§ 95. THE SACRAMENT OF THE EUCHARISF. 501
poses a sort of assimilation of the flesh and blood of Christ bj the believing participation. " What we believe, that we receive with the mouth. . . . The participation of the body and blood of Christ causes that we pass into that which we receive, and bear Clirist in us in spirit and bodj." Yolantary abstinence from the wine in the Supper was as yet considered by this pope a sin,'
III. The old liturgies, whose testimony on this point is as important as that of the church fathers, presuppose the actual presence of Christ in the Supper, but speak throughout in the stately language of sentiment, and nowhere attempt an explanation of the nature and mode of this presence, and of its relation to the still visible forms of bread and wine. They use concerning the consecrated elements such terms as : The holy body. The dear blood, of our Lord Jesus Christ, The sanctified oblation, The heavenly, spotless, glorious, awful, divine gifts, The awful, unbloody, holy sacrifice, &c. In the act of consecration the liturgies pray for the sending down of the Holy Ghost, that he may " sanctify and perfect " ' the bread and wine, or that he may " sanctify and make " them the body and blood of Christ," or " bless and make." *
IV. As to the adoration of the consecrated elements : This follows with logical necessity from the doctine of transubstantiation, and is the sure touchstone of it. ^o trace of such adoration appears, however, in the ancient liturgies, and the whole patristic literature yields only four passages from which
' Comp. the relevant passages from the writings of Leo in Perthel, Papst Leo I. Leben u. Lehren, p. 216 ff., and in Rlickert, 1. c. p. 4Y9 ff. Leo's doctrine of the Supper is not so clearly defined as his doctrine of baptism, and has little that is peculiar. But he certainly had a higher than a purely symbolic view of the sacrament and of the sacrifice of the Eucharist.
"^ In the liturgy of St. Mark (in Neale's ed. : The Liturgies of S. Mark, S. James, S. Clement, S. Chrysostom, S. Basil, Lond. 1859, p. 26):''lj'a ah-ra. ay laa-ri Kal TiKiidxTri . . . Kal TToiriffTi rhu fxkv &pTov ffoo,aa, to which the Congregation answers : 'A/xtJi/.
' In the liturgy of St. James (in Neale, p. 64): "iva . . . ay tdcrr) koI ■iroi-n<Tr Thv fifv apTov TovTov (yojfxa ayiov tov Kpiarov aov, k.t.A.
* The liturgy of St. Chrysostom (Neale, p. 13 '7) uses the terms ev\6yri<ro tnd iro'iT) (7 0 v .
502 THIRD PEP.IOD. A.D 311-590.
this practice can be inferred ; plainly showing that the doctrine of transnbstantiation was not yet fixed in the consciousnesi of the church.
Chrysostom says : " The wise men adored Christ in the man e;er; we see him not in the manger, bnt on the altar, and should pay him still greater homage." ' Theodoret, in the passage already cited, likewise uses the term TrpoaKvvelv, but at the same time expressly asserts the continnance of the substance of the elements. Ambrose speaks once of the flesh of Christ " which we to-day adore in the mysteries," '' and Augustine, of an adoration preceding the participation of the flesh of Christ."
In all these passages we must, no doubt, take the term TT poa Kvvelv and adorare in the wider sense, and distinguish the bowing of the knee, which was so frequent, especially in the East, as a mere mark of respect, from pi'oper adoration. The old liturgies contain no direction for any sucb act of adoration as became prevalent in the Latin church, with the elevation of the host, after the triumph of the doctrine of transnbstantiation in the twelfth century."
§ 96. The Sacrifice of the Eucharist.
Besides the works already cited on the holy Supper, coiiip. Hoflinq: Die Lehre der altesten Eirche vom Opfer im Leben u. Cultiis der Kirche.
* Horn. 24 in 1 Cor.
" De Spir. S. iii. 1 1 : " Quam [camcm Chiisti] hodic in mysteriis adoramus, et quam apostoli in Domino Jcsu adoraverunt."
' In Psalm. 98, n. 9 : " Ipsam carnem nobis manducandam ad salutem dedit ; nemo autem illam camem manducat nisi prius adoraverit . . . et non modo non peccemus adorando, sod peccemns non adorando."
* So says also the Roman liturgist Muratori, De rebus liturgicis, c. xix. p. 227 ; "Uti omncs inter Catholicos eruditi fotentur, post Berengnrii hceresiam ritus in Catholica Romana ecclesia invahut, scilicet post consccrationem elevare hostiam et caliccm, ut a populo adoretur corpus et sanguis Domini." Freeman, Principles of Div. Service, Introduction to Part ii. p. 169, asserts: "Tiie Church througliout the world, down to the period of the unhappy change of doctrine in the Western chnrcl in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, never worsliijipcd either the consecrated elements on account of their being tlie body and blood of Chiist, or the presence of that body and blood ; nor again, either Christ Himself as supernaturally present bj consecration, or the presence of His divinity ; neither have the churches of God tc ibis hour, with the exception of those of the Roman obedience, any such custom."