DOCTRINE RESPECTING THE CHURCH.

465 in which the word of God is preached and the sacraments administered essentially as they were instituted by Christ. But no single visible body of Christians can justly assume to be the entire Church; much less exclude from the pale of salvation all who are not included in their number. The true Church is an ideal, which is realized but imperfectly in any existing organization. External societies of Christians are more or less pure; they approximate, in different degrees, to a conformity to the idea of the real or invisible community. The Protestants carefully refrained from arrogating for the bodies which they organized an exclusive title to be considered the Church. When charged with being apostates from the Church, and when themselves denouncing the Papacy as the embodiment of Antichrist, they never denied that the true Church of Christ was on the side of their opponents, as well as with themselves. "I say," said Luther," that under the Pope is real Christianity, yea the true pattern of Christianity, and many pious, great saints." Calvin has similar expressions; for example, in his noted Letter to Sadolet.

The Roman Catholic theory affixes the attributes of unity, holiness, catholicity, and apostolicity to the external, visible society of which the Bishop of Rome is the chief, and declares that outside of this body there is no salvation. The notes of the true Church belong to this society; and accordingly the promises made in the New Testament to the Church, and the privileges there ascribed to it, are claimed for this body exclusively. The Church, says Bellarmine, is something as tangible as the Republic of Venice. In opposition to the second of the Protestant principles, the traditions of the oral teaching of Christ and of the Apostles, which, it is claimed are infallibly preserved in the Church, through the supernatural aid of the indwelling Spirit, are put on a level with Scripture; and of Scripture itself, the

Church is the appointed, unerring expounder. It was not an uncommon thing in the Middle Ages for doctrines to be attributed to revelations made to the Church, subsequent to the Apostolic age; doctrines not supposed to be contained in the Scriptures. But the prevailing Catholic doctrine since the Reformation finds the entire revelation as a complete deposit, in the written and oral teaching of Christ and the Apostles. The connection of the individual with Christ is not possible, except through his connection with the Church. In the Catholic theory, the invisible Church is not only included in the visible organization in communion with the Papal see, but it cannot exist out of it or apart from it.1

seven.

As an inseparable part of the Catholic theory of the Church stands the doctrine of a particular priesthood and of the sacraments. The idea of the sacraments was fully developed by the Schoolmen, and the number, which had been indefinite and variable, was fixed at It is essential to the conception of the sacrament that it should efficiently convey the hidden gift of grace which it symbolizes. It is the channel through which the grace is communicated; the ordained and indispensable vehicle by which it passes to the individual; the instrument by the direct operation of which the divine. mercy reaches the soul." Hence the efficacy of a sacrament is independent of the personal character of the.

In the later editions of his Loci, Melancthon treats of the visible church alone. He was led to this course, not by a change of opinion respecting the . reality of the conception of the invisible church, but in consequence of the aberrations, in a spiritualistic direction, of the Anabaptists. He is concerned to guard against the notion that the invisible church is a mere ideal, or is to be sought for outside of all existing ecclesiastical organizations a mere Platonic republic. See Julius Müller, Dogmatische Abhandlungen (Die unsichtbare Kirche), pp. 297, 298.

2 "Per quæ omnis vera justitia vel incipit, vel coepta augetur, vel amissa reparatur." Concil. Trid. Sess. vii. Proemium. "Si quis dixerit sacramenta novæ legis non esse ad salutem necessaria;" "si quis dixerit, per ipsa novæ legis sacramenta ex opere operato non conferri gratiam, anathema it." Ibid., IV. viii.

ROMAN CATHOLIC DOCTRINE OF THE SACRAMENTS.

467

administrator, provided he have the intention to perform the sacramental act; for such an intention is requisite. The sacrament, moreover, imparts a divine gift which is not involved in, nor produced by, the faith of the recipient it is ex opere operato. The effect is wrought, in case the recipient interposes no obstacle. The sacraments are the means of grace, and are essential to the beginning and growth of the Christian life; they meet the individual at his birth, and attend him to his burial. They are to the soul and the religious life, what bread is to the body; nor is their effect confined to the soul; it extends even to the physical nature. In the Sacrament of the Altar, the body and blood of Christ are literally present. Christ is once more offered, an unbloody sacrifice, through which the benefits of the sacrifice on the

1 This is the declaration of the Council of Trent (sess. vii. can. vi.): "Si quis dixerit sacramenta novæ legis non continere gratiam, quam significat; aut gratiam ipsam non ponentibus obicem non conferre anathema sit." The

later Schoolmen taught that the sacraments are efficacious, unless a mortal sin creates an obstacle in the way of the working of divine grace. Duns Scotus (1. iv. d. 1. qu. 6) says: "Non requiritur ibi bonus motus interior, qui mereatur gratiam," etc. Gabriel Biel (Sententt, 1. iv. d. 1. qu. 3.) maintains the same proposition. It is this tenet which the Reformers attacked. After the Reformation, Bellarmine says (De Sacr., ii. 1.): "Voluntas, fides et poenitentia in suscipiente adulto necessario requiruntur ex parte subjecti," etc. Mohler (Symbolik, c. iv. § 28), reaffirms this last doctrine. One of the first propositions which Cajetan required Luther to retract was: Non sacramentum, sed fides in sacramento justificat. The modification of the Catholic representation on this point since the Reformation, is referred to by Winer, Comparative Darstellung, p. 126; Hase, Prot. Polemik, p. 350 seq. See also Nitzsch, Prot. Beantwortung auf Möhler (Studien u. Kritiken, 1834, p. 853). It is still to be observed, however, that the "fides," which Bellarmine requires in the recipient of the sacrament, is not faith, in the Protestant sense, but the assent to doctrinal truth.

As to the "intention" in the priest which is requisite to the validity of the sacrament, some make it external —an intention to do, as to the outward form of the sacrament, what the church does; while others make it "internal "— an intention to fulfill the end or design of the sacrament. The Council of Trent leaves the point doubtful. Sess. VII. xi. Perrone, one of the most eminent of the recent Catholic theologians, holds to the necessity of the "internal" intention. Prælectiones Theolog., ii. 118 (p. 232). This is more commonly considered to be most consonant with the Tridentine declaration. Klee, Dogmengeschichte, ii. 132. Thus a secret intention of the priest may deprive the recipient of the benefit of a sacrament.

cross are obtained and appropriated. In the converted substance of the wafer, the recipient actually partakes of the Redeemer's body. The sacrifice of the Mass is the central act of worship.

Of course, this conception of the sacraments presupposes a consecrated priesthood, a hierarchical order, which is authorized to dispense them. They stand in the position of mediators, from whose hands the means of salvation must be received; by whom, acting in a judicial capacity penances, or the temporal punishments due to mortal sin after repentance and confession, are appointed; and who have it in their power to pronounce against contumacious offenders the awful sentence of excommunication, which blots their names out of the book of life. Between the individual and Christ stands. a fully organized, self-perpetuating body of priests, through whose offices alone the soul can come into the possession of the blessings of salvation. It is true that baptism, .without which one cannot be saved — unless, indeed, the intention to receive it is prevented from being carried out, without the candidate's fault may be performed by unconsecrated hands, in emergencies where no priest can be summoned. But the other sacraments, Confirmation, the Lord's Supper, the allotment of Penance and Absolution, Marriage, Ordination, Extreme Unction, belong exclusively to the priest, and have no validity unless performed by him. Standing thus, not as a member on a level with the general congregation of believers, but as an intermediate link between the body of believers and God, the priest is naturally subject to the rule of celibacy. He stands aloof from the ordinary relations of this earthly life.1

In direct opposition to this theory of a sacerdotal class, the Protestants maintained the doctrine of the universal priesthood of believers. The laity stand in no such de

1.Neander, Catholicismus u. Protestantismus, p. 210.

PROTESTANT DOCTRINE OF THE SACRAMENTS.

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pendence on a priestly order. Every disciple has the right of immediate access to God; none can debar him from a direct approach to the Redeemer. The officers of the Church are set apart among their brethren, for the performance of certain duties; but the clergy are not a distinct and superior order, clothed with mediatorial functions. The idea of the direct relation of the soul to Christ, which is involved in the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and in that of the general, as opposed to a particular priesthood, carried with it an essential modification of the previous doctrine of the sacraments. The sufficiency of the sacrifice once made, dispensed with such a supplement as was sought in the repeated sacrifice of the Mass; and transubstantiation was rejected as a gross perversion of the Scriptural and primitive doctrine. The sacraments were declared to be but two in number, Baptism and the Lord's Supper. The other five had been added to the number without warrant of Scripture. Of these, extreme unction was set aside as an unauthorized superstition. Marriage might be concluded without the intervention of a priest. Penances vanished with the doctrine of human merit; and auricular confession, instead of being a duty owed to the priest, an obligation to recount to him all remembered sins of a heinous character, was resolved into the general privilege which disciples enjoy, of confessing to one another their faults, for the purpose of receiving from brethren rebuke, counsel, and comfort. Moreover the efficacy of the sacraments was made dependent on the spiritual state of the communicant, or the disposition with which they were received. Everything like a magical efficiency was denied to them; without faith, the sacrament of the Supper brought no benefit. But while the Protestants

1 Yet both Lutherans and Calvinists held that in the sacraments the outward sign represents the inward operation of the Holy Spirit, which gives to the sacrament its efficacy. Thus in the Conf. Belgica (art. xxxiii.), it is said of the