15.

a fact to which the universal consent of tradition bears witness.

IY. If marriage, even according to the Roman laws, was estimated as the mutual enjoyment of right, both divine and human (jurium divinorum et humanorum consortium), one may imagine how much more highly it was regarded in the purer atmosphere of Chris tianity. First in the actual life of the members of Christ, and then in the scientific development of the idea, we find a perfect revolution in the relations which obtained between the sexes. The prevalence of the Manichsean heresy and of Gnosticism, both of which depreciated Matrimony, was under God the means whereby the doctrine concerning it became submitted to Christian analysis, and therefore we find, in those authors who confuted these heresies, a sci entific treatment of it. Especially is this the case in St. Augustine.

Matrimony, such as it exists under the Gospel, is the most mysterious expression of human love, shadow ing out Divine. St. Chrysostom remarks the mystery in this, as laid down in Paradise, how, towards one, heretofore a stranger and unknown, it surmounts the highest love of relationship of parent and child, and parents rejoice to be forsaken for it, as being the earthly contentment of human love. But the Gospel made it more. Through grace, the full, self- forgetful, self-surrender of each to the other in all things lawful, in unfelt, unconscious, because love- ensouled self-denial, makes it a human shadow of that

Divine self-emptying love of Christ for His Church, wherewith ” He gave Himself for it,” and of the Church’s fealty to its Lord and Head. The mysterious oneness of the married ” signified the mystical union between Christ and His Church.” St. Paul was speaking of Christian marriage when he said, ” this mystery,” or ” Sacrament, is great, but I say with reference to Christ and the Church,” i.e. the mystery of the conjugal union is great, in its bearing on the union between Christ and the Church. But marriage out of Christianity did not so picture that union, on account of the toleration (1.) of polygamy, (2.) of di vorce. In any case, it is of Christian marriage that he is speaking, since he is giving a rule for living in it according to the greatness of its mystery. He is writing to Christians about themselves and their own duties.

Christian marriage being, then, so high a mystery, the Church from the first joined it in with sacred grace-conferring rites. ” How can we find words,” says Tertullian c, ” to describe the happiness of that marriage, which the Church joineth together, and the oblation confirmeth, and the blessing sealeth, the an gels report, the Father ratifieth ! ” St. Siricius says d, ” that among the faithful it is a sort of sacrilege, if that blessing, which the priest places upon one about to marry, were violated by any transgression,” [viz., if one betrothed to one were to marry another].

c Ad Uxor., ii. 8, fin. See the beautiful sequel, pp. 430, 431, Oxf. Tr. d Epist. ad Rimer. Tarrac., n. 4.

St. Jerome e says that matrimony, so far from being dis approved by the Church, is on the contrary conferred by her. If Marius Victorinus, St. Zeno of Yerona, St. Chrysostom, St. Epiphanius, content themselves by recognising in general terms the profound and mys terious signification of marriage ; St. Augustine fre quently calls it in. the most express terms a Sacra ment^ even predicating of it an indelible character as in Baptism and Confirmation e.

In 1179 it was forbidden to receive fees for it, “as for other Sacraments V Yet several of the middle-age theologians do not express themselves very strongly on the subject. Abelard and Peter Lombard denied that Matrimony conveyed grace. Durandus, granting that the theologians of his age held it to be a Sacra ment properly so called, maintained that it was not so in a proper and rigorous sense, but only taken largely.

V. The unction of the sick is the lost pleiad of the Anglican firmament. One must at once confess and deplore that a distinctly Scriptural practice has ceased to be commanded in the Church of England. Excuses may be made of ” corrupt following of the Apostles,” in that it was used, contrary to the mind of St. James, when all hope of the restoration of bodily health was

e Adv. Jovin., 1. i.

[…]

e Adult. Conj., ii. 4 ; Nupt. et Concup., i. x. n. 4, xvii. n. 19 ; de bono Conj., c. vii. ; de Gen., 1. c.

b Later an., 1179. Can. \ii.

Hh

gone; but it cannot be denied that there has been practically lost an Apostolic practice, whereby, in case of grievous sickness, the faithful were anointed and prayed over, for the forgiveness of their sins, and to restore them, if God so willed, or to give them spiri tual support in their maladies. “Is any sick among you ? Let him call for the elders of the Church. And let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the Name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up, and if he have committed sins they shall be forgiven him *.”

On whatever ground, the earliest notice which occurs of the unction of the sick k, is in an Epistle of Innocent I., A.D. 416. For, although Origen quotes the text of St. James, he does so; exclusively in relation to the power of the keys, and the course of public penitence1, as Bellarmine acknowledges”1, in regard both to him and St. Chrysostom11, Yet, since the object of Inno cent was to inform Decentius as to the practice at Home, as being the only Apostolic Church in the West °, his answer conveys not his own judgment

1 St. James v. 14, 15.

k Baronius (H. E. 63, xvi.) separates off as altogether distinct from ” the Sacrament of unction,” the mention of miraculous cures by the use of oil, such as Tertullian mentions to have been used by Proculus (ad Scap., c. 4); or as Egyptian monks used to expel diseases (Sozom., vi. 20 and 29; Ruffin. H. E. ii. 4); and St. Martin, according to Severus (Vita S. Martini, n. 15); and St. Hilarion, as related by St. Jerome (vit. S. Hilarion.)

1 In Lev., Horn. ii. n. 4. m De Sacr.

u De Sac., iii. 6. ° Inn. I., ad Decent., Przuf. and Resp. viii.

only but a knowledge of that practice. The question of Decentius was, whether a Bishop might anoint the sick ; Innocent’s answer was, certainly he might, since according to St. James, presbyters might. But the answer brings out the facts, that the Chrism for that object was prepared by the Bishop, and that the laity might use it in any needs of themselves or their friends. Only those under penance, being in fact ex communicate, could not have it, being a Sacrament, since they were debarred from all Sacraments.

” There is no doubt that this [the passage of St. James] ought to be understood of the faithful, when sick, who can [possuni] be anointed with the holy oil of Chrism, which, being made by the Bishop, not the Priest only, but all Christians may use, by anoint ing, in their own or their friends’ necessities. But it was added needlessly, that it was doubted as to Bishops, in what, there is no doubt, is allowed to Presbyters. For it is therefore said [in St. James] of Presbyters, because the Bishops, being hindered by other occu pations, cannot go to all sick persons. But if a Bishop either can or thinks it meet to visit any one, he can unhesitatingly bless and touch with the Chrism, to whom it appertaineth to make the Chrism itself. For on penitents it cannot be poured, because it is a kind of Sacrament. For to whom the remaining Sacraments are denied, how can it be thought that one kind is allowed P?”

St. Csesarius, of Aries, exhorts persons in sickness to

P Kesp. viii.

have recourse to the remedies of the Church, not to charms : — ” As soon as any illness supervenes, let the sick person receive the Body and Blood of Christ, and then anoint his poor body, that that which is written may be fulfilled in him ; ’ If any is sick among you/ &c. See, brethren, that he who in sickness has recourse to the Church, will both receive health . of body and obtain forgiveness of sins. Since these two fold benefits can be found in the Church, why do hapless men strain to bring on themselves manifold evils through enchanters, or soothsayers, or diviners q?” The passage of Csesarius agrees with that of Innocent I. in presupposing that the sick man anointed himself.

In the Eastern Church, the early reference to the text relates (as we have seen) to “the power of the keys;” in Origen and St. Chrysostom no mention of, or allusion being made to the sick, much less to any anointing of them. The passage of Victor, of Antioch, was made to bear upon it, only through an inaccurate Latin translation. Victor himself, while explaining the meaning of St. Mark r, adduces the passage of St. James

i In App. S. Aug., t. v. Serm. 265, olim. S, Aug. de Temp., Serm. 215.

r On St. Mark vi. 13, Greek Catena, in S. Marc., p. 125, ed. Possini, Rom. 1673, p. 324, ed. Cram., Oxon. The whole passage is : — “Things like this, Luke, too, sets forth j but the * anointed with oil’ [Peltanus glosses * de mystica unctione et olei usu/] Mark alone said ; to whom James, too, said the like in the Catholic [Epistle] : ‘Is any sick among you, let him call to him the presbyters of the Church, and let them pray over him ; and the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up/ The oil then applied signified both the irercy from God, and the cure of the disease, and the enlightening of the heart.

as akin to it, but speaks of the anointing and the prayer accompanying it, as a thing of the past, so that the natural inference would rather be, that it was not used in Antioch in his time. He ascribes emphatically the whole effect to the prayer. St. Cyril, of Alex andria, also quotes the text barely, in the course of an abstract argument about heathen incantations a. If people thought that the titles of God would dispel their diseases, he bids them, praying for themselves, utter the words. ” Thou,” he says, ” wilt do better than they [the evil spirits], offering glory to God and not to the foul spirits. I will mention the Divinely-inspired Scripture too, which saith, ’ Is any sick among you let him call/ ” &c.

The meagreness of tradition is, however, replaced in some measure by the agreement of the Greeks, the Armenians, the Nestorians, and all the Orientals, with the Latins on this subject ; so that one cannot doubt that a sacramental use of anointing the sick has been from the beginning.

Our Abp. Theodore, A.D. 680, contrasts the customs of the Greeks and Latins, in that ” according to the

For it is manifest to every one, that the prayer effected the whole, but the oil, as I deem, was the symbol of these things.” [Pelt, para- . phrased, ” But it may be said that prayer effected all these things, but that the oil is only an outward symbol of all those things which take place. ”]

s De Adorat., 1. vi. t. i. p. 211, Aub. Palladium, the other speaker in St. Cyril’s Dialogue, being satisfied on this subject of augury, St. Cyril goes on to speak of false-swearing. Anastasius Sinaita, qu. 23, on the power of evil spirits to produce miraculous effects, extracts this with other passages.

Greeks a Presbyter may make the Chrism for the sick, if need be ; according to the Romans, it is not allowed, save to the Bishop only *.” Ecgbert, Abp. of York, A.D. 732, in his extract de jure sacerdotali, has the rule, “That according to the enactment of the holy fathers, if any is sick, he be diligently anointed with sanctified oil together with prayers u.” Among the canons enacted under King Edgar, it is enjoined, that ” every Priest give unction to the sick, if they desire it” and “have both baptismal oil and unction for the sick x,” and an enactment occurs, as to his re port of himself, ” when he fetches Chrism,” i.e. from the Episcopal city. The unction of the sick ” if the sick layman desire it,” is enjoined in the canons of .ZElfricy; and a separate portion of the consecrated Chrism is directed to be kept for that use z. It ap pears from the ritual, alike of the Western a and

a ” O Lord God, Who hast said by Thy Apostle James, ’ Is any sick among you ? let him call the presbyters of the Church, and let them pray over him in the Name of the Lord; and the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall a’leviate him ; and if he be in sins, they shall be remitted to him ;’ Cure, we beseech Thee, our Redeemer, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, the languors of this sick person, and heal his wounds, and forgive his sins, and expel from him all dolours of mind and body, and mercifully restore full health within and without, that, restored by the hrlp of Thy mercy, he may be repaired for his former duties; […] Ho y Lord, Almighty Father, Everlasting God, Who, pouring the grace of Thy ble-sing into sick bodies, with manifold love guard* st Thy creature, be present, of Thy goodness, at the

Eastern b Church, that restoration to bodily health was, and is still, according to the belief of the Church, a primary object of the anointing. Mabillon c traces the change to the popular superstition about the be ginning of the thirteenth century.

” Of old,” he says, ” it was used before the via ticum,” [and probably some time before, whence it would follow, that, since it was used once only in the same illness, it would not be used at the last] . Hence he explains the fact, that there is no mention of unc tion in the life of St. Gertrude (died A.D. 678), of St. Eustasius (died about A.D. 625), of St. Bicharius (died about 645), although there is mention of their receiving the viaticum. The anointing with the holy oil before the viaticum is mentioned in Sugerius’ life of Louis VI., as to his Queen St. Chrotildis, and in the contem porary but anonymous life of St. Hernigundis (died about A.D. 660).

Mabillon says, moreover, that it came to be called ” extreme unction” [probably, originally, the last of the

Invocation of Thy Name, and, freeing Thy servant from sickness and granting him health, raise him up with Thy right hand, strengthen him with might, protect him with power, and, with the longed-for prosperity, restore him to Thy Holy Church, […] Rituale Rom. Paul V. jussu, edit. Antw. 1669.

b ” Holy Father, healer of souls and bodies, Who didsfc send Thine Only-Begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, healing every disease and redeeming from death, heal this Thy servant also of the sickness of soul and body which encompasses him, and quicken him through the grace of Thy Christ;— for Thou art the Fountain of healings, O Christ our God, and to Thee we send up the glory, to the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” — Euchologion, p. 417. Paris, 1647.

e Prof, ad torn. i. Actt. S. Ordinis Benedict.

unctions used in the rites of the Church during the Christian’s life], ” not before the close of the 12th cen tury.” For that “the name ‘extreme unction’ does not occur in the Sacramentaries published by Menard ; nor in Uldaric, in the Consuetudines Cluniacemes ; nor in Lanfranc, Anselm, Peter Damiani, Peter de Honestis, in the regula Clericorum ; nor in St. Bernard or P. Lombard.” Yet that ” it was called ‘extreme unction/ before it was placed after the viaticum, as appears from the contemporary life of William, Abp. of Bourges, died A.D. 1209, in Bollandus, Jan. 10.” ” This custom,” he says, ” continues intact till now only among the Cistercian monks, and perhaps certain Churches.”

The first appearance of the superstition cited by Mabillon, occurs in Constitutions of Richard, Bishop of Salisbury, about A.D. 1227 : — ” Let the Priest, more over, say and announce confidently, that after the use of this Sacrament, it is lawful to return to the use of Marriage.”

It occurs, however, two centuries before in .^Elfric’s Pastoral Epistle, from which it appears, that some, as a religious act, vowed, in case of recovery, to abstain from the use of marriage ; others, who had not vowed, held themselves to be so bound, looking upon it as a sort of ordination. .ZElfric had to say that those who had not vowed were free in these things, and that unction might be repeated, if any should again fall sick d. From the Canons of JElf ric, it appears that

d “If the sick layman desires to receive unction, let him then con fess him and forgive every grudge before the unction; and if he recovers and after the unction become sick, he may, unless he have

some so dreaded the anointing, that they would not consent to receive it. Confession of sin to the Priest was required before the unction could be used e. The superstition was condemned by the sixth statute of the Synod of Exeter, A.D. 1287. There it was found neces sary to enjoin, that it should be publicly declared through the parochial presbyters f, that that Sacra ment, as also some others, may be repeated as often as there is need. And thus, because some unskilled laity, thinking unwisely concerning this Sacrament, so ab hor it, and refuse to receive it even in extremis, fool ishly thinking that after its reception, the eating of flesh, walking barefoot, and even tokens of love from one’s lawful wife, are entirely forbidden g ; the Synod speaks of it as a heresy. This enactment is itself repeated almost verbatim in the Synodal Constitutions

vowed the contrary, enjoy the society of women, and flesh, if he himself will. In the unction there is healing and forgiveness of sins, and it is no ordination as some men imagine. And if the man be again sick, let him again receive unction, when it be needful.” (^Elfric. Past. Ep., n. 47, 48. Thorpe, ii. 385.)

e ” The priest shall have allowed oil apart for children, and apart for sick men, and always anoint the sick in bed. Some sick men are fearful, so that they will not consent to be anointed in their illness. Now we will tell you how James, the Apostle of God, taught hereon : — ’ If any among you be sick, let him pray with one mind and praise his Lord !’ ’ If any one among you be sick, let him order to be fetched to him the mass-priests of the Church, and let them sing over him, and pray for him/ &c. Thus spake James the Apostle concerning the unction for sick men ; but the sick must confess with inward groan ing to the priest, whether he has any crimes unatoned for, before he anoints him, as the Apostle lias before enjoined; and no man may anoint him before he pray for this, and do his confession.”

f Wilkins, Cone , ii. 295.

e Ibid., torn. ii. p. 135 ; sec Statuta Scotice, torn. ii. 278.

474 A11T1CLE XXV.

of H. Wodlake, Bishop of Winchester, about A.D. 130Sh. But the popular dread of the Sacrament prevailed ; and Mabillon thinks it probable, that ” on account of such phrenzies, the anointing of the sick began to be reserved for the point of death, and that that cus tom was gradually extended to all Churches.”

But abusus non tollit usum. The Church of England acted more in conformity to its declared adherence to antiquity, by appointing, in the first instance, a service for the anointing of the sick in her first English Prayer-book. This was among the losses in those unhappy times just before the accession of Mary, and although everything of that earlier liturgy was praised by those who removed it, it has never been restored. Since, however, the Visitation of the Sick is a private office, and uniformity is required only in the public offices, there is nothing to hinder the revival of the Apostolic and Scriptural custom of anointing the sick, whensoever any devout person may desire it. It is, indeed, difficult to say on what principle it could be refused. The rite was restored by the nonjuring Bishops. Meanwhile, until it can be generally re stored, it may be observed, that it was never considered necessary to salvation, as is formally laid down by St. Thomas *. It was rather a privilege of the devout.

[…]

Notes

• . The first point impressed upon us is, the sense of Sacraments being witnesses of grace, or, in stricter theological language, signifying grace. They are types of that holiness and righteousness which they convey. There is a celebrated passage in St. Augustine, where he says that ” Sacraments are called the things which they signify, from a certain similarity and likeness a.” Thus they are the pledges of the divine will in regard to man, and sureties of the truth of God’s promises. As God, under the Mosaic dispensation, employed out- » S. Aug., torn. ii. p. 203 f., Ep. 98, 9.
• Inst. iv. n. i. h Ibid., n. 22. ’ Ibid., n. 19.
• St. Hilary, in 8. Matt., c. v. n. 1.
• ” Sacramentum esuritionis.” — St. Hilary, in S. Matt., c. xii. n. 2. r St. Hi!., ibid., c. xxiii. n. 4.
• On Is. xxv. 6, t. ii. p. 353, Aub.
• ” Ordo Sacerdotalis.”— Tertullian, Exhort, cast., 7, p. 778, Rig. y 2 Tim. i. 6. z St. Aug., Civ. Dei, xx. 10.
• Cap. Theod. in Thorpe, Ang.-Sax. Laws, ii. 63. u Excerpt. Ecgb., n. 21. Ibid., ii. 100.
• Can. 65, 66, 67. Ibid., ii. 259. 7 Can. 47. Ibid., 385.
• JElfr., Ep., Ibid., 391.