amount of misery, for their sakes I submit.' The Saviour's love, therefore, involve l an immense sacrifice. This is a proof of its genuineness, and also of its greatness. Nothing but real Almighty love would endure such agony for objects so unworthy. The primitive disciples were deeply imbued with the spirit of their Master. They made great sacrifices-they left all and followed Him. But if we ask Christian professors now what has been surrendered for Christ's sake, they must reply, Nothing. They can accompany Him to Calvary, and see Him pour out His heart's blood for them, and yet make no sacrifice for Him; or, if there has been any, it is so insignificant that they would blush to announce it. As a rule, it is a pound for the world, and a penny for Christ.'" Popular Literature of Ritualism. By Rev. J. RIPPON. Elliot Stock. The Ritualists are wise in their day and generation, and use the press extensively in the dissemination of their principles. Much proselytizing has been effected by ecclesiastical narratives, tales, popular catechisms, poems, tracts, and "Manuals," written expressly for the young and persons of the humbler class. Some of these teach the rankest Popery, and assume without the slightest reservation the grossest pretensions of priestcraft; others are more cautiously worded, are wrapped in ambiguous expressions, Jesuitical reservations, and most "ineffable" meanings, but all, nevertheless, covertly exalting the "priest," and introducing the most pernicious error. These publications are the most dangerous because the most dishonest. popular literature of Ritualism looks to the young and inexperienced a pleasant pasture, but the deadly slime is there, and we thank the Rev. Mr. Rippon for pointing out to the unwary the trail of the serpent. The Birmingham Protestant Magazine. Nos. 1 to 5. Wilson, Birmingham. The A magazine established in the birthplace of John Rogers, the martyr, to oppose "Popery in this Protestant kingdom." It has our sympathy and best wishes. The Protestants of Birmingham are not a few, and their efforts, in the way of lectures, discussions, and publications, have for years past evinced their zeal. The issue of this Magazine is an encouraging sign of the vitality of the Protestant spirit in Birmingham. BOOKS RECEIVED. Lessons of Truth. Houlston.-Church of England proved to have Expelled the Dogma of Endless Torments. Stock.-Great Crisis at Hand. Snow. British Workwoman.-Annual Report of Birmingham Protestant Association, &c., &c. THE REV. CAPEL MOLYNEUX ON THE BENNETT JUDGMENT.-The Record states that the Rev. Capel Molyneux, of St. Paul's, Onslow-square, preached on Sunday morning on the Bennett judgment. Speaking of the position in which it had placed the Evangelical clergy, Mr. Molyneux said there were two courses open to them-one in relation to the Church, and the other in relation to their connexion with the Church. With regard to the Church, what was wanted was a downright radical revision of the Prayer-book. It was ridiculous to talk of anything short of it; and he would be content with nothing less. He would not listen to any compromise. The Church Association was making an attempt to get a petition signed all over the country, to be sent with a memorial to Her Majesty praying for some such alteration in the laws of the Church as would prevent this heresy of the real presence from having a place in the doctrine of the Church. He, however, had little hope of success in this direction, seeing that the Judicial Committee was the final court of appeal. He said boldly that if the Church remained as she was, there was no alternative but secession. He would accept no other. Let the Church be changed, and he would abide; but let the Church abide, and he would change himself. wished them thoroughly to understand that if he remained in the Church for some time longer it would only be because efforts were being made to eradicate this accursed evil from the Church. He wished it to be known to all men that he for one would not, directly or indirectly, sanction in any way the idolatrous worship of a sacrificial image, which the Judicial Committee, by acquitting Mr. Bennett, had set up in the Church of England. He CONTRIBUTIONS, COLLECTIONS, AND SUBSCRIPTIONS, FOR THE SOCIETY FOR THE SPREAD OF THE GOSPEL AT HOME AND ABROAD Dover.-Rev. THOS. ANDERSON. Miss Marks... Wifrenden Mrs. Coveny R. Bell, Esq. Kidderminster.-Rev. IRA BOSELEY. Mr. Brown. A few Friends 0 5 Less Expenses £2 0 0 Lynmouth.-Rev. F. NEWMAN. Collected by Mrs. NEWMAN. Basingstoke.-Per Rev. W. Subscriptions for Magazines.. Rev. W. H. Hines Friends £25 0 H. Downs, Esq. Mrs. Handley. Home Box 050 Friend Ditto 18 5 9 0.10 0 £17 15 9 H. HINES. £3 2 2 110 1 0 0 10 0 010 0 8 7 8 8 10A 7 1 9 6 2 25 0 8 2 13 2 £22 7 6 £1 0 0 0 19 4 900 Ditto Mr. Potterton 2 12 8 E. J. Lewis, Esq. Rev. T. Dodd... Collected at Comer Free Church 0 7 Collected at Birport Free Church Rev. G. Llewellyn...... 2 8 8 5 0 15 9 Lecture, per Rev. J. Dunning 1 Paid to Treasurer £27 8 8 £1 19 4 After Sermons by the Rev. Spencer A Friend, per Rev. W. H. Sister Ground 0 10 0 22 Collections after Sermons Malvern.-Per Mr. E. STOKES. 4 18 3 £7 10 2 £5 1 10 Middleton.-Rev. R. W. MAYDON. £6.10 0 Hereford.--Per Rev. J. WAGER. £0 10 2 Collected by Miss Hovel £1 2 10 Sunday-school Teachers..... 0 17 2 0 6 10 Collection after Sermon.... 150 351 Contributions, &c., to be sent to the Treasurer, MR. FREDERICK WM. WILLCOCKS, 1, Myddleton Villas, Lloyd Square, London, W.C. THE FREE CHURCH OF ENGLAND MAGAZINE. SEPTEMBER, 1872. The "Mass," or "The Lord's Supper." THE great fundamental doctrine involved in the whole course of the struggle for a Reformed Church in this country, from its first spring-bud in the early Saxon Church of Ælfric to the organization of the Free Church of England, in the present century, has been the doctrine of the Lord's Supper-whether, in fact, the partaking of the bread and wine at the Communion is a Commemorative feast or an Eucharistic sacrifice. The Protestants maintained that it was the former, the Romanists maintained that it was the latter. The question is not one of mere metaphysical speculation, is not one of those subtle disputations which were wont to amuse the controversial powers of the Schoolmen—is not a mere idle theory about some undefined and "ineffable" sentiment which, whether received or rejected, cannot affect the rights and liberties of the Christian Church. The point at issue involves a claim which underlies all the pretensions of priestcraft. The doctrine of the Real Presence, with its inevitable consequences, is an error of great antiquity. Partially in the third, and more strongly in the fourth century it took root, and rapidly infused into the whole system of Christian worship a doctrinal and practical idolatry. The admission or rejection of this dogma was the acknowledged test in the great controversy between Romanist and Protestant from the very first— "the touchstone," as Fuller says, "to discover the poor Protestants," the crucible in which all heresy was to be tried. It was for the rejection of this dogma that Elfric was shunned and Wickliffe persecuted in life, and insulted after death; that the Lollards suffered, and our Reformers were burned. "Protestants," says the biographer of Cranmer, "of all shades of opinion were united on this one point, that the Mass should be turned into a Communion.* The Mass was regarded as a sacrifice of our Lord's body, present in the elements by the power of the priest, for the * "Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury," II., p. 150. quick and the dead. 66 grievous" error. This the Reformers, one and all, denounced as a The Lollards or Wickliffians were firm on this point. As a body, they denied the corporal presence of Christ in the bread and wine. They denied the power of man to work the miracle of transubstantiation. They denied that God had given to the "priest" the power to make Christ out of the simple elements of bread and wine; nay, they boldly decried it as a "juggling" mystery, got up to blind the reason and to lead the faithful into rank idolatry. But this dogma was the foundation of all the pretensions of the Roman priesthood, without which sacerdotalism could not exist; and the priests fought for it as for life. Lord Cobham might have died in his Kentish castle in peace had he acknowledged the doctrine of the Mass, but Archbishop Arundel put this question to him, and gave him two days to consider it : "The fayth and determinacion of holy church, touchyng the blissfull sacramente of the aulter, is this: That after the sacramentall wordes ben sayde by a prest in hys masse. The materiell bred that was before, is turned into Christes verray body, and the materiell wyne that was before, is turned into Christes verray blode, and there leiveth in the aulter, no materiell bred, nor materiell wyne, the whych were there before the seying the sacramentall wordes. How lyve ye this articul?" Lord Cobham did not "lyve" this article, and would not subscribe to it, and because he would not, his body was hung in chains, and he was dragged up to London on a litter, and burned in St. Giles's Fields. It is not difficult to see why the Church of Rome and Ritualistic "priests" of the English Church contend so energetically for this doctrine of the Mass. The whole power of the priests depends upon its maintenance. If this dogma is faithfully believed in all its consequencesif it is understood that the very God becomes, at the mere incantation of the priest, present in the elements of bread and wine-that the priest, and the priest alone, can effect this mysterious transubstantiation by the power of his exalted prerogative—that he alone has the high authority to make Christ and to dispense Christ to the laity—that he alone has the right and privilege to feed the poor, hungry, dying sinner with the Bread. of everlasting life,—we see what a stupendous, mysterious power is here. assumed, to bow the spirits of men and enslave the human mind to the designs of a grasping priesthood! The English blood rose in old time against this tyrannous assumption. The reason and common sense of English Christians rebelled against this awful blasphemy; and when the plain, homely words of their English Bible taught them that this "Mass" had taken the place of the commemorative Supper of their Lord and Master, they indignantly protested against the heresy of the "Mass," refused to allow that it was propitiatory either for the quick or the dead, and held to the very death, for the simple Communion Supper of our Lord. The whole history of the Reformation in England may be regarded as a great contest for the abolition of the Mass and the institution of the Lord's Supper. The martyrs died chiefly for refusing to believe in the corporal presence of Christ in the Sacrament. Rogers declared it to be a falsehood. Hooper said plainly that he did not believe in any such thing. Rowland Taylor testified that transubstantiation and concomitation were "two juggling words," whereby the Papist would make us believe "that Christ's natural body is made of bread." Bishop Ferrar maintained that the Sacrament "ought not to be administered on an altar, or to be elevated, or to be adored in any way." John Bradford strongly denounced the Mass as the very "darling of the devil." Good Bishop Latimer denied it, as opposed to all reason and truth. Philpot denied it, and so did Cranmer and his brother martyrs; and because they did deny it, knowing how it dishonoured Christ, to the exaltation of the miserable priests of Rome-knowing how, instead of a spiritual worship, it favoured a gross and absurd idolatry—they were one and all persecuted, racked, tortured, imprisoned, and carried forth to be burned to death in the market-places of England. Let us never forget that it was for the simplicity of the Lord's Supper that these martyrs died. Let us never forget that it was their righteous detestation of the Mass, their horror at the blasphemous assumptions of the priesthood as sacrificing mediators, their love and reverence for the honour and majesty of their Saviour's finished work, that gave them the courage to die. Above all, let us not forget this now, when on every side we see the emissaries of Rome, in the garb of Protestant clergy, using strenuous efforts to restore this abomination of Romanism into the State-bound Church; when, alas ! we see this doctrine of the Mass acted in our parish churches with all its gorgeous ritualism; when we hear its mysteries proclaimed with reverence from the pulpits in which our Protestant fathers preached, and when it is the acknowledged aim of the strongest party in the Established Church to restore the sacrificing office of the "Priests of the Mass." Time is it, indeed, for another Reformation. Time is it, indeed, to protest against such abominations. Time is it, indeed, for true Protestants, to seek, in a Free and Apostolic Church, disentanglement from this yoke of bondage. Glory Begun Below.— -CHAPTER IV. Very early on a morning, about a fortnight before her death, symptoms of her immediate dissolution appeared, and she believed herself to be entering the dark river. Friends were around her bed, when she began, with a heavenly expression of countenance, to repeat these lines, which often before she had loved to sing : |