changeable discipline, or each of the three principal denominations of Protestants has contradicted itself. I should be glad to know which part of the alternative his Lordship may choose.

I am, &c.

J. M.

LETTER XL.

To JAMES BROWN, Esq.

ON THE SACRIFICE OF THE NEW LAW.

DEAR SIR,

THE Bishop of London leads me next to the consideration of the Sacrifice of the New Law, commonly called THE MASS, on which, however, he is brief, and evidently embarrassed. As I have already touched upon this subject, in treating of the means of sanctification in the Catholic Church, I shall be as brief upon it here as I possibly can.

A sacrifice is an offering up, and immolation of, a living animal, or other sensible thing, to God, in testimony that he is the master of life and death, the Lord of us and all things. It is evidently a more expressive act of the creature's homage to his creator, as well as one more impressive on the mind of the creature itself, than mere prayer is; and, therefore, it was revealed by God to the Patriarchs, at the beginning of the world, and afterwards more strictly enjoined by him to his chosen people, in the revelation of his written law to Moses, as the most acceptable and efficacious worship, that could be offered up to his Divine Majesty. The tradition of this primitive ordinance, and the notion of its advantageousness, have been so

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universal, that it has been practised, in one form or other, in every age, from the time of our first parents down to the present, and by every people, whether civilized or barbarous, except modern Protestants. For when the nations of the earth changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of corruptible man, and of birds and four-footed beasts, Rom. i. 23, they continued the right of sacrifice, and transferred it to those unworthy objects of their idolatry. From the whole of this, I infer, that it would have been truly surprising, if under the most perfect dispensation of God's benefits to men, the New Law, he had left them destitute of sacrifice. But he has not so left them; on the contrary, that prophecy of Malachy is evidently verified in the Catholic Church, spread as it is over the surface of the earth: From the rising of the sun, even to the going down thereof, my name is great among the Gentiles; and in every place, there is SACRIFICE; and there is offered to my name a clean oblation. Malac. i. 11. If Protestants say: we have the sacrifice of Christ's death; I answer, so had the servants of God, under the law of nature, and the written law; for it is impossible that with the blood of oxen and goats sin should be taken away. Nevertheless, they had perpetual sacrifices of animals to represent the death of Christ, and to apply the fruits of it to their souls. In the same manner Catholics have Christ himself really present, and mystically offered on their altars daily, for the same ends, but in a far more efficacious manner, and, of course, a true propitiatory sacrifice. That Christ is truly present in the blessed Eucharist, I have proved by many arguments; that a mystical immolation of

him takes place in the Holy Mass, by the separate consecration of the bread and of the wine, which strikingly represents the separation of his blood from his body, I have likewise shewn. Finally, I have shewn you, that the officiating Priest performs these mysteries by command of Christ, and in memory of what he did at the last supper, and what he endured on Mount Calvary: DO THIS IN MEMORY OF ME. Nothing then is wanting in the Holy Mass, to constitute it the true and propitiatory sacrifice of the New Law; a sacrifice which as much surpasses, in dignity and efficacy, the sacrifices of the Old Law, as the Chief Priest and victim of it, the incarnate Son of God, surpasses, in these respects, the sons of Aaron, and the animals which they sacrificed. No wonder then that, as the Fathers of the Church have, from the earliest times, born testimony to the reality of this sacrifice, (1) so they should speak, in such lofty terms, of its awfulness and efficacy: no wonder that the Church of God should retain and revere it, as the most sacred, and the very essential

(1) St. Justin, who appears to have been, in his youth, contemporary with St. John the Evangelist, says, "Christ instituted a Sacrifice in bread and wine, which Christians offer up in every place," quoting Malachy i. 19. Dialog. cum Cryphon. St. Irænus, whose master, Polycarp, was a disciple of that Evangelist, says, that "Christ, in consecrating bread and wine, has instituted the Sacrifice of the New Law, which the Church received from the Apostles, according to the prophecy of Malachy." L. iv. 32. St. Cyprian calls, the Eucharist, "A true and full Sacrifice;" and says, that "as Melchisedech offered bread and wine, so Christ offered the same, namely, his body and blood." Epist. 63. St. Chrysostom, St. Augus tin, St. Ambrose, &c, are equally clear and expressive, on this point. The last mentioned calls this sacrifice by the name of Missa, so do St. Leo, St. Gregory, our Ven. Bede, &c.

part of her sacred liturgy :-and I will add, no wonder that Satan should have persuaded Martin Luther to attempt to abrogate this worship, as that which, is most of all, offensive to him. (1)

The main arguments of the Bishops of London and Lincoln, and of Dr. Hey, with other Protestant controvertists, against the sacrifice of the New Law, are drawn from St. Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews; where, comparing the sacrifice of our Saviour with the sacrifice of the Mosaic Law, the Apostle says: that Christ being come a High 'Priest of the good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, 'that is, not of this creation: neither by the blood of goats, or of calves, but by his own blood, entered once into the holies, having obtained eternal redemption.' Heb. ix. 11, 12. Nor yet that 'he should offer himself often, as the High Priest 'entereth into the Holies every year.' v. 25. Again,' St. Paul says: Every Priest standeth indeed, 'daily ministering, and often offering the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins: but this man offering one sacrifice for sins, sitteth at 'the right hand of God.' Chap. x. 11, 12. Such are the texts, at full length, which modern Protestants urge so confidently against the sacrifice of the New Law; but in which neither the ancient Fathers, nor any other description of Christians, but themselves, can see any argument against it.

(1) Luther, in his Book de Unct. et Miss. Priv. tom. vii. fol. 228, gives an account of the motive which induced him to sup press the sacrifice of the Mass among his followers. He says that the Devil appeared to him at midnight, and, in a long conference with him, the whole of which he relates, convinced him that the worship of the Mass is idolatry. See Letters to a Prebendary. Let. v.

In fact, if these passages be read in their context, it will appear that the Apostle is barely proving to the Hebrews, (whose lofty ideas and strong tenaciousness of their ancient rites appear from different parts of the Acts of the Apostles,) how infinitely superior the sacrifice of Christ is to those of the Mosaic Law; particularly from the circumstance, which he repeats, in different forms, namely, that there was a necessity of their sacrifices being often repeated, which, after all, could not, of themselves, and independently of the one they prefigured, take away sin; whereas the latter, namely Christ's death on the Cross, obliterated at once the sins of those who availed themselves of it. Such is the argument of St. Paul to the Jews, respecting their sacrifices, which in no sort militates against the Sacrifice of the Mass; this being the same sacrifice with that of the cross, as to the victim that is offered, and as to the Priest who offers it, differing in nothing but the manner of offering; (1) in the one there being a real, and in the other a mystical, effusion of the victim's blood. (2) So far from invalidating the Catholic doctrine on this point, the Apostle confirms it in this very Epistle; where, quoting and repeating the sublime Psalm of the Royal Prophet concerning the Messiah; Thou art a Priest for ever ACCORDING TO THE ORDER OF MELCHISEDECH, Ps. 109, alias 110: he enlarges on the dignity of this Sacerdotal Patriarch, to whom Aaron himself, the High Priest of the Old Law, paid tribute, as to his superior, through his ancestor Abraham Heb. v.-vii. Now in what did this Order of Melchisedech consist? In what, I (1) Concil. Trid. Sess. xxii cap. 2. (2) Cat. ad. Paroc. P. ii. p. 81.