wine, and afterwards believed to be changed into the real body and blood, soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ, by virtue of the words of consecration, as really and substantially as he was born of the virgin, died on the cross, and is reigning at his Father's right hand in heaven! In this belief he is offered in the Mass for the sins of the people, and afterwards eaten by the priest! Some of this kind of bread, but no wine, is given to the communicants, under the idea of being the God who created and redeemed them! And in order to confirm this, when the priest administers it to the people, he says, "Ecce Agnus Dei qui tollit peccatum mundi;"* and then tells them that it is the real and substantial body and blood, soul and divinity, of Jesus Christ! Here are ignorance, idolatry, and the most infatuated delusion, as palpable as are represented by the Prophet in the xliv. chap. of Isaiah, respecting a man cutting down a tree, making a fire of one part of it to warm himself and cook his victuals, and of the other part making a god and falling down to worship it. For we find the priest and his people worship a god of bread and wine made of the same materials as those which so often constitute part of their richest banquets; and they are not content with worshipping him only, but also eat him! And this god they tell us is perfect and indivisible, and yet he is offered and eaten in hundreds of places at one and the same time! But if this be the real Christ who is offered so

*Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world.

often, the priests who offer him differ very much from the declaration of St. Paul, who speaks of Christ having been once offered to bear the sins of many, and shews that he would not imitate the high-priest, whose offering prefigured him; for, says he, Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us: nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high-priest entereth into the holy place every year with the blood of others; for then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world; but NOW ONCE, in the end of the world, hath he appeared, to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." Heb. ix, 24, 25, 26.

But the Romish priests, it appears, are not content with this one offering; for they pretend to make a God of bread and wine, and offer and eat him as often as they please! the nature of which they call the sacrament of transubstantiation, and tell us that it was instituted by Christ himself, which they attempt to prove from the vi. chap. of the Gospel by St. John, where they take our Lord's meaning of the following words to be according to their literal sense: Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you." Now, if we are to understand the words of Christ here literally, we must think that at his last supper, when this sacrament was instituted, he ate himself, and at the same time gave himself to be eaten by his disciples; for they all partook of the same bread

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and wine together. And if this is the manner in which we are to understand Christ when he speaks to us in figurative language, then we must believe that Herod was a real fox, and lived in a den in the earth; Christ a door made of boards, and at the same time a highway made of stones and gravel; also, a solid rock, a vine, and all his disciples branches growing out of him; and his Father a real man dressing this vine. To understand all or any part of this literally, would be worse than idiotism, and an abomination. And yet it is as reasonable as the doctrine of transubstantiation. The bread and wine which our Lord blessed and shared with his disciples, were not flesh and blood, but the figures or representations of them; for Christ had not then suffered : therefore they could not have been his flesh and blood, but bread and wine, according to his own words; for although he called the bread his body figuratively, and the wine his blood, or representation of it; yet, after they had received both, he said to his disciples,-"I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom." Matt. xxvi, 29.

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But the passage, 'Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you,"-is figurative language, and the meaning is this: as our natural food is the support of our bodies, so Christ must be the spiritual life of our souls; otherwise we can have no life in us. As our souls must have died eternally without the virtue of Christ's atonement; so, by sincere

repentance, and a lively faith in God, through the merits of his sufferings and death, we have spiritual life through him, these blessings having been purchased for us by the breaking of his body and spilling of his blood on the cross, of which the bread and wine were only figures. He is the bread or supporting means of eternal life, that came not up out of the earth, "but down from heaven." Hence it is evident that our Lord's meaning is spiritual and not literal, as appears also from his reply to his disciples who murmured at his discourse, and said, it was a hard saying, who could bear it? He answered them,It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life." John vi, 60-63. The words which he then spoke related to man's redemption and salvation, by the sacrifice of himself; and in the commemoration of which we are to receive the pledges of his love in the holy sacrament, as he has said, "Do this in remembrance of me." Luke xxii, 19. And St. Paul says, "As often as ye eat this bread," (not flesh,) "and drink this cup," (not blood,) "ye do shew the Lord's death till he come." 1 Cor. xi, 26.

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From these remarks, so strongly confirmed by our Lord's own words, it is palpable that the doctrine of transubstantiation is both irrational and antiscriptural. Oh! was ever God more dishonoured, and man more degraded, even by the most rigid cast of Indians, than by those who believe the doctrine of transubstantiation! and yet a man under the light of revelation must be deemed

a heretic, and persecuted as a traitor, for leaving so dangerous a doctrine. May God hasten the happy era, when pagan and papal darkness shall hide its gloomy face beneath the refulgent glory of Gospel light!

Of the improper and evil use of an unknown tongue in the public worship of God.

ANOTHER evil attending the Mass, is the mysterious language, to many, in which it is celebrated; for there are select portions of scripture read in the course of the service, generally taken from the Gospels, Epistles, and the Psalms; and these, which are all the good that attends it, are kept from the principal part of the congregation. Now, as in this part of the world Latin is not generally understood, very few can receive any instruction from a Latin Mass; therefore, the priests may be said to give no instruction in this service, but rather

"Sullen like lamps in sepulchres they shine, and "Enlighten but themselves." BLAIR.

Whilst the poor deluded people, content to be kept in the dark, think there is a virtue in the sacrifice and holy water from which they receive much benefit. But where can the priest find authority to justify such conduct as this? If there is any thing in the Mass which he does not wish people to know, why should they be censured for not attending it? If it is for their instruction, why not express it in a language in which it can be generally understood? The general answer to