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Of the five leading reformers above mentioned, Luther being the first to throw off the dominion, so seems to have remained the nearest to the superstition the superstition of the Romish church. He maintained that the body and blood of Christ were materially and visibly present in the consecrated elements of the Eucharist. He did not assert that any transubstantiation took place in consequence of the consecration of the priest, but that the natural presence of Christ was joined, and connected with that of the bread and wine. This opinion was usually understood under the word consubstantiation,* was strictly main

*This doctrine of consubstantiation was by no means originated by Luther. We read of it in the first and second book of Guitmund, who flourished in the eleventh century. Hospinian gives the following account of its origin: "After the condemnation of the doctrines of Berenger, when it was not safe any longer, on account of the cruel tyranny of the Roman priests, openly to adhere to them, while many were not able altogether to disapprove and reject them, as agreeing with the word of God and the primitive church, yet they did not like openly to maintain them; so they found out a midway between the two, and taught that the true bread and wine after consecration remained with the body and blood of the Lord." Guitmund expressly calls this Impanation. See Hospin. Hist. Sacr., second part, p. 6. fol.

There was also another branch of this doctrine still more anomalous. "There were some who asserted that the bread was partly changed into the body, and partly remained as it was. They wished that that part of the bread which was to

tained by Luther himself until the day of his death; and the Lutheran church, following in his doctrine, upheld it by their doctors and public confessions.*

Zuingle, the head of distinctly of opinion

On the other hand, the Swiss church, was that the bread and wine were nothing more than signs and symbols of the absent body and blood of Christ. As early as the year 1524, if not earlier, he asserted publicly, and taught this doctrine; and it may be justly denominated the leading cause of the division between the Lutheran and reformed churches. It was in consequence of this, that when the Protestants gave in their public confession at Augsburg, there arose, in contradiction, the Tetrapolitan confession, i. e. the confession of four great towns, Strasburg, Constance, Memmingen, and Lindau, which adhered to the opinions of Zuingle, in distinction from Luther, on the presence of Christ in the Eucharist.

The third of the reformers, Melancthon, who was the successor of Luther in the government of his church, was his successor also in opinion; though, it must be confessed, in some degree

be received by the good, should be changed by consecration into the body, but that that part which was to be received by the wicked should not be changed."-Hosp. Hist. Sacr. lib. iv. Perceiving the absurdity in this case, they blindly fell into a greater absurdity, rather than discard the doctrine altogether. * See Hist. Conf. Augsb. by David Cheytrus.

modified.

The character of Melancthon was that of excessive mildness and charity, desirous of union and concord; and if it had been in his day possible to join all the Protestant churches under one rule of faith, by mutually conceding points of disputed tendency, and widening the enclosures of God's fold, his was undoubtedly the character to have achieved so great an object. He did, however, differ in some degree from his predecessor Luther, for we find in many extracts of his letters, which are collected by Hospinian,* that he looked upon the doctrine of consubstantiation as untrue, and even bearing the semblance of idolatry. But the mildness of his character was such that he did not consider it a matter of so great moment as to run the risk of sowing further dissensions among his Protestant brethren; and, indeed, had he at all proceeded to enforce his individual opinion, so jealously attached were the principal directors of the church to every doctrine of their founder, that he would only have incurred their enmity without advancing his own opinions. Even as it was, by his lenity and charitable indifference to many of those points which the Lutherans held dear, he incurred much odium, and many of his doctrines were censured and opposed by both parties.

*Hospinian, Hist. Soc. vol. ii.

Next we come to Carlostadt. He at first was the friend and colleague of Luther, but soon separated from him on the same question of the Eucharist, agreeing entirely with the opinion of Zuingle that the bread and wine were to be understood as the mere signs and symbols of Christ's presence; that the whole of the Sacrament was a commemoration of Christ's death, and not a celebration of his bodily presence. In consequence of this opinion, he was banished from the territories of the Elector of Saxony, and was separated from Luther. He retired to Switzerland, where he found the general opinion of men more consonant with his own. Sometime afterwards a reconciliation took place between the two reformers, but no alteration of opinion. Carlostadt remained throughout his life constant in denying the bodily presence of Christ, and the doctrine of consubstantiation.

Lastly, we come to Calvin. He differed in some respects both from Luther and from Zuingle, but if anything, according to the account of Mosheim, he seemed rather inclined to the opinions of Luther. "He acknowledged a real, though though spiritual, presence of Christ; or, in other words, that true Christians who approached the holy ordiunited in a with lively faith were

nance

certain manner to the man Christ, and that

from this union the spiritual life derived new vigour in the soul, and was carried on, in a progressive motion, to a greater degree of purity and perfection," thus going higher than Zuingle and Carlostadt, but not ascending so high as Luther-denying the consubstantiation, or bodily presence, of Luther, but maintaining something more than the mere symbol of Zuingle.*

This point of difference was long a subject of discussion even in those churches where Zuingle's authority prevailed; but at last, by

* It would seem that the doctrine of our church approaches more nearly to Calvin than any other of the Continental reformers above-mentioned. We certainly hold nothing like consubstantiation, but we as certainly do maintain some thing very nearly allied to that presence of Christ which Calvin denotes. Witness our catechism: "What is the inward part or thing signified? The body and blood of Christ, which are verily and indeed taken and received by the faithful." There is, therefore, the presence of Christ, but, it would seem, that the presence depends, and the reception verily and indeed depends, not on the consecrating words of the priest who gives, but on the faith of him who receives. -See the note on p. 62.

Johnson, in his treatise entitled "The Unbloody Sacrifice," draws a close distinction between the opinions of Calvin and Luther, and says, "The church of England does not declare for any particular modus; she says: 'verily and indeed,' but not 'how.' "The bread and wine are the very body and blood, though not in substance, yet in spirit, power, and effect." See Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, and Altar Unveiled, c. ii. s. 1.

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