by Jesus Christ upon the cross for the sins of man, and refuse to celebrate and shew forth this death, by the simple, yet significant mode of commemoration, which he has appointed?

Even, then, if baptism were a mere rite of admission into the Christian Church, and the Lord's Supper no more than a commemoration of our Saviour's death; the certainty that He himself commanded us to observe them, would sufficiently bind them upon all who call themselves Christians. But they are much more; they are sacraments; outward and visible signs, of inward grace bestowed upon us, they are at once the means of procuring it, and pledges granted by God himself to assure us of its reception. The baptized Christian is a different being from the unbaptized heathen: the one possesses faculties and affections, privileges and expectations, to which the other is of necessity a stranger by baptism, he is, as the Church expresses it, made "a member of Christ, a "child of God, an inheritor of the king"dom of heaven;" and, as such, a new

principle is implanted within him, by which he is rendered capable of cultivating the desires, and performing the duties, indispensable in all, who are admitted into this new and spiritual state.

Such then being the benefits conferred in baptism, it cannot be doubted, that the sacrament, which admits us into the family of God, and gives us a share in the privileges set apart for his household, must also be essential to Christian unity for it cannot well be conceived, that he can be one with the Church, which is composed of God's children, who has no part nor lot in their adoption and inheritance; and is incapable of performing the duties, expected from them, having never partaken in that spiritual regeneration, by which the new man is raised up in the human heart, and power is given to the fallen sons of Adam to triumph over the enemies of his salvation. While, however, we thus lay down the scriptural rule with that precision which becomes the stewards

i

of God's mysteries; still we speak as men, commissioned plainly to declare the counsel of God, but by no means affirming more, respecting any part of the divine plan of redemption by Jesus Christ, than has been clearly revealed. We presume not to say, that no possible case can be imagined, in which God may dispense with his own ordinances; but such and so decided is the language of Scripture respecting the nature and the efficacy of baptism, as the appointed means of admission into that state of salvation, in which every member of Christ's Church is or has been placed; and as the channel through which the ordinary gifts of the Spirit are bestowed, to enable us to perform the duties of our Christian calling; that the want of it can be excused by nothing but an insuperable necessity. that necessity, be it remembered that God will be the judge, and not man. To him therefore we should be satisfied to leave the case of those, who unhappily have not participated in this sacrament; asserting only, in the moderate and well

Of

weighed language of our own excellent Church, that k❝ baptism is generally ne

cessary to salvation."

If the sacrament of baptism be essential to Christian unity, because it is the appointed means of admission to that community of hopes and privileges, which binds Christians together; the sacrament of the eucharist is so to be considered, because it is the instituted mode of confirming these hopes, and preserving to us the enjoyment of these privileges; because it is, moreover, the service by which Christ himself has commanded us to express our sense of them; to seek a continuance of them; and solemnly to devote ourselves, our souls and bodies, to the performance of those duties, both towards God and man, on which our final salvation is made to depend.

There is perhaps no particular, in which the sentiments of Christians have suffered so melancholy, so humiliating a change, as in their reverence for this holy sacra

K

ment, and their sense of its necessity. Among the first recorded practices of the Christian Church, we find this, that its members" continued stedfast in breaking "of bread." During the lives of the Apostles, so full and deep was the conviction of its importance and obligation, that we have no account of an assembly for the purpose of devotion, where the Lord's Supper was not celebrated. For many ages after, it continued the distinctive mark of the Christian profession that high and awful mystery, by which the disciples were separated unto God, as a "peculiar people, an holy nation." Their ordinary services; their prayers, and their sermons, were accessible to all; the infidel, as well as the believer, was invited to come, and listen to the word of God; he was permitted to witness the pure worship of prayer and praise, which they offered; and, if he pleased, to join in its celebration. But from the table of the Lord, all were m excluded, but the faithful.

1 1 Pet. ii. 9.

m See Note LXXVII. Appendix.