On that last subject it is not my intention to enter at any length. But a few words I may take this occasion to say, and I will assume that I am speaking to a younger Brother who in the main agrees with me in what are commonly called Evangelical Church principles. Let me first then counsel you to take care that no one shall be able, lawfully, to charge you with making light of the Sacraments,[19] or with leaving uncertain your belief as to their divine purpose and function. A ministry which is silent about them, and indistinct in its teaching on them, cannot in this respect be fully true to either the Prayer Book or the Bible. Let your instructions on this great subject, in public and in private, be definite, reverent, and full of thankfulness and praise for those great gifts of God. Then on the other hand, do not, if I may speak freely, while with all respect, think to honour the Sacraments by exaggeration, by speaking more of them than of that far greater thing, the blessed Grace of God in Christ, of which they are the "sure _witnesses_ and effectual _signs_."[20] If I do not mistake, one of the most prevalent tendencies of current thought in the Church now is the tendency to invert, in a certain way, the relations between Sacrament and Grace; to develop a doctrine of the Sacrament such that the doctrine of Grace can be seen only, as it were, through it. And the result is, very often, so at least it seems to me to be, a very poor and attenuated presentation of the glorious things said in Scripture about "the grace of God which bringeth salvation," [Tit. ii. 11.] and about the work of pure and simple, but mysteriously mighty, faith in our appropriation of Christ's merits and our reception of Christ's living power by the Holy Ghost. Let no such inversion mark your teaching. And if I may give one further suggestion, I would say, remind yourself frequently of the very words of the Prayer Book (including the Catechism) and the Articles on these great subjects. And inform yourself to some extent, at first hand, of the views of the men who cast our Services and our Articles into their practically present shape; the views of Cranmer, of Ridley, of Jewell, and, just after them, of Hooker; not forgetting one great foreign theologian, Henry Bullinger, who exercised a special influence on the English divines of Edward and Elizabeth's time in the matter of sacramental doctrine.[21] You will find in him a full measure of holy reverence, and at the same time a luminous clearness and definiteness of exposition. The central idea of his teaching is the idea of the Covenant Seal, the "instrument" of solemn, valid, legal "conveyance."
[19] I mean of course Baptism and the Supper of the Lord, which _alone_ the Church of England recognizes as Christian Sacraments, _Sacramenta Evangelica_, "Sacraments of the Gospel" (see Art. xxv., par. 2).
[20] _Certa testimonia, efficacia signa_ (Art. xxv.). It is worth the while to point out that a "_sign_" is "_effectual_" when it _effectually does the work of a sign_, not some quite different work. A seal is an effectual seal, not because, conceivably, its matter could be used as a powerful medicine, but because, _attached to its document_, it effectually seals the document's validity. A seal is in this respect a special sort of "effectual sign." And so are the Sacraments.
[21] See the Parker Society's collection of authors for Bullinger's _Decades_, or Doctrinal Sermons; officially recognized as a body of divinity by the Church of England in Elizabeth's reign.