which He receives from those whom, of all created things, He has placed the nearest to Himself.

This act of praise in our Service-book is as follows:"With angels and archangels, and with all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify Thy glorious name, evermore praising Thee, and saying, 'Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Hosts, heaven and earth are full of Thy glory. Glory be to Thee, O Lord Most High!'"

The reader will perceive that these words of highest adoration will more than bear comparison, for majesty and simplicity, with the corresponding act in any Liturgy, no matter how ancient or widely used.

To assist him in forming a due estimate of them, I give, in a note at the end of this section (page 187), this anthem, or hymn, as it exists in Liturgies used in all parts of the world, from the remotest times.

In addition to this, we offer up to God, at this most sacred time, the "Gloria in excelsis." This act of praise, also, is characterized by its extreme simplicity. It is, if I may so say, a more human act of praise than the Tersanctus or Seraphic Hymn. There are cries for mercy mingled with the strain of thanksgiving. It is also more particularly addressed to the Son of God, as the Lamb of God that taketh away sin.

The use of this hymn can be traced, according to Palmer, for more than fifteen hundred years in the Eastern Church; and the Church of England has used it, either at the beginning or end of the Liturgy, for above twelve hundred years.

No forms of praise can be higher than these; and none exist which have been sanctified like these, by the general use of the Catholic Church in her highest worship.

A question arising out of the preceding remarks now calls for some notice.

It may be asked, In what part of our Communion

Service do we make that solemn sacrificial memorial of the death of Christ, which the Church has ever esteemed it her highest privilege to put up to God?

It is well known that all the ancient Liturgies had a particular form of words, in which the celebrant made the oblation.

Thus, in the Clementine :—

"Wherefore having in remembrance His Passion, Death, and Resurrection from the dead, His return into heaven, and His future Second Appearance when he shall come with glory and power to judge the quick and the dead, and to render to every man according to his works; we offer to Thee, our King and our God, according to his institution, this bread and this cup, giving thanks to Thee through Him," &c.

The first Liturgy of Edward VI.'s reign had a form of oblation answering to this, in the words—

"Wherefore O Lord and heavenly Father, according to the Institution of thy dearly Beloved Son Our Saviour Jesus Christ, we thy humble servants do celebrate, and make here before thy Divine Majesty, with these thy Holy gifts, the memorial which thy Son hath willed us to make, having in remembrance His blessed Passion, mighty Resurrection, and glorious Ascension, rendering unto Thee most hearty thanks for the innumerable benefits procured unto us by the same, entirely desiring thy Fatherly Goodness mercifully to accept this our Sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving: most humbly beseeching Thee to grant that by the merits," &c.

The particular form of oblation with which this prayer begins is omitted in our present service, and I (with very many of my brethren) regret the omission.

We have, however, now to inquire, whether this omission vitiates that true sacrificial character of the Eucharist, which our reformers, as well as all our great divines, have acknowledged. I cannot think that, in the sight of God, it does; for, if we are to judge by the words of St. Paul, the special sacrificial act is the act of the whole Church,

and is intimately connected with the partaking. "As oft as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till He come."

From the words of Christ, "Do this in remembrance of Me,” and from these words of St. Paul, we derive all our views of the sacrificial character of Holy Communion.

Now, the words, "Do this in remembrance of Me" certainly do not refer to one particular act of oblation in the service, but to the whole Eucharistic action — giving thanks, blessing, breaking, on the part of the minister; taking, and eating and drinking, on the part of the whole. Church.

If we are to judge of it by these words of Christ and His Apostle, the sacrificial character of the Eucharist is not to be confined to any particular form of oblation, in words or acts, but is to be extended to the whole Eucharistic service, especially to the "partaking."

We do, or may, however, make a verbal act of oblation in the words, "We, thy humble servants, entirely desire Thy fatherly goodness mercifully to accept this our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, most humbly beseeching Thee to grant," &c.

The words, "sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving," (as any one who is in the least conversant with any Communion Service besides our own, well knows,) allude not to any act of praise in the service (such as the Tersanctus, for instance), but to the Eucharist itself, i. e. the blessing, breaking, giving, taking, and eating, as a memorial of Christ.

NOTE. Let the reader remember, that the foregoing chapter is not a treatise on the Eucharist, but an attempt to show very briefly that the doctrine which we derive from

the notices of it in the New Testament is fully represented in the Prayer-book.

This must be my apology for not entering into several matters of great importance and interest, such, for instance, as the Jewish sacrifices considered as types of the Eucharist. The reader who desires to study this branch of the subject will find it exhausted in Mr. Freeman's book, "The Principles of Divine Service."

I here give some very ancient forms of the "Tersanctus," or "Hymn of the Seraphim," called by some the "Triumphal Hymn." From the Liturgy of St. James, anciently used in the Church of Jerusalem:

“It is very meet, right, and our bounden duty that we should praise and bless, worship, glorify, and give thanks to Thee, the Maker of all visible and invisible things; the Treasure of eternal happiness, the Fountain of life and immortality, the God and Governor of the universe: To whom the heavens sing praise and all their powers: The sun and moon, and the whole choir of stars: The earth and sea and all their inhabitants: Jerusalem the heavenly assembly and Church of the first-born that are written in heaven : The spirits of just men and prophets: The souls of Martyrs and Apostles, Angels, Archangels, Thrones, Dominions, Principalities, Authorities, and the tremendous Powers: The many-eyed Cherubim and the Seraphim with six wings, who with twain cover their faces, and with twain their feet, and with twain they fly, crying incessantly one to another, and with uninterrupted shouts of praise,

"People. 'Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabaoth, Heaven and earth are full of thy glory. Hosanna in the Highest: Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord: Hosanna in the Highest.''

From the Liturgy used in the Church of Alexandria, ascribed to St. Mark :

". . . The many-eyed Cherubim and Seraphim of six wings who with twain cover their faces, and with twain their feet, and with twain they fly, calling one to another, never ceasing from Divine

praises, singing, crying aloud and glorifying, lifting up their voices and saying to the majesty of thy glory the triumphal hymn, ‘Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord of Sabaoth, Heaven and earth are full of thy glory.'

"It is Thou indeed who dost make all Holy, but with all that glorify Thee accept our Holy Song which we sing together with them saying,

"People. 'Holy, Holy, Holy Lord.""

From the Clementine, a Liturgy of the remotest antiquity ::"The Cherubim and Seraphim with six wings crying incessantly, with uninterrupted shouts of joy : and let all the people say with them :

"Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of Sabaoth.

Heaven and earth

are full of His glory : Blessed be He for evermore.”

From the Liturgy used in the Church of Ethiopia or Abyssinia:"And as they (the Seraphim and Cherubim) always praise and sanctify Thee, so do Thou receive these our praises and thanksgivings which we offer to Thee, saying, 'Holy, Holy, Holy.'

"People. Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabaoth. Heaven and earth are full of the holiness of Thy glory.''

From a Liturgy used in ancient Persia, called the Liturgy of the Apostles. According to Neale (Holy Eastern Church, General Introduction, vol. i. pp. 319, 321) "this Liturgy bears every mark of the remotest age. It is simple, stern, entirely unlike the pompous effusions of later writers, evidently incapable of being derived from any amplification or change of the offices of Cesarea or Jerusalem." The introduction to the Tersanctus is so singularly good that I give it in full :—

"Worthy is praise from every mouth, and confession from all tongues, and worship and exaltation from all creatures unto the adorable and glorious name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, who created the world from His goodness, and the inhabitants thereof by His loving-kindness, and who hath saved mankind by His mercy, and magnified His grace upon the perishing. Thy Majesty, O Lord, a thousand thousand spirits and ten thousand times ten thousand holy angels, the intellectual hosts, the ministers and spirits of fire, the holy Cherubim and spiritual Seraphim, do sanctify and celebrate and praise without end to one another, crying,