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the real body and blood of Christ Jesus-became a tenet of the Christian faith. This greatest of mysteries was developed gradually. As early as the second century, however, the seeds were planted, when we find Ignatius, Justin Martyr, and Irenæus advancing the opinion, that the mere bread and wine became, in the Eucharist, something higher-the earthly, something heavenlywithout, however, ceasing to be bread and wine. Though these views were opposed by some eminent individual Christian teachers, yet both among the people and in the ritual of the Church, the miraculous or supernatural view of the Lord's Supper gained ground. After the third century the office of presenting the bread and wine came to be confined to the ministers or priests. This practice arose from, and in turn strengthened, the notion which was gaining ground, that in this act of presentation by the priest, a sacrifice, similar to that once offered up in the death of Christ Jesus, though bloodless, was ever anew presented to God. This still deepened the feeling of mysterious significance and importance with which the rite of the Lord's Supper was viewed, and led to that gradually increasing splendor of celebration which took the form of the Mass. As in Christ Jesus two distinct natures, the divine and the human, were wonderfully combined, so in the Eucharist there was a corresponding union of the earthly and the heavenly.

For a long time there was no formal declaration of the mind of the Church on the real presence of Christ Jesus in the Eucharist. At length a discussion on the point was raised, and the most distinguished men of the time took part in it. One party maintained that "the bread and wine are, in the act of consecration, transformed by the omnipotence of God into the very body of Christ which was once born of Mary, nailed to the cross, and raised from the dead." According to this conception, nothing remains of the bread and wine but the outward form, the taste and the smell; while the other party would only allow that there is some change in the bread and wine themselves, but granted that an actual transformation of their power and efficacy takes place.

The greater accordance of the first view with the credulity of the age, its love for the wonderful and magical, the interest of the priesthood to add lustre, in accordance with the heathens, to a rite which enhanced their own office, resulted in the doctrine of Transubstantiation being declared an article of faith of the Christian Church.

Transubstantiation, the invisible change of the bread and wine

into the body and blood of Christ, is a tenet that may defy the powers of argument and pleasantry; but instead of consulting the evidence of their senses, of their sight, their feeling, and their taste, the first Protestants were entangled in their own scruples, and awed by the reputed words of Jesus in the institution of the sacrament. Luther maintained a corporeal, and Calvin a real presence of Christ in the Eucharist; and the opinion of Zuinglius, that it is no more than a spiritual communion, a simple memorial, has slowly prevailed in the reformed churches.'

Under Edward VI. the reformation was more bold and perfect, but in the fundamental articles of the Church of England, a strong and explicit declaration against the real presence was obliterated in the original copy, to please the people, or the Lutherans, or Queen Elizabeth. At the present day, the Greek and Roman Catholics alone hold to the original doctrine of the real presence.

Of all the religious observances among heathens, Jews, or Turks, none has been the cause of more hatred, persecution, outrage, and bloodshed, than the Eucharist. Christians persecuted one another like relentless foes, and thousands of Jews were slaughtered on ac count of the Eucharist and the Host.

See Gibbon's Rome. vol. v. pp. 399, 400. Calvin, after quoting Matt. xxvi. 26, 27, says: There is no doubt that as soon as these words are added to the bread and the wine, the bread and the wine become the true body and the true blood of Christ, so that the substance of bread and wine is transmuted into the true body and blood of Christ. He who denies this calls the omnipotence of Christ in question,

and charges Christ himself with foolishness." (Calvin's Tracts, p. 214. Translated by Henry Beveridge, Edinburgh, 1851.) In other parts of his writings, Calvin seems to contradict this statement, and speaks of the bread and wine in the Eucharist as being symbolical. Gibbon evidently refers to the passage quoted above.

CHAPTER XXXI.

BAPTISM.

BAPTISM, or purification from sin by water, is supposed by many to be an exclusive Christian ceremony. The idea is that circumcision was given up, but baptism took its place as a compulsory form indispensable to salvation, and was declared to have been instituted by Jesus himself or by his predecessor John.' That Jesus was baptized by John may be true, or it may not, but that he never directly enjoined his followers to call the heathen to a share in the privileges of the Golden Age is gospel doctrine; and this say ing:

"Go out into all the world to preach the gospel to every creature. And whoever believes and is baptized shall be saved, but whoever believes not shall be damned,"

must therefore be of comparatively late origin, dating from a period at which the mission to the heathen was not only fully recog nized, but even declared to have originated with the followers of Jesus. When the early Christians received members among them they were not initiated by baptism, but with prayer and laying on of hands. This, says Eusebius, was the "aneient custom," which was followed until the time of Stephen. During his bishopric controversies arose as to whether members should be received "after the ancient Christian custom" or by baptism,' after the heathen custom. Rev. J. P. Lundy, who has made ancient religions a special study, and who, being a thorough Christian writer, endeavors to get over the difficulty by saying that:

"John the Baptist simply adopted and practiced the universal custom of sacred bathing for the remission of sins. Christ sanctioned it; the church inherited it from his example."5

1 The Rev. Dr. Geikie makes the assertion that: "With the call to repent, John united a significant rite for all who were willing to own their sins, and promise amendment of life. It was the new and striking requirement of baptism, which John had been sent by divine appointment to INTRODUCE." (Life of Christ, vol.

i. p. 394.)

2 See Galatians, i1. 7-9. Acts, x. and xi.
See The Bible for Learners, vol. iii. pp. 68
and 472.

See Eusebius: Eccl. Hist., lib. 7, ch. ii.
Monumental Christianity, p. 385.

When we say that baptism is a heathen rite adopted by the Christians, we come near the truth. Mr. Lundy is a strong advocate of the type theory-of which we shall speak anon-therefore the above mode of reasoning is not to be wondered at.

The facts in the case are that baptism by immersion, or sprinkling in infancy, for the remission of sin, was a common rite, to be found in countries the most widely separated on the face of the earth, and the most unconnected in religious genealogy.'

If we turn to India we shall find that in the vast domain of the Buddhist faith the birth of children is regularly the occasion of a ceremony, at which the priest is present. In Mongolia and Thibet this ceremony assumes the special form of baptism. Candles burn and incense is offered on the domestic altar, the priest reads the prescribed prayers, dips the child three times in water, and imposes on it a name."

Brahmanism, from the very earliest times, had its initiatory rites, similar to what we shall find among the ancient Persians, Egyptians, Greeks and Romans. Mr. Mackenzie, in his "Royal Masonic Cyclopædia," (sub voce " Mysteries of Hindustan,") gives a capital digest of these mysteries from the "Indische AlterthumSkunde" of Lassen. After an invocation to the SUN, an oath was demanded of the aspirant, to the effect of implicit obedience to superiors, purity of body, and inviolable secrecy. Water was then sprinkled over him, suitable addresses were made to him, &c. This was supposed to constitute the regeneration of the candidate, and he was now invested with the white robe and the tiara. A peculiar cross was marked on his forehead, and the Tau cross on his breast. Finally, he was given the sacred word, A. U. M.3

The Brahmans had also a mode of baptism similar to the Christian sect of Baptists, the ceremony being performed in a river.

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was the agent by means of which everything was regenerated or born again. Hence, in all nations, we find the Dove, or Divine Love, operating by means of its agent, water, and all nations using the ceremony of plunging, or, as we call it, baptizing, for the remission of sins, to introduce the candidate to a regeneration, to a new birth unto righteousness." (Higgins: Anacalypsis, vol. i. p. 529.)

"Baptism is a very ancient rite pertaining to heathen religions, whether of Asia, Africa, Europe or America." (Bonwick: Egyptian Belief, p. 416.)

"Baptism, or purification by water, was a

ceremony common to all religions of antiquity. It consists in being made clean from some supposed pollution or defilement." (Bell's Pantheon, vol. ii. p. 201.)

"L'usage de ce Baptême par immersion, qui subsista dans l'Occident jusqu' an 8e ciècle, se maintient encore dans l'Eglise Greque: c'est celui que Jean le Précurseur administra, dans le Jourdain, à Jesus Christ même. Il fut pratiqué chez les Juifs, chez les Grecs, et chez presque tous les peuples, bien des siècles avant l'existence de la religion Chrétienne." (D'Ancarville Res., vol. i. p. 292.)

2 See Amberly's Analysis, p. 61. Bunsen's Angel-Messiah, p. 42. Higgins' Anacalypsis, vol. ii. p. 69, and Lillie's Buddhism, pp. 55 and 134. 3 Lillie's Buddhism, p. 134.

The officiating Brahman priest, who was called Gooroo, or Pastor,' rubbed mud on the candidate, and then plunged him three times into the water. During the process the priest said:

"O Supreme Lord, this man is impure, like the mud of this stream; but as water cleanses him from this dirt, do thou free him from his sin."

Rivers, as sources of fertility and purification, were at an early date invested with a sacred character. Every great river was supposed to be permeated with the divine essence, and its waters held to cleanse from all moral guilt and contamination. And as the Ganges was the most majestic, so it soon became the holiest and most revered of all rivers. No sin too heinous to be removed, no character too black to be washed clean by its waters. Hence the countless temples, with flights of steps, lining its banks; hence the array of priests, called "Sons of the Ganges," sitting on the edge of its streams, ready to aid the ablutions of conscience-stricken bathers, and stamp them as white-washed when they emerge from its waters. Hence also the constant traffic carried on in transporting Ganges water in small bottles to all parts of the country.'

The ceremony of baptism was a practice of the followers of Zoroaster, both for infants and adults.

M. Beausobre tells us that:

"The ancient Persians carried their infants to the temple a few days after they were born, and presented them to the priest before the sun, and before the fire, which was his symbol. Then the priest took the child and baptized it for the purification of the soul. Sometimes he plunged it into a great vase full of water: it was in the same ceremony that the father gave a name to the child.”

The learned Dr. Hyde also tells us that infants were brought to the temples and baptized by the priests, sometimes by sprinkling and sometimes by immersion, plunging the child into a large vase filled with water. This was to them a regeneration, or a purification of their souls. A name was at the same time imposed upon the child, as indicated by the parents.*

Life and Religion of the Hindus, p. 94. 2 Prog. Relig. Ideas, vol. i. p. 125.

Every orthodox Hindu is perfectly persuaded that the dirtiest water, if taken from a sacred stream and applied to his body, either externally or internally, will purify his soul." (Prof. Monier Williams: Hinduism, p. 157.) The Egyptians bathed in the water of the Nile; the Chaldeans and Persians in the Euphrates, and the Hindus, as we have seen, in the Ganges, all of which were considered as "sacred waters by the different nations. The Jews looked upon the Jordan in the same manner.

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Herodotus, speaking of the Persians' man

ners, says:

"They (the Persians) neither make water. nor spit, nor wash their hands in a river, nor defile the stream with urine, nor do they allow any one else to do so, but they pay extreme veneration to all rivers." (Hist. lib. i. ch. 188.) 3 Williams' Hinduism, p. 176.

4 Hist. Manichee, lib. ix. ch, vi, sect, xvi. in Anac., vol. ii. p. 65. See also, Dupuis: Orig. Relig. Belief, p. 249, and Baring-Gould: Orig. Relig. Belief, vol. i. p. 392.

"Pro infantibus non utuntur circumcisione, sed tantum baptismo seu lotione ad animæ purificationem internam. Infantem ad

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