that any of the Corinthians actually became intoxicated at the table which they called the table of the Lord, or whether he meant simply to say, that while one had more, another had less, than enough, it is not easy to decide. As they seem to have accommodated their service to the sacrificial feasts to which they had, while yet heathens, been accustomed, it is the less improbable that in some cases they were guilty of actual excess. " It is wonderful, and well nigh portentous," says Calvin, " that Satan could have accomplished so much in so short a time. We may learn from this example, what is the worth of mere antiquity ; that is, what authority is due to custom unsustained by the word of God. . . . Yet this is the firmest foundation of Popery : it is ancient ; it was done of old, therefore it has divine authority ! " If, within twenty years of its institution, the Corinthians turned the Lord's sup- per into a disorderly feast, although the apostles were then alive, we need not wonder at the speedy corruption of the church after their death.
22. What ! have ye not houses to eat and to drink in ? or despise ye the church of God, and shame them which have not ? What shall I say to you ? shall I praise you in this ? I praise (you) not.
The two grounds on which the apostle condemned this conduct of the Corinthians were, first, that it was a perversion of the Lord's supper ; and secondly, that it was disrespectful and mortifymg to their poorer brethren. It was a perversion of the Lord's supper, because it made it an ordinary meal de- signed to satisfy hunger. For that purpose they had their own houses. The church comes together to worship God and to celebrate his ordinances, not for the purpose of eating and drinking. It is important that the church, as the church, should confine itself to its own appropriate work, and not as such undertake to do what its members, as citizens or mem- bers of families, may appropriately do. The church does not come together to do what can better be done at home. Or despise ye the church of God f This was the second ground of condemnation. Their conduct evinced contempt of their brethren. They treated them as unfit to eat with them. Yet the poor were constituent members of the church of God. They were his people ; those whom he had chosen, whom he had made kings and priests imto himself. These persons, thus