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 Fox, Norman, 1836-1907. 
 
 Christ in the daily meal 
 
Cbdst in tbe 
 
 OR 
 
 THE ORDINANCE OF 
 THE BREAKING OF BREAD 
 
 NORMAN FOX, D. D., 
 
 LATE PROFESSOR OF CHURCH HISTORY IN SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY, 
 WILLIAM JEWELL COLLEGE ; MISSOURI 
 
 *' They did eat their meat with gladness " 
 
 NEW YORK 
 FORDS, HOWARD & HULBERT 
 
 LONDON : JAMES CLARKE & CO. 
 1898. 
 
Copyright in 1898, 
 By NORMAN FOX. 
 
To my friends, the Editors <7/*The Indepen- 
 dent and the me7?ibers of The Baptist Minis- 
 
 TERS'CONFERENCE OF NeW YoRK AND ViCINITY, 
 
 is dedicated this expansion of a brief paper which, 
 read before the latter and published by the 
 former [Afarch, i8g^), created some discussion. 
 
 MoRRisTowN, New Jersey, 
 February, 1898. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 FACe 
 
 I. The Questio7i .... 7 
 
 //. Took — Blest — Bj-ake — Gave . 10 
 
 III. The Old and the New . . 13 
 
 IV. ''Hoc Est'' . . , , 23 
 
 V. Symbolism .... 30 
 
 VI. '' Our Daily Bread'' as the 
 
 Body of Christ . , . 40 
 
 VII. May One Disciple " Do This " ? S4 
 VIII. What Did Christ Mean by 
 
 " As Oft As" ? . . 61 
 
 IX. Apostolic Precedent , , , ^4 
 
 X. Union with Christ . . S2 
 
 XI. lore to the Brethren . . . <Pp 
 
 XII Historical .... 104 
 
 XIII. Practical ..... 7/5 
 
 XIV. The Church Supper , . J22 
 
 XIV. In Conclusion .... 13^ 
 
CHRIST IN THE DAILY MEAL 
 
 The Question, 
 
 SAID Jesus" to his disciples, — ^'This do 
 in remembrance of Me." But how 
 often was their eating of bread and drink- 
 ing of wine to be done with thought of 
 Him ? Once a month, — once a week, — 
 occasionally, — now and then ? Was not 
 his command this, — that each time and 
 whenever they ate bread to sustain their 
 mortal bodies they should think of him, 
 the food of their souls; and that when- 
 ever they took in their hands their cup 
 of the blood of the grape, the drink of 
 their daily meals, they should be thereby 
 reminded of his blood shed for them ? 
 
 Let us review those paragraphs of the 
 New Testament which refer to the break- 
 
8 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 ing of bread. They may be catalogued 
 as follows : — 
 
 The feeding of the five thousand — Mat- 
 thew xiv. 19 ; Mark vi. 41 ; Luke ix. 16 ; 
 John vi. II; and of the four thousand 
 —Matthew xv. 36 ; Mark viii. 6. 
 
 The Saviour's last Passover — Matthew 
 xxvi. 26; Mark xiv. 22; Luke xxii. 19; 
 I Corinthians xi. 23. 
 
 The meal at Emmaus — Luke xxiv. 30. 
 
 The breaking of bread at Jerusalem — 
 Acts ii. 42, 46. 
 
 The breaking of bread at Troas — Acts 
 XX. 7, II. 
 
 Paul's repast in the shipwreck — Acts 
 xxvii. 35. 
 
 Communion with Christ and commun- 
 ion with demons — I Corinthians X. 14. 
 
 The church meals at Corinth — i Cor- 
 inthians xi. 17. 
 
 Compare also : — 
 
 The Bread of Life — John vi. 31. 
 
 The Agapae or Love-Feasts — 2 Peter 
 ii. 13 ; Jude 12. 
 
 These should be read in the Revised 
 
The Question. 9 
 
 Version ; also in the very excellent trans- 
 lation issued by the American Baptist 
 Publication Society. 
 
 And now in proceeding to the study of 
 these passages, let us attempt a difficult 
 thing, namely, to divest our minds of all 
 inherited preconceptions, to restrain our- 
 selves from injecting into the meaning of 
 the text ideas received from outside 
 sources, to read the familiar sections as 
 if they were entirely new to us. For so 
 only can we gather from them their natu- 
 ral and true meaning. 
 
II. 
 
 Took — Blest — Bra ke — Ga ve. 
 
 IN the feeding of the five thousand, 
 Jesus took the loaves and gave 
 thanks and blessed and brake them and 
 gave to his disciples. In the record of 
 the feeding of the four thousand the same 
 acts and words appear. In the meal at 
 Emmaus, the Saviour " when he had sat 
 down with them to meat, took the bread 
 and blessed it and brake and gave to 
 them " and "he was known of them in 
 the breaking of the bread." Paul also 
 in the shipwreck took bread and gave 
 thanks and " brake it and began to eat " 
 and " themselves also took food." 
 
 In each of these cases, " the breaking 
 of bread " pertains to the taking of daily 
 food. And when some old fashioned 
 brother with old fashioned hospitality 
 expresses the hope that at some time 
 
Took — Blest — Brake— Gave. 1 1 
 
 you will stop and '' brake bread " with 
 him and his household, that is, eat a 
 meal with them, he uses strictly biblical 
 phraseology. 
 
 Be it carefully observed that when 
 Jesus at his last Passover took bread and 
 gave thanks and blessed and brake it 
 and gave to the disciples, he did nothing 
 peculiar to that occasion. He had done 
 the same at the feeding of the five thou- 
 sand and of the four thousand and did it 
 afterwards in the meal at Emmaus, while 
 Paul did in like manner on his vessel, 
 and indeed every pious Jew did all this 
 whenever he took food. 
 
 Says Prof. W. N. Clarke, in the Amer- 
 ican Connnentary, on the " took bread 
 and blessed," of Mark xiv. 22: "This 
 was no * prayer of consecration,' it was 
 the simple ' grace ' or ' blessing ' over 
 food." And of the thanksgiving over 
 the cup, (v. 23), he says ; '' This too was 
 a simple ' grace before meat.' " 
 
 Nor is there anything peculiar in the 
 fact that there was a thanksgiving first 
 
12 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 over the bread and then over the wine. 
 In the Passover celebration, as will be 
 seen in all accounts of the Jewish paschal 
 customs, there was a succession of bless- 
 ings asked over the different courses of 
 the meal. We may note also that in 
 the feeding of the four thousand, (Mark 
 viii. 6, 7), there was one blessing over the 
 loaves and another over the fishes. 
 
 On that Passover night every Jewish 
 father of a family took bread and gave 
 thanks and blessed and brake it and eave 
 to those that sat with him, and then 
 blessed and gave out the wine also, just 
 the same as did Jesus. There was then 
 nothing in this to separate Jesus* last 
 Passover from previous Passover occasions 
 observed by himself, or from the ordinary 
 Passover gatherings of Jewish families, 
 nor indeed from the daily meals of any 
 pious Israelite. The force of the record 
 is simply that in doing these things, 
 which were customary at all meals, he 
 added a special injunction, an admoni- 
 tion peculiar to that occasion. 
 
III. 
 
 The Old and the New, 
 
 THE point may be one of no great im- 
 portance, but carefulness of state- 
 ment forbids us to declare, as many have 
 done, that it was not till after the com- 
 pletion of the Passover feast, the supper 
 of the old dispensation, that Jesus ap- 
 pointed the new memorial. For the 
 record expressly says that it was " as they 
 were eating" the paschal meal that he 
 bade them henceforth eat in remem- 
 brance of him. Says Edersheim ; " If 
 now we ask ourselves at what part of the 
 paschal supper the new institution was 
 made, we cannot doubt that it was before 
 the supper was completely ended." So 
 say other commentators. 
 
 Nor was the '' cup after supper" some- 
 thing apart from and independent of that 
 meal ; it was a concluding cup of the 
 
14 CJirist in the Daily Meal. 
 
 Passover ritual. As the cup mentioned 
 in Luke xxii. 17, might be termed a cup 
 before the supper, though it was in fact 
 the first course of the repast, so " the 
 cup after supper " was simply its closing 
 portion. As the coffee at the modern 
 formal dinner might be said to come 
 after the meal or on the other hand to be 
 the concluding part thereof, so '' the cup 
 after supper " — which indeed came after 
 the main portion of the supper, namely, 
 the lamb and the bitter herbs — was in 
 fact but the final course of the repast, 
 not something after its full conclusion 
 and thus entirely unrelated thereto. It 
 was in giving the paschal bread that 
 Jesus commanded them to eat in remem- 
 brance of him ; it was in handing a 
 paschal cup that he bade them drink in 
 memory of his death. Indeed it may be 
 said that the Passover celebration was 
 not fully at an end till they "had sung 
 an hymn " before they *' went out," this 
 hymn, a part of the Great Hallel, being 
 the standard conclusion of the paschal 
 
The Old and The New. 1 5 
 
 rites. It is the general view which is 
 given by Abbott in his Commentary on 
 Matthew when he says that the expres- 
 sion, — as they were eating, '* clearly 
 indicates that the Lord's Supper was in- 
 stituted during the progress of the PascJial 
 Supper, not as a separate ordinance at its 
 close." 
 
 Nor can we say, as many have done, 
 that the Passover was then done away 
 and the new memorial put in its place. 
 The Apostles certainly did not under- 
 stand this to be the case, for they went 
 right on keeping the Passover just the 
 same as before. 
 
 They discontinued none of the ancient 
 rites. Peter and John, (Acts iii. 13), 
 went up to the Temple at the hour of 
 prayer or evening sacrifice, it evidently 
 never occurring to them,— what later 
 theologians have taught, — that the Leviti- 
 cal sacrifices were done away in the cruci- 
 fixion. The fact that the disciples had 
 '' favor with all the people*," (Acts ii. 47), 
 shows that they did not shock their feU 
 
1 6 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 low Israelites by abandoning their ances- 
 tral observances. They are well repre- 
 sented by the good Ananias of Damascus 
 who was " a devout man according to the 
 law," keeping all the Mosaic rites so 
 strictly as to have *' a good report of all 
 the Jews" (Acts xxii. 12). In Acts xx. 
 6, Luke notes " the days of unleavened 
 bread," and in verse 16 we see Paul 
 *' hastening if it were possible to be at 
 Jerusalem the day of Pentecost." The 
 Apostles and the other believing Jews 
 did not in any point abandon the Mosaic 
 ritual. Their new faith and order was 
 merely an addition to their Judaism, not 
 in any way a substitute therefor. 
 
 To illustrate ; they did not put baptism 
 in the place of circumcision. Not only 
 did they baptize those who were already 
 circumcised but Timothy was circumcised 
 though already baptized, and it was 
 strongly urged that circumcision be re- 
 quired of the thousands of baptized Gen- 
 tiles also. If Paul knew that "baptism 
 took the place of circumcision," why did 
 
The Old and The New, 1 7 
 
 he not flourish that fact in the face of 
 his bitter opponents when this would at 
 once and completely have overthrown 
 their demand for the circumcision of the 
 Gentile converts? 
 
 So far from there being on the part of 
 the Jewish disciples a tendency to 
 abandon the Mosaic law, we find among 
 them more than twenty years after the 
 Day of Pentecost a well nigh overpower- 
 ing demand that the Gentile converts 
 also be required to observe it, a demand 
 to which the Galatian churches were 
 actually brought to succumb. The fact 
 that it was necessary as late as the year 
 50 or thereabout to lay before an apos- 
 tolic council the question whether the 
 believing Gentiles should be compelled 
 to keep Moses' law, implies that no one 
 even dreamed that the Jewish disciples 
 might abandon it. A quarter of a cen- 
 tury after the resurrection we find that 
 the *' many thousands" of Jews which 
 believe are " all zealous of the law," (Acts 
 xxi. 20), that is, they are still circumcis- 
 
1 8 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 ing their children, keeping the Seventh 
 Day, and offering the Levitical sacrifices 
 just as strictly as their unbelieving coun- 
 trymen, or as their fathers had done 
 before them. And this is said, more- 
 over, not merely of a faction but of 
 ''all," including of course the Apostles. 
 
 Not even "gradually" did they give 
 up the ancient ritual ; for that word 
 " zealous " signifies more than a broad 
 minded toleration of antiquated usage ; it 
 implies a vehement insistence on the 
 strictest observance. And Paul himself 
 took part in that ceremony o/ the vow 
 the more emphatically to declare that on 
 this point he did not differ from the 
 strictest of his fellow Hebrews, and that 
 he did not teach that the Jewish disciples 
 should cease to observe the Mosaic rites. 
 
 It is not strange that the Jewish be- 
 lievers as well as their unbelieving coun- 
 trymen were shocked at the report that 
 Paul was teaching that the ancient usages 
 could lawfully be discontinued. Be it 
 observed, that in the Law the Passover 
 
The Old and The New^ 19 
 
 was to be kept not merely till some 
 new memorial should be instituted but 
 " throughout your generations by an 
 ordinance forever." (Exodus xii. 14). 
 Circumcision was ordained not for a few 
 centuries merely and then to give place 
 to another rite but " throughout their 
 generations for an everlasting covenant." 
 (Genesis xvii. 7, 13). And the Seventh 
 Day, the day of God's rest from creation, 
 was to be hallowed not merely till some 
 greater event should confer greater honor 
 on some other day but " throughout 
 their generations for a perpetual cove- 
 nant, a sign forever." (Exodus xxxi. 16, 
 17). In the face of such explicit declara- 
 tions, the idea that a Jew was at liberty 
 to abandon these observances seemed an 
 impious rejection of the plainest word of 
 God. 
 
 Says Prof. Stifler of Crozer Theologi- 
 cal Seminary {Bibliothcca Sacra, Oct., 
 1896); "There is no reason why a Jew 
 on becoming a Christian should cease to 
 be a Jew. Circumcision, the Seventh 
 
20 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 Day, the distinction in meats, have not 
 been abolished for him." This is saying 
 that for a converted Jew to neglect cir- 
 cumcising his children or to discontinue 
 the observance of the Seventh Day is as 
 wrong for him as it would be for us to re- 
 fuse to be baptized, a doctrine directly 
 conflicting with the ideas of modern 
 churches, but sustained by the passages 
 above quoted. If the w^ords of these 
 texts do not enjoin the perpetuity of 
 those ancient institutions, what form 
 of speech would serve to convey that 
 idea? Upon what principle of the con- 
 struction of statutes can writers on eccle- 
 siastical polity declare that the Christian 
 Jew of to-day need not keep the ancient 
 Sabbath or the Passover without their at 
 the same time absolving the Friends 
 from the necessity of the observance of 
 water baptism ? * 
 
 *0n the other hand, as against the principle of 
 "strict construction," it may be noted that although 
 the Passover law plainly said, " And thus shall ye 
 eat it ; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet 
 and vour staff in vour hand ; and ve shall eat it in 
 
The Old and The New. 2 1 
 
 The Jewish disciples were as thor- 
 oughly Jewish as the Sadducees or Phari- 
 sees or any other " sect " of the Israelitish 
 cult. Till the burning of the Temple 
 they continued to offer the Levitical 
 sacrifices and to observe the other Mosaic 
 precepts just as strictly as they had done 
 before they believed on Jesus. And so 
 we must say that their eating of bread in 
 remembrance of the Master did not " take 
 the place" of their Passover supper but 
 was observed in addition to, parallel with 
 and independent of the same. All must 
 accept the statement of Prof. McGiffert 
 in his Christianity in the Apostolic Age : 
 " There is no indication in our sources 
 that in these early days the Lord's Supper 
 was thought of as a continuation of or 
 
 haste," (Exodus xii. ii), the Saviour and the Eleven, 
 with the other Jews of their time, ate it reclining on 
 couches and with the utmost deliberation. It was also 
 written, " And none of you shall go out of ihe door of 
 his house until the mornino;," but Jesus and his com- 
 pany ** went out into the Mount of Olives." What 
 principle is to be adopted in construing the commands 
 of Scripture concerning ritual } 
 
22 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 substitute for the Jewish Passover or 
 that any paschal significance whatever 
 attached to it." 
 
 And their adherence to the Mosaic Law 
 makes plain beyond contradiction another 
 noteworthy fact, namely, that the mem- 
 bers of the church at Jerusalem did not 
 hold the doctrine of the modern church 
 of Rome that the bread of the supper is 
 a sacrifice, the table an altar and the 
 minister a priest. For the old Altar, the 
 old Sacrifices and the old Priesthood, 
 which still remained, were in their view 
 still the appointed media of atonement 
 with God, and of course they cannot 
 have believed in two altars, two priest- 
 hoods and two contemporaneous sets of 
 sacrifices. 
 
IV. 
 '' Hoc Estr 
 
 WHAT did Jesus mean when he 
 said, '' This is my body, — my 
 blood"? 
 
 The church of Rome in the decrees of 
 the Council of Trent declares that '' by 
 the consecration of the bread and of 
 the wine a conversion is made of the 
 whole substance of the bread into the 
 substance of the body of Christ our Lord 
 and of the whole substance of the wine 
 into the substance of his blood." Under 
 this doctrine the words of Jesus could be 
 paraphrased as: — This which a moment 
 ago was bread, and which to all the senses 
 appears still to be bread, is bread no 
 longer, but has been transubstantiated 
 and changed so that now it is my body. 
 The, " This /j," would be construed as 
 meaning, — This Jias become — my body. 
 
24 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 The Lutherans go so far in this direc- 
 tion as to declare that '' the body and 
 blood of Christ are truly present and are 
 distributed to those that eat in the Lord's 
 Supper," {Augsburg Confession) \ and 
 that *' the true body and true blood of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ are truly and sub- 
 stantially present and are distributed 
 with the bread and wine and are taken 
 with the mouth by all those who use this 
 sacrament be they worthy or unworthy, 
 good or bad, believers or unbelievers " 
 {Formula of Concord). They deny tran- 
 substantiation and hold that the bread 
 and wine remain such, but they assert that 
 the body and blood of Christ are mysteri- 
 ously and supernaturally united with the 
 physical elements so that the former are 
 eaten and drunk when the latter are. 
 Under this doctrine the, '' This is " 
 might be paraphrased as, — Here is — my 
 body. 
 
 The Presbyterians declare in the West- 
 minster Confession that worthy receivers 
 do inwardly by faith really and indeed 
 
'' Hoc Estr 25 
 
 receive and feed upon Christ crucified, 
 the body and blood of Christ being really 
 present to the faith of believers. What 
 they mean by this the reader must decide 
 for himself. 
 
 The Baptists, however, and many others 
 with them, regard the bread and wine as 
 mere symbols. They declare the physi- 
 cal elements in the new memorial to be 
 simply remembrancers, as were the lamb 
 and the bitter herbs in the Passover 
 meal. They deny that the partaker is 
 spiritually affected by the bread and wine 
 except indirectly as was the pious Israel- 
 ite in receiving the paschal symbols. 
 
 The theory of the Baptists concerning 
 the breaking of bread is the same as their 
 belief regarding baptism, namely, that the 
 outward act is merely symbolic. Though 
 in opposition to the Society of Friends 
 they declare that water-baptism is to be 
 retained, — as a coronation ceremony is 
 fitting when one has become a king, — 
 yet they declare also just as emphatically 
 as do the Friends that salvation is in no 
 
26 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 way conditioned on baptism but comes 
 by faith alone. And it is in what they 
 consider the only logical carrying out of 
 this doctrine that they will baptize none 
 but believers and will use nothing but 
 immersion as baptism. 
 
 The Church of Rome, holding that 
 there is a regenerative efficacy in the 
 baptismal water, such that one is truly 
 " christened," that is, made a Christian, 
 in baptism, logically baptizes unconscious 
 infants, and also adults, who give practi- 
 cally no signs of ** grace." But Baptists 
 holding that baptism is merely a symbol 
 of a spiritual change already wrought, 
 baptize none but those who give evidence 
 of being regenerate already and without 
 baptsim. Again, the Church of Rome, 
 which practised immersion down to the 
 thirteenth century, and in Great Britain 
 till the sixteenth, believes baptism to be 
 essential to salvation, and so when one 
 was converted in sickness, and immersion. 
 the ordinary baptism, was out of the 
 question, it administered pouring or 
 
*■' Hoc Esty 27 
 
 merely sprinkling. But Baptists hold 
 that water-baptism is in no way essential 
 to salvation, and so when the apostolic 
 ceremony of immersion is impracticable 
 they do not have recourse to sprinkling 
 or any other substitute but unhesitatingly 
 let the convert die entirely unbapti'zed. 
 So far from their believing that immersion 
 is essential to salvation, as some ill-in- 
 formed persons have ridiculously sup- 
 posed them to hold, the very fact that 
 Baptists will practice nothing but immer- 
 sion — which often involves the necessity 
 of letting sick converts and prisoners die 
 without baptism — shows plainly that they 
 consider water-baptism in no way neces- 
 sary to salvation. Holding that faith is 
 the only condition to salvation they do 
 not scruple in the least, in a case of diffi- 
 culty, to let a convert die ivitJiout any 
 baptismal ceremony zv hat ever. As com- 
 pared with others they make very little of 
 baptism. 
 
 Now as Baptists hold that baptism will 
 not make a man a Christian any more 
 
28 Christ ill the Daily Meal. 
 
 than putting a crown on his head will 
 make him a king, and as they deny that 
 immersion is essential to salvation any 
 more than a coronation ceremony is ab- 
 solutely necessary to real kingship, or a 
 uniform to one's being a soldier, so they 
 declare that the bread and wine are only 
 symbols, mere outward emblems. 
 
 This symbolic conception is often called 
 the Zwinglian theory, after the great 
 Swiss reformer. He did indeed adopt it 
 concerning the breaking of bread, and 
 when Hubmeyer and others of his associ- 
 ates went on and applied it to baptism 
 also, Zwingli was at first inclined to go 
 with them. But when he perceived that 
 the baptism of none but believers logically 
 involved a discontinuance of the union 
 between the Church and the State he 
 shrank back, and at last became a violent 
 persecutor of his friends who had adopted 
 Baptist views. Now it is hardly proper 
 to name a theory after a man who shrank 
 from carrying it out to its full extent. 
 It would be more truly historic if the 
 
" Hoc Estr 29 
 
 symbolic conception were called the 
 Baptist theory. 
 
 Under this theory, the declaration, 
 **This is my body," is construed meta- 
 phorically, like '' The field is [in a figure] 
 the world;" " The tares are [representa- 
 tively] the children of the wicked one ; " 
 " The seven good kine are seven years ; " 
 " I am the vine ; " and, " That rock was 
 Christ." As of a picture we say, *' This 
 is Napoleon," so one may understand 
 Jesus as saying, — This is my body, sym- 
 bolically : and, — This is, in an image, 
 my blood. 
 
Symbolism, 
 
 UNDER any theory, the term, ''the 
 body of Christ," must refer to 
 Christ himself. The mere flesh of Jesus 
 was but chemical matter and no one can 
 show that it differed from the flesh of 
 any other man '' born of a woman." 
 In John vi. 56, 57, the expression, " He 
 that eateth my flesh," is used as an 
 equivalent to, '' He that eateth me." 
 We may say therefore with the Helvetic 
 Confession, " His body and blood, that 
 is. Himself " ; and with Dean Stanley 
 {Christian Institutions), " As in other 
 parts of the Bible the hand, the heart, the 
 face of God, are used for God himself, 
 so the body, the flesh, of Christ are used 
 for Christ himself, for his whole person- 
 ality and character." 
 
 And now let us ask in what sense one 
 
Symbolism. 31 
 
 may say that Christ's body and blood 
 are represented by the bread and wine. 
 
 Taking the latter first, we recall that 
 vivid picture in Hebrew poetry of the 
 warrior with dyed garments whose ap- 
 parel is red '' like him that treadeth in 
 the wine fat," (Isaiah Ixiii. i,) and in 
 Deuteronomy xxxii. 14, the red wine is 
 termed " the blood of the grape." One 
 may understand that it is this familiar 
 comparison of wine to blood which Jesus 
 uses, bidding them note in the crimson 
 of the cup an image of his blood shed for 
 them. 
 
 Some have thought that they beheld a 
 symbolism in the pouring out of the 
 wine. It may be noted however, that 
 the scriptures nowhere speak of the wine 
 as " poured out." For all that we are told 
 to the contrary it may have been dipped 
 out. We are not informed how the cup 
 was filled. It is in the wine itself, not 
 in what is done to it, that the symbol is 
 found. 
 
 It may also be remarked that if it be 
 
32 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 only by virtue of its color that it repre- 
 sents Christ's blood, it matters not wheth- 
 er the wine be fermented or unfermented. 
 The presence of alcohol is in no way 
 necessary to the symbolism. The spirit- 
 ual is not dependent on the spirituous. 
 
 And though we can hardly accept the 
 view of a certain distinguished author 
 that ''cider, milk or even water may be 
 substituted for wine," for neither of these 
 has the suggestive color, yet the red juice 
 of some other berry than the grape could 
 represent Christ's blood. 
 
 It may be worth while to note that 
 wine had no part in the Passover ritual 
 as ordained by Moses ; it was introduced 
 only by " the elders." But Jesus could 
 use it as a symbol all the same. 
 
 Turning now to the bread, it will be re- 
 membered that many have thought they 
 saw in it as well as in the wine a direct 
 reference to Christ's death, the breaking 
 of the bread being supposed to be in- 
 tended to present " His broken body." 
 It should be noted however that in 
 
Synibolisni. 33 
 
 I Corinthians xi. 24, " My body which is 
 broken for you," — the only passage in the 
 Common Version in which the term 
 broken is applied to Christ's body, the 
 Revised Version omits the word, while 
 on the other hand the Gospel of John 
 (xix. 36), calls especial attention to the 
 fact that Christ's body \vas not broken. 
 Not only each bone but the flesh of Jesus 
 also was left substantially whole. His 
 body was not torn and mangled but only 
 " pierced " and to speak of it as broken is 
 as incorrect as it would be to say that a 
 loaf of bread is broken when the tine of 
 a fork is thrust into it. 
 
 Again, why should a reference to 
 Christ's death be supposed in the break- 
 ing of bread at that Passover supper any 
 more than on other Passover occasions 
 and in all other meals? When Jesus 
 broke bread in the feeding of the five 
 thousand did he intend to symbolize his 
 death ? Did Paul intend a reference to 
 this when he broke bread on his vessel ? 
 Was there a reference to Christ's death 
 
34 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 in the daily meals of all the Jews, among 
 whom the breaking of bread was the pro- 
 cedure in, as it was a name for, the or- 
 dinary repast ? Why should we in this 
 one case ascribe to the breaking of bread 
 a significance which plainly it did not 
 have elsewhere ? The fact is that to say 
 there was a reference to Christ's death in 
 the breaking of the bread is as purely 
 fanciful as it would be to imagine that 
 death was symbolized by the reclining at 
 the table. 
 
 Jesus already in speaking to the multi- 
 tude (John vi.) had referred to bread as a 
 symbol of himself. And so at his last 
 Passover, the Lord may be understood 
 to present the loaf as an object parable, 
 saying, — This which ye eat to sustain 
 your mortal existence is a symbol of me 
 whom ye must receive as the support of 
 your spiritual life. 
 
 The Heidelberg Catechism, under the 
 question why Christ doth call the bread 
 his body, answers that like as bread sus- 
 tains this temporal life, so his body is the 
 true meat of our souls. 
 
Symbolism, 35 
 
 The Belgic Confession, the standard of 
 the Dutch Reformed Church, says, " God 
 hath given us for the support of the bod- 
 ily and earthly life, earthly and common 
 bread -^^ * * * but for the support of the 
 spiritual and heavenly life which believ- 
 ers have, he hath sent a living bread 
 which descended from heaven, namely, 
 Jesus Christ," and, '' Christ that he might 
 represent unto us this spiritual and heav- 
 enly bread hath instituted an earthly and 
 visible bread as a sacrament of his body." 
 
 In like manner the Articles of Religion 
 of the Reformed Episcopal Church de- 
 clare the Supper '' a symbol of the soul's 
 feeding upon Christ." 
 
 Charles Hodge {Systematic Theology^ 
 makes the bread an '' emblem of him 
 who declared himself to be the true 
 bread which came down from heaven " 
 and he says that the Supper " represents 
 our feeding upon Christ for our spiritual 
 nourishment." Such quotations could 
 be multiplied. 
 
 We may remark in passing that if it be 
 
3^ Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 simply in its character of food that the 
 bread symbolizes Christ, it is a vain con- 
 ceit to dwell on merely incidental facts 
 such as that the bread is made from sepa- 
 rate grains and that the grains must be 
 crushed. This is an attempt to " make 
 the parable go on all fours." 
 
 Nor matters it whether the bread be 
 leavened or unleavened, since in both 
 cases it is food the same. The fact that 
 the bread was unleavened presents it as 
 travelers' food, the bread of haste, a 
 matter of sicrnificance in the ancient 
 memorial but of none in the new. And 
 of course one need not be troubled by a 
 question like that which Parkman men- 
 tions as discussed between Huguenots 
 and Catholics among the " Pioneers of 
 France in the New World," whether the 
 sacramental bread could be made of the 
 meal of Indian corn. Bread is bread, no 
 matter of what it be compounded. 
 
 And if it be merely as sustenance of 
 the body that the bread symbolizes 
 Christ the support of the soul, the term 
 
Symbolism. 37 
 
 bread may be given the same meaning 
 in this connection as in the, *' Give us 
 this day our daily bread," and may 
 include all forms of food. In Acts ii. 46 
 and xxvii. 34-36, where the breaking of 
 bread is mentioned, <^P™f, bread, is made 
 synonymous with i"po9'7, nourishmejit.^ 
 
 Alford on Matthew xxvi. 26, makes 
 rovTo^ tJiis^ equivalent to '' the food of 
 man " and says that in this passage " we 
 have bread ' the staff of life ' identified 
 with the body of the Lord." This con- 
 struction makes the term bread include 
 all varieties of food, and it would sanction 
 what is said sometimes to have occurred 
 in far northern islands, the use of dried 
 fish in place of a loaf in the church sup- 
 per.f 
 
 Instead, therefore of regarding the 
 
 *And while tovto, this, being neuter, cannot agree 
 with aprog, bread^ which is masculine, it will, by coin- 
 cidence, agree with ftpcjua,food. 
 
 t And would it not be limiting the power of the 
 priestly Hoc est to doubt that it could transubstantiate 
 something else than a wheaten wafer into the true 
 body, something else than grape wine into the true 
 blood ? 
 
38 Christ in the Daily Meal, 
 
 bread and wine as, like the kine and 
 wheat-heads of Pharaoh's dream, mere 
 duplicate emblems of the same thing, 
 many regard the bread as symbolizing 
 Christ himself in his whole personality 
 and work, while the wine sets forth the 
 crowning act of his ministry, his yielding 
 himself a sacrifice ; the bread recalling 
 the whole Christ and the wine his death. 
 So Godet on Luke says that the supper 
 seems '* to represent the totality of salva- 
 tion ; the bread, the communication of 
 the life of Christ ; the wine, the gift of par- 
 don ; in other words, according to Paul's 
 language, sanctification and justification." 
 And on i Corinthians x. 16, he says, " In 
 the blood represented by the cup we con- 
 template and apply to ourselves Christ 
 dead for us ; in the body, represented by 
 the bread we appropriate Christ living in 
 usr 
 
 The late Dr. H. J. Van Dyke writes, 
 " Christ did not say, ' This do in remem- 
 brance of my death ' * * -^ -^^ Christ him- 
 self in his divine fullness and not any part 
 
Symbolism. 39 
 
 of his person or of his history is the sub- 
 ject and the substance of the sacrament. 
 His death as the sacrifice for sin, though 
 it is the central point, is but a small part 
 of the history of his relation to his re- 
 deemed people." 
 
VI. 
 
 " Our Daily Bread'' as the Body of 
 Christ. 
 
 TO determine the meaning of the words, 
 ''This is my body," let us ask, — 
 Just when does the bread become the 
 body of Christ ? 
 
 The Roman CathoHc answers that it is 
 when the consecrated priest utters the 
 august formula that the mysterious change 
 takes place. But what evidence has he 
 that any change is wrought in the bread 
 and wine? 
 
 It is not correct to say that the Roman 
 Catholic takes Christ's words '' literally." 
 His construction of the Lord's declara- 
 tion is, — This is my body as a monient 
 ago it was not. The latter clause how- 
 ever is an unwarranted addition ; it is 
 
" Our Daily Bread.'' 41 
 
 not expressed nor in any way implied in 
 Jesus' own words. 
 
 One has no right to construe the dec- 
 laration, " This is my body," as mean- 
 ing, — This has been changed into, has 
 become, my body. I'heword /f does not 
 mean Has become ; it predicates simply 
 existence without any suggestion of a 
 beginning. The declaration, ''This is a 
 diamond," does not imply that it was 
 formerly something else than a diamond. 
 And if to a group of tourists it be said, 
 " That officer on the gray horse is the 
 Kaiser," he does not then first become 
 Kaiser. And so the words, " This is my 
 body," do not in any way suggest that 
 it has not been Christ's body hereto- 
 fore. 
 
 The implication is in fact just the op- 
 posite. What a thing is to-day we must 
 assume it to have been yesterday and 
 last week and indefinitely hitherto. If a 
 man asserts that what a thing is now, it 
 formerly was not, the burden of proof is 
 on him. Until therefore it be clearly 
 
42 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 shown that the bread has indeed under- 
 gone a change we must hold that the 
 loaf which is Christ's body now as it lies 
 on the church table was his body just the 
 same before it came to the table and has 
 been his body from the first. 
 
 Till the additional idea has been 
 proved untenable the words, ''This is," 
 mean also, — This was. Wherefore the 
 '' literal " and only logical construction 
 of Jesus' words is, — This is my body 
 as it ahvays has been. 
 
 Says Martin Luther in arguing for 
 the doctrine of the Real Presence, '' We 
 should allow the words of Scripture to 
 retain their natural force and should 
 assign no other signification to them." 
 But he himself directly violates this 
 canon and ascribes an " other significa- 
 tion " to the words, "This is my body," 
 when he construes them as meaning, — 
 This is my body, as it has not been here- 
 tofore. The "natural force" of the 
 Lord's words is, — This is my body as it 
 has been from the first. 
 
'' Our Daily Breads 43 
 
 Take, again, the quip ascribed to 
 Queen Elizabeth, — 
 
 " It was the Word that spake it. 
 He took the bread and brake it, 
 And what his word doth make it, 
 That I believe and take it." 
 
 This is very good ; but what does the 
 Lord "make it"? He does not say or 
 hint that the bread has undergone a 
 change so that it is now what it was not 
 before. No suggestion of any such trans- 
 mutation is found in the Saviour's words 
 nor in the necessities of the case. And 
 in the failure to produce evidence of a 
 change, all forms of the doctrine of the 
 Real Presence, whether Roman, Lutheran 
 or Anglican, break down utterly and com 
 pletely. 
 
 To determine therefore the sense in 
 which the bread on the Church table is 
 Christ's body, we have only to inquire in 
 what sense it was his body before it came 
 to the table. Certainly it was not such in 
 constituent substance. It was however 
 his body even then in symbol, the food 
 
44 CJirist hi the Daily Meal. 
 
 of the natural life being an image of 
 Christ the bread of heaven. Until there- 
 fore some one shows that it was or has 
 become his body in some other sense, the 
 only fair construction we can assign to 
 Jesus' declaration is, — This is my body, 
 my blood, in a figure ; or, — This is, sym- 
 bolically, my body.' 
 
 But even in " Evangelical " circles, 
 where the bread and wine are considered 
 merely symbols, the idea lingers that they 
 are made what they were not before. This 
 shows itself in that common term, '* the 
 consecration of the elements." Now in 
 what sense are the bread and wine con- 
 secrated when they are declared symbols 
 of Christ's body and blood? Were the 
 leaven and the mustard seed " conse- 
 crated " in any manner when Jesus pro- 
 nounced them figures of divine things ? 
 When he said, — " I am the vine," — he did 
 not impart to the vine any new quality 
 or make it in any way to differ from what 
 it had always been. How then are the 
 bread and wine, when declared to be sym- 
 
" Our Daily Bread:* 45 
 
 bols, made what they were not before ? 
 Is not this term, *' the consecration of the 
 elements," merely a survival of Roman 
 Catholic doctrine ? 
 
 If a man gave to his friend, say, an an- 
 cient coin to remember him by, this would 
 indeed undergo a change, the act of the 
 giver imparting to it a memorial quality 
 which it did not before possess. But were 
 it his photograph which the man presented 
 the case would be different. The coin is a 
 remembrancer only by arbitrary appoint- 
 ment ; the portrait, in its original nature. 
 Of the coin, the giver says, " Let this be- 
 come a reminder " ; of the likeness, he 
 says, *' This is something which will 
 make you think of me." The coin is 
 given that it may be changed into a me- 
 morial ; the picture, because it has the 
 memorial quality already. Now the 
 bread and wine are not arbitrarily ap- 
 pointed remembrancers ; they are remem- 
 brancers by their very nature, the loaf 
 being a figure of the bread of heaven and 
 the wine an image of Christ's blood. 
 
46 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 They are not changed into Christ's body 
 and blood ; they are such already. 
 
 Till it is clearly shown, what has never 
 been shown, that there is indeed some 
 change wrought in or passed upon the 
 loaf on the Church table, we must say 
 that it is Christ's body not because of any 
 change it has undergone but by virtue of 
 its original character, that it does not be- 
 come Christ's body but is such by its 
 proper nature. 
 
 And now if the words of Christ do not 
 mean, — This is my body as a moment ago 
 it was not,— they cannot be construed 
 as meaning, — This is my body as other 
 bread is not. If the loaf on the Church 
 table be Christ's body not in virtue of a 
 change wrought in or passed upon it, but 
 by reason of its original character as food, 
 then every other loaf is his body just the 
 same, for each other loaf possesses the 
 same character and contains in itself the 
 same symbolism. 
 
 When the wife of the deacon or sac- 
 ristan, making bread for her household 
 
" Our Daily Breads 47 
 
 takes out one loaf for use in Church, at 
 what exact time does that loaf become 
 Christ's body ? This loaf is borne to the 
 church not that it may be there changed 
 into Christ's body, but because of the 
 fact that it is such already, being even 
 now, as material food, an image of the 
 the bread of heaven. It is the symbolic 
 body of Christ even now as it still lies 
 among its fellow loaves and these other 
 loaves though carried to the home table 
 are Christ's body in just the same sense, 
 for they also symbolize Christ, the bread 
 of life. 
 
 The ancient coin which a man gives 
 his friend as a souvenir is by that act 
 made to differ from all other coins even 
 of the same kind. But the photograph 
 presented as a remembrancer is such only 
 as is every other photograph struck from 
 the same negative. Now the loaf on the 
 church table has no memorial character 
 which is not possessed by every other 
 loaf, and thus its fellow loaves are Christ's 
 symbolic body as truly as it. 
 
48 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 Had Jesus pointed to a particular vine 
 and said, '' I am this vine " ; we should 
 still have understood him to speak not of 
 that one vine alone but of every vine, for 
 in every vine resides the like symbolism. 
 When according to an old time formula 
 the so-called "■ consecration of the ele- 
 ments" was cautiously limited to " so 
 much as is needed," wherein was the 
 '' needed " portion made to differ from 
 the unconsecrated remainder when the 
 latter represented as truly as the former 
 the bread of heaven and the atoning 
 blood? There is no symbolism in one 
 loaf which is not found in every loaf 
 none in one wine which is not in all wine. 
 One bread represents Christ's body only 
 as does every other bread. If therefore,. 
 the, "This is," means, — This represents 
 — my body ; all bread is Christ s body 
 as much as any one bread. The symbolic 
 theory makes every loaf Christ's body, 
 all wine his blood. 
 
 When St. Patrick according to legend 
 held up before the people the shamrock 
 
" Our Daily Breads 49 
 
 as a symbol of the Trinity, he did not 
 then and there make it a symbol ; he 
 held it forth because it was already such 
 a symbol. Nor did he speak .merely of 
 the one sprig he then presented in his 
 hand. That particular leaf illustrated 
 the doctrine only as did every other tre- 
 foil. He in effect declared every sprig 
 of shamrock an image of the great 
 mystery. And so the declaration, " This 
 is my body," cannot be understood to 
 mean that the bread then first becomes 
 Christ's body ; nor, again, to refer to one 
 loaf as distinct from others. The loaf 
 represents Christ's body only as it always 
 has done, and only as does every other 
 loaf, the bread on the home table just as 
 fully as that on the plates in church. 
 
 For the manna in the desert was not 
 less a type of Christ, a " spiritual meat," 
 because it was the every day food of the 
 people. A genuine shepherd, a man 
 actually guarding sheep, would represent 
 Jesus fully as well as a boy dressed up 
 like a shepherd in a Sunday School 
 
50 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 tableau. And so the loaf of the daily 
 meal, eaten actually to sustain life, sym- 
 bolizes Christ our daily Saviour and sup- 
 port certainly as well as a little cube of 
 bread eaten at rare intervals in the mere 
 imitation of a meal. 
 
 The Westminster Confession speaks of 
 the bread on the Church table as " set 
 apart from a common to a holy use." 
 But the bread devoted to the '' common " 
 use of the support of the body is in fact 
 the only bread which is truly capable of 
 the sacred use of representing Christ the 
 support of the soul. For the church 
 supper presents no symbolism whatever 
 except as it is assumed to be an ordinary 
 meal. The church bread does not repre- 
 sent Christ, is not his body at all, except 
 as it purports to be *' daily " bread. It is 
 the bread to which one sits down faint 
 and hungry which is the true likeness of 
 the bread of heaven, the food so much 
 and so continually needed by our starv- 
 ing, perishing souls. It is in fact only the 
 bread of the daily meal, eaten actually to 
 
'' Our Daily Breads 51 
 
 support life, which truly represents and 
 thus '' is " Christ's body. 
 
 We have an analogous case in the 
 washing of feet commanded by the Lord 
 " the same night." The true exhibition 
 of Christ-like humility is not when pope 
 or kaiser dramatically laves a poor man's 
 feet which have been carefully cleansed 
 and perfumed beforehand ; it is when a 
 Sister Dora in the hospital washes the 
 noisome feet of a dying tramp. The foot- 
 washing which Jesus ordained was the 
 washing of dirty feet. Those churches 
 which consider it their duty literally to 
 maintain the practice should perform the 
 act on Saturday night when the feet still 
 reek with the sweat of toil, for it is a 
 solemn farce to defer the procedure till 
 Sunday morning when the real cleansing 
 has been already done. And just as un- 
 reasonably do they exalt form above sub- 
 stance who deem the bread of a merely 
 dramatic meal a better symbol of the 
 sustaining Christ than the food eaten 
 actually to support existence. As it is 
 
52 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 not a pretended but a real washing of 
 feet which displays humility, so it is not 
 a pretended but a real taking of food 
 which shows forth the soul's feeding on 
 Christ. 
 
 When Paul says, *' As often as ye eat 
 this bread and drink this cup ye do shew 
 the Lord's death till he come," (i Corin- 
 thians xi. 26), we cannot understand him 
 to distinguish between " this bread " and 
 other bread any more than to understand 
 that when Jesus says, '' I will not drink 
 henceforth of this fruit of the vine," 
 he distinguishes between this and some 
 other fruit of the vine which he may 
 drink. The bread and cup of the disci- 
 ples' daily meal served to symbolize and 
 ** shew " the Lord and his death as fully 
 as did the loaf and cup of their church 
 gatherings. There was no symbolism in 
 their church meals which was not found 
 in their daily repasts. And in like man- 
 ner one cannot declare of the bread on 
 the church table of to-day that it alone 
 is the body of Christ, for it does not repre- 
 
*' Our Daily Breads 53 
 
 sent Christ any more fully than does the 
 loaf of the daily meal. 
 
 Since the words, *' This is my body," 
 mean, — This is my body in a symbol, 
 This represents my body,— and since all 
 bread symbolizes Christ the food of the 
 soul just the same as any one bread, then, 
 all bread is the body of Christ, the loaf 
 on the cottage-board, just as truly as the 
 wafer on the high altar of the cathedral ; 
 and one wine is his blood only as is every 
 other wine, all blood of the grape being 
 an image of Christ's blood shed for men. 
 Therefore, whenever a disciple beholds in 
 his daily bread an image of Christ the 
 food of his soul, that daily bread is the 
 body of Christ just as truly as is the loaf 
 of ecclesiastical ceremony. 
 
VII. 
 
 May One Disciple ''Do This''? 
 
 ON whom did Jesus lay the command, 
 " This do ye " ? Taken by itself, 
 the injunction would apply indifferently 
 to the disciples as a body, or as indi- 
 viduals. Did the Saviour mean, — Unite 
 and do this, — or, — This do ye eacJi one 
 of y oil, in company with others or alone? 
 
 It has been assumed that we have here 
 a "church ordinance"; that the com- 
 mand was given to the disciples as a cor- 
 poration and therefore that the memorial 
 eating can be done only by the assembled 
 congregation, or at least by the authori- 
 zation of the whole Church. 
 
 The Eleven, however, to whom these 
 words were addressed were not a church. 
 They were not the whole body of disci- 
 ples even there in Jerusalem. They were 
 more like a traveling theological semi- 
 
May One Disciple ''Do This'' ? 55 
 
 nary than a church. They were in fact 
 a family, a group of travelers having the 
 right under Jewish usage to act as a 
 household for the purposes of the paschal 
 celebration. Nor is there any ground 
 for saying that they *' represented the 
 church " any more than did the house- 
 hold at Bethany or than did any one of 
 the many other groups of believing Gali- 
 lean pilgrims who that night ate the 
 Passover in and around Jerusalem. And 
 the fact that the paschal feast like our 
 Thanksgiving Dinner was not a public 
 and general, but a family and private 
 gathering would suggest that the new 
 memorial can be celebrated by a smaller 
 group than the w^iole church. 
 
 Sometimes after a meeting of the 
 Evangelical Alliance or on some other 
 such occasion there is held a " Union 
 Communion Service." But this is not a 
 church gathering. No ecclesiastical body 
 authorizes the celebration nor is any 
 asked so to do. Those \\A\o take part in 
 it do so merely as individual Christians, 
 
56 Christ in the Daily MeaL 
 
 acting entirely outside church connec- 
 tions. It is not an ecclesiastical assem- 
 blage any more than is a prayer meeting 
 in the cabin of an ocean steamer. Now 
 those who say that the command of Christ 
 is obeyed when two hundred individual 
 Christians eat and drink in remembrance 
 of the Lord, must say that it will be just 
 as truly obeyed if only two do this or 
 when a disciple alone by himself breaks 
 bread in remembrance of the Saviour. 
 
 Among the Baptists there are many 
 who declare that the memorial eating 
 cannot properly be observed at the meet- 
 ing of an Association or at any other 
 general gathering but only by a local 
 congregation. Even these, however, will 
 admit that it may take place in the cham- 
 ber of the sick provided the occasion be 
 a church meeting formally appointed. 
 But surely it is a piece of ecclesiastical 
 pettifogging to call that a church assem- 
 bly from which it is intended that the 
 church members with two or three ex- 
 ceptions shall all stay away. 
 
May One Disciple '' Do This''? $7 
 
 It is true that the Master uses the 
 plural form, '' This do ye." But so does 
 he in, *' Ye believe in God, believe also 
 in me," — "Abide in me and I in you," 
 — " Hitherto ye have asked nothing in 
 my name ; ask and ye shall receive, that 
 your joy may be full," — injunctions given 
 at the same sitting and in which he is 
 certainly addressing the disciples not as a 
 corporation but as individuals. Now re- 
 membrance of Christ is an individual act 
 as truly as believing in Christ, abiding 
 in him or asking in his name, and we 
 must say therefore that if a disciple, sit- 
 ting down alone by himself, eats and 
 drinks in remembrance of the Saviour he 
 obeys this memorial ordinance just as fully 
 as if he ate and drank in the great con- 
 gregation. 
 
 Whether a command addressed to a 
 plurality of persons is intended for them 
 as a company or as individuals may be 
 determined by the nature of the injunc- 
 tion. If a minister called on his congre- 
 gation to arise and build a new house of 
 
58 CJirist ill the Daily Meal. 
 
 worship, we should understand that they 
 were to act as a body. If, however, he 
 demanded of them to be prayerful, or to 
 love their enemies, we should regard him 
 as addressing them individually. Now 
 remembrance of Christ, like faith in Christ, 
 is the act not of a corporation but of a 
 single person, and a command therefor 
 must be regarded as contemplating indi- 
 vidual action. 
 
 A Christian Robinson Crusoe, a lone 
 missionary like Livingstone, the one pious 
 sailor on board ship or the single devout 
 traveler in the caravan would need to 
 remember Christ, and why should he not 
 do this in the bearking of bread ? Is 
 there not as much reason for his so doing 
 in his loneliness as there would be had he 
 a thousand to join him ? The command, 
 "Believe in me," or, ''Abide in me," 
 would be given all the same were there 
 but one disciple in the world, and why is 
 it not the same with the injunction, 
 ''This do ye in remembrance of me"? 
 Why should not any disciple at any time 
 
May One Disciple " Do This " f 59 
 
 break bread even alone in remembrance 
 of his Lord ? 
 
 Tl:iere are many Baptists who in defend- 
 ing the usage of restricted communion 
 declare that in taking the bread and wine 
 the disciple communes not with his fellow 
 disciples but with Christ alone. If, how- 
 ever, the sole parties to the transaction 
 are the individual believer and Christ 
 why is it necessary that other disciples be 
 present? A man can certainly commune 
 with Christ at home by himself alone as 
 well as in the church assembly. 
 
 It will of course be granted that as the 
 Christian delights to pray in company 
 with his brethren and to join his voice 
 with theirs in singing praise to the 
 Redeemer, so he will take pleasure in 
 sitting down with them to eat bread in 
 remembrance of their common Lord. 
 But the breaking of bread is not solely a 
 church ordinance any more than prayer 
 or praise, in which a man can engage 
 alone by himself as well as in company 
 with the whole church, and the disciple 
 
6o Clu'ist i?i the Daily Meal. 
 
 who is isolated from his brethren is not 
 ** deprived of the privilege " of a memo- 
 rial feast any more than of the enjoyment 
 of singing or prayinj. 
 
 The words, '* This do ye,*' do not 
 necessarily mean, — Assemble and do this. 
 The idea that the memorial breaking of 
 bread can lawfully be observed only in 
 ecclesiastical connection has no basis 
 whatever in the New Testament nor in 
 sound . reason. One needs no Church 
 warrant for remembering the Lord in the 
 breaking of bread any more than for any 
 other Christian exercise. One can eat 
 and drink in remembrance of Christ alone 
 by himself and on his own authority as 
 freely as he can sing praise by himself 
 alone. As the command, "After this 
 manner pray ye," is observed when a 
 single disciple kneels down and says, 
 "Thy kingdom come," so if a believer 
 eats and drinks in his own home in re- 
 membrance of his Saviour, he obeys the 
 command, " This do ye," just as truly 
 as when he goes to the house of God 
 with the multitude to keep holy day. 
 
VIII. 
 
 What did Christ Mean by, ''As 
 Oft As— ? 
 
 THE Lord's command is — Eat, drink, 
 in remembrance of me. And this 
 is the whole of his command. There is 
 no ground in Scripture for the traditional 
 idea that he orders not only an eating and 
 drinking '' in remembrance " but also 
 that this be done apart from other eat- 
 ing and for memorial purposes alone. 
 
 One repast may serve two ends. As 
 the table which is spread for the satisfac- 
 tion of hunger may also be used in the cul- 
 tivation of friendship with neighbors, so 
 the bread and wine taken by the disciples 
 in support and refreshment of the body 
 could be also made remembrancers of 
 Christ's body and blood. Thus the com- 
 mand to them to eat and drink in remem- 
 brance of the Master was not necessarily a 
 
62 CJirist in the Daily Meal. 
 
 command for a separate meal. That they 
 should fully and completely carry out 
 the injunction, all that was required was 
 that they should eat their daily bread in 
 memory of Christ, the bread of heaven, 
 and make their daily cup a reminder of 
 the blood of Christ, of which that wine 
 was an image. 
 
 The Passover Supper was not solely 
 memorial in character. Like our Thanks- 
 giving dinner or the collation at a Col- 
 lege Commencement it served as one of 
 the ordinary meals of the day. The 
 command establishing it was simply that 
 on that notable day the food for the sup- 
 port of the body should be a lamb, etc., 
 which would serve also a historical pur- 
 pose. Why then may not the Christian 
 memorial eating be done in the daily 
 meal ? Since the Passover feast was an 
 actual supper, why may not the new re- 
 membrance be made in a true repast. 
 
 We have already seen (p. 14) that it 
 was a paschal loaf which Jesus bade them 
 eat, a paschal cup which he bade them 
 
''As Oft As—'' 63 
 
 drink, as symbols of his body and blood. 
 To the bread and wine of the ancient me- 
 morial he gave an additional meaning. 
 But if the loaf and cup of the Saviour's 
 last Passover could serve a double pur- 
 pose, if remembrance of Christ could be 
 made in the paschal meal, why cannot 
 also the daily repast subserve a two-fold 
 end, reminding of Christ while supporting 
 the body ? 
 
 Had Jesus intended a special meal Hke 
 the ancient Passover would he not have 
 appointed for it special articles of food 
 like the lamb and the bitter herbs of the 
 paschal feast? But the materials or- 
 dained for the new memorial were simply 
 the bread and wine of the every day 
 meal. Now if the memorial eating was 
 to differ from the ordinary eating in no 
 respect whatever in its outward acts, 
 what ground is there for saying that it 
 was to differ therefrom in time? 
 
 What did Jesus tell the disciples to do 
 in remembrance of him ? He told them 
 to do only what they were already doing 
 
64 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 every day, namely, to eat bread and drink 
 wine. He appointed nothing new to be 
 eaten and drunk, but merely a new 
 thought in eating and drinking what they 
 now ate and drank. All that was neces- 
 sary to change the old meal into the new 
 was to bring into it a remembrance of 
 Christ. When once the new thought was 
 introduced the daily supper became the 
 required memorial feast. 
 
 Let us ask, — Would it be allowable 
 for a disciple of to-day to behold in his 
 daily loaf a symbol of Christ the bread of 
 heaven and to eat this " in remembrance 
 of" the Bread of Life 1 Please stop and 
 answer. But if the disciple did this 
 would he not do all that we do when we 
 eat of the loaf in church ? Wherein 
 would an eating of the daily meal " in re- 
 membrance " fall short of the breaking of 
 bread in church ? And what occasion was 
 there for the Master to institute for the 
 disciples a new and separate meal when 
 the loaf and cup of their daily repast gave 
 all the symbolism needed for a memorial ? 
 
^*As Oft As—" 65 
 
 Though the declaration, " This is my 
 body," and the command, "This do in 
 remembrance of me," do not stand in 
 the Gospels in immediate connection, yet 
 each implies the other. Taken together, 
 their meaning is, — Forasmuch as this 
 bread is, in a symbol, my body let it re- 
 mind you of me. Now what bread is it 
 that, is in a figure, Christ's body? It is 
 (p. 50) the bread which is eaten to satisfy 
 hunger. A loaf eaten for a memorial 
 purpose alone would in fact not be a 
 memorial. The loaf which is not eaten 
 to satisfy hunger is not Christ's symbolic 
 body at all. The bread on the Church 
 table is a figure of Christ's body only as 
 we assume the Church supper to be an 
 ordinary meal eaten to sustain the physi- 
 cal nature. It is only the bread eaten to 
 support the natural life which is a true 
 image of Christ the food of the spiritual 
 life. Therefore it cannot be a special 
 bread which the Lord appoints as a re- 
 minder of himself, but only the loaf of the 
 ordinary meal. 
 
66 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 If, as the Roman Catholics affirm, it 
 were only the transubstantiated wafer 
 that is Christ's true body, then the sacred 
 eating could be done only apart from the 
 daily meal, for such bread is not found on 
 the home table. But if it be symboli- 
 cally that the bread is Christ's body, then 
 the loaf of the daily meal is material for 
 the memorial eating, for it symbolizes the 
 bread of heaven, Christ our daily Saviour, 
 as well as, not to say better than, the 
 bread of a purely ceremonial repast. 
 
 That the Master did not intend to es- 
 tablish a special eating and drinking, one 
 for memorial purposes only, is seen — is 
 it not? — in the words, — "As oft as," — 
 which though given only in the command 
 regarding the cup must be understood in 
 regard to the bread also. 
 
 If a man receives the injunction, — As 
 often as you go to the city, buy some- 
 thing for those at home, — the direction 
 is not that he shall go to the city for that 
 purpose but that when going to do other 
 things he shall do this also. So the direc- 
 
''As Oft As—'' 6y 
 
 tion, " As oft as ye [eat and] drink, do 
 this in remembrance of me," commands 
 that the eating and drinking in support ' 
 and refreshment of the body be also " in 
 remembrance." The thing enjoined is 
 not a new eating but a new thought in 
 the accustomed eating. It is in fact not 
 the eating and drinking, but only the re- 
 membrance, that is commanded. 
 
 To make the, *' As oft as," refer only 
 to a particular wine, drunk for memorial 
 purposes alone, would be to construe the 
 command as, — This particular cup which 
 I command you to drink in remembrance 
 of me, I command you to drink in re- 
 membrance of me ; or, — As oft as ye 
 drink in remembrance of me, drink in 
 remembrance of me : — a construction 
 which is absurd. The only reasonable 
 paraphrase of the Saviour's words is, — As 
 oft as ye drink with other thoughts, 
 drink at the same time in remembrance 
 of me. It would not be possible to put 
 in plainer words the injunction that the 
 red wine of their daily meals should be 
 
68 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 made a reminder of his shed blood. Had 
 he actually intended to command that 
 every cup should have a memorial pur- 
 pose, in what clearer terms could he have 
 couched that command than this, ''As 
 oft as ye drink, do this in remembrance 
 of me " ? 
 
 The current idea is that Jesus said, — 
 Ye shall eat in remembrance of me now 
 and then; ye shall drink in remembrance 
 of me once in the while. But these limita- 
 tions are not expressed in the wording of 
 his command nor are they suggested by 
 the nature of the case. 
 
 The question how often a thing is to 
 be done, may be determined by inquiring 
 how often it may profitably be done. 
 How often were the disciples to " con- 
 sider the lilies" and "behold the fowls 
 of the air"? As often as they needed 
 reminding of God's providential care, 
 And now how often does the disciple 
 need to remember Christ? Once a 
 month? Once a week? Why should 
 he not every time he takes food for the 
 
''As Oft As—'' 69 
 
 body think of Christ, the food of the soul ? 
 Jesus terms the wine his " blood of 
 the covenant." When Jehovah made a 
 covenant with ancient Israel, he promis- 
 ing to be their protector and they en- 
 gaging to be his servants, that sacred 
 agreement was sealed with the blood of 
 a slain victim (Exodus xxiv. 8). And 
 now the disciples have made a new cove- 
 nant with the Father, (Jeremiah xxxi. 31), 
 not national but personal, of which sacred 
 compact the blood of their Master is to 
 be the seal and witness. In that Eastern 
 country the red juice of the grape was 
 the drink of the daily meal, thus present- 
 ing continually an impressive reminder of 
 the blood of the Redeemer, serving daily 
 to " shew " his death. And the Lord 
 says to them, — Whenever ye take in 
 your hands your daily cup of the blood 
 of the grape let it recall to your minds 
 my blood shed for you, and your solemn 
 compact with the Father, of which my 
 blood is to be the witness. Thus were 
 they at every meal to renew their cove- 
 
70 CJirist in the Daily Meal. 
 
 nant with the Father, daily and contin- 
 ually reminding themselves of their Lord's 
 death till he should come. 
 
 The memorial eating then is not a 
 " ceremony." It is not like baptism, 
 which involves an act and words that 
 might not be done and said without 
 special direction ; nor is it like the Pass- 
 over, in which were articles of food that 
 might not have been prepared without 
 specific injunction. The disciples always 
 ate bread and drank wine, and needed no 
 additional command so to do. The be- 
 liever's eating and drinking in remem- 
 brance of Christ was to be in outward act 
 just the same as a worldly man's eating 
 and drinking. The new supper involved 
 no peculiar act ; it was merely a custom- 
 ary act done with new thoughts. As it 
 was not a new bow in the cloud but the 
 old familiar arch which God made a 
 memorial in the days of Noah, so it was 
 not a new meal but the ordinary repast 
 which Jesus made a remembrancer; arid 
 in the remembrance there is no more of 
 
''As Oft As—" 71 
 
 " ceremony " than in looking at the 
 rainbow or considering the lilies or be- 
 holding the fowls of the air. In the 
 memorial eating which Christ ordained 
 there is no element whatever of ritual ; 
 its characteristics are purely spiritual. 
 
 It may be remarked that the words, 
 *' Do this, as oft as ye drink it," contain 
 no command to drink wine. The injunc- 
 tion, — As often as you go to the city, buy 
 something for the children, — would not 
 be a command to go to the city. And so 
 in the Saviour's words before us there is 
 no command to drink wine but only to 
 remember him. 
 
 Nor is there a true command in the, 
 '' Drink, all ye, of it " (Matthew xxvi. 
 26). Of course they would all drink of 
 the Passover cup and no command so to 
 do was needed. The meaning of Jesus' 
 words is simply, — Yes, drink all ye of it ; 
 or,— Well may ye all drink of it ; for it 
 is my blood of the covenant. Though 
 the clause is imperative in form it is in 
 its significance merely approbative. 
 
72 Christ i?i the Daily Meal. 
 
 Among the ''many thousands" of be- 
 lieving Jews who were " all zealous of the 
 law " there was not unlikely many a Naza- 
 rite like John the Baptist. This is sug- 
 gested by the passages, " Having shorn 
 his head in Cenchrea, for he had a vow " 
 (Acts xviii. 1 8), and, " We have four 
 men which have a vow on them " (xxi. 23). 
 Now a believing Nazarite would not have 
 been required by these words of Jesus to 
 cease from his determination to " drink 
 neither wine nor strong drink," nor 
 does this injunction require the drinking 
 of wine by a disciple of to-day who pre- 
 fers to abstain from it. The words of 
 Jesus were addressed to those who were 
 in the habit of drinking wine at their 
 meals as we drink tea and coffee, and his 
 injunction is not that they shall continue 
 so to do but that in doing it they shall 
 remember him. As to the man not drink- 
 ing wine, whether ancient Nazarite or 
 modern abstainer, he is left to make his 
 remembrance in some other way, as in 
 rainless countries something else than the 
 
*'As Oft As—'' 73 
 
 *' bow in the cloud " must serve as a me- 
 morial concerning the flood. 
 
 In concluding this chapter, it may be 
 remarked that in the Lord's, *' As oft as 
 ye [eat and] drink, [even in your daily 
 meals], do it in remembrance of me," 
 we have something more than the direc- 
 tion that whatever we do shall be done 
 to the glory of God. We have a special 
 injunction that every meal shall be eaten 
 in the " gladness " of a special remem- 
 brance of Christ and his redeeming love. 
 
IX. 
 
 Apostolic Precedent, 
 
 THE traditional understanding of 
 Jesus' words is, — This is my body, 
 my blood, ^j" anotJiei' loaf or cup is not ; 
 eat, drink, in chnrch assembly, in remem- 
 brance of me, and for a mcjuoriat 
 purpose only. But the findings in the 
 preceding pages are that the words in 
 italics are no part of the Lord's instruc- 
 tions, that they are utterly unwarranted 
 interpolations. 
 
 We have come to the position that the 
 bread and wine which are Christ's body 
 and blood on the church table were such 
 in the same sense before they came to 
 the table ; and that such are all bread and 
 wine, all food of the body being sym- 
 bolic of Christ the bread of heaven, all 
 wine an image of his blood. It is, more- 
 over, the individual believer, primarily, 
 
Apostolic Precedent. 75 
 
 that is bidden to eat and drink in remem- 
 brance of the Master. And finally the 
 disciple is commanded to do this not 
 merely now and then, but whenever he 
 eats and drinks, even in his daily repast. 
 
 And now as we turn to Apostolic his- 
 tory in the Acts and Epistles we find no 
 breaking of bread apart from an actual 
 meal. For a supper consisting of but a 
 morsel of bread and one swallow of wine, 
 there is no more precedent in Scripture 
 than for kneeling at a rail to eat. And, 
 again, though memorial eating was done 
 in church assemblies, there is nothing in 
 the record which even remotely indicates 
 that it was confined to them. 
 
 In Acts ii. 46, (Rev. Vers.) we read of 
 the disciples at Jerusalem that "breaking 
 bread at home, they did take their food 
 w^ith gladness." This particular break- 
 ing of bread was certainly the ordinary 
 meal. All must agree with the Rev. 
 Wm. Arnot of Edinburgh when in ''The 
 Church in the House,'* he says on this 
 passage: — "It is not the religious ordi- 
 
;6 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 nance but the common meal that is signal- 
 ized as having been simple and joyful." 
 But why should *' gladness " mark the 
 taking of their food more than the other 
 acts of the daily routine of their lives? 
 Was it not because the Lord had com- 
 manded that each daily repast should be 
 a memorial occasion, and that thus they 
 made each home meal a festal hour, a 
 time of solemn joy ? 
 
 In verse 42, we read that *' they con- 
 tinued * ^ * in the breaking of bread." 
 This implies of course, that they remem- 
 bered Christ in the breaking of bread. 
 It is generally assumed that they did 
 this in gatherings of the church members ; 
 but, be this as it may, we must consider 
 that this eating, like the breaking of 
 bread at Emmaus, (Luke xxiv. 45), and 
 that mentioned in verse 46, was an actual 
 meal, not merely a pretended repast. 
 
 Alford says that to render the break- 
 ing of bread in verse 42 '' to mean the 
 breaking of bread in the Eucharist as 
 now tinderstood would be to violate his- 
 
Apostolic Precedent. 77 
 
 torical truth. The Holy Communion 
 was at first and for some time -^ ^ * in- 
 separably connected with the agapae or 
 love-feasts of the Christians, and unknown 
 as a separate ordinance.''' (Italics his.) 
 
 Meyer on this passage says that the 
 modern Eucharist '* is of later origin ; the 
 separation of the Lord's supper from the 
 joint evening meal did not take place at 
 all in the Apostolic Church." 
 
 Says Schaff {Hist. Christian Church 
 I. ^7j) .- *' In the apostolic period the Eu- 
 charist was celebrated daily in connection 
 with a simple meal of brotherly love." 
 
 Says Hase, {Hist. Christian Church Sec. 
 ^jf. :) "■ The love-feast, in which were com- 
 bined the ordinary meal and the religious 
 service of the primitive Christians, was 
 originally celebrated in Jerusalem every 
 day." 
 
 Says Stanley {Christian Institutions, p. 
 44): ''In the Acts, the believers at Je- 
 rusalem are described as partaking of a 
 daily meal." 
 
 Says McGiffert {History of Christianity 
 
78 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 in the Apostolic Age) : '' That the disci- 
 ples held a special service and partook of 
 a special communion meal, there is no 
 sign. It is far more likel}^ that whenever 
 they ate together they ate the Lord's 
 Supper. Not that it preceded or fol- 
 lowed the ordinary meal but that the 
 whole meal was the Lord's Supper ; that 
 they partook of no ordinar\% secular, un- 
 holy meals, of none that was not a Kvptanbv 
 
 delTTVOv.^* 
 
 The late President Robinson of Brown 
 University, in some remarks at a dinner 
 of the Baptist Social Union, spoke of 
 such a repast by assembled Christian 
 brethren as reproducing perhaps more 
 completely than awything else we have 
 to-day the religious meal of the Apostolic 
 churches. 
 
 As to the declaration that there was a 
 purely ritual supper, c-aten at tkc same 
 sitting but yet apart -from the love-feast, 
 preceding or following it, we may say 
 that this idea of two distinct meals has 
 not the least support in the text. It is 
 
Apostolic Precedent. 79 
 
 *' eisegesis " pure and simple, a mere 
 fancy which finds no basis whatever in 
 the evidence. The record puts before 
 us but one breaking of bread, and that 
 not a fictitious but a genuine repast. 
 The same remark may.be made of the 
 accounts of the church meals at Troas 
 and Corinth. 
 
 In the account of Paul's visit to Troas 
 (Acts xx) it is recorded : " And upon 
 the first day of the week, * * we were 
 gathered together to break bread." Here 
 we certainly have a church supper. But 
 we must also assume that here as at 
 Emmaus and on Paul's vessel, the break- 
 ing of bread was an actual repast. The 
 statement of the text is therefore that 
 the brethren assembled to eat a meal 
 in company. Lechler, {Lajiges Coin), 
 calls it '' a meal of brotherly fellowship." 
 It was an agape or *' love-feast." In it, 
 of course, they remembered Christ, the 
 food of their souls. 
 
 The only mention of actual eating is, 
 ''When [Paul] was gone up, and had 
 
8o Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 broken the bread, and eaten, and had 
 talked with them a long while, even till 
 break of day, so he departed." Whether 
 the apostle's eating was or was not in the 
 breaking of bread of verse 7, it looks like a 
 taking of food to refresh himself after his 
 long discourse and to strengthen him for 
 his journey. This also would be indicated 
 by the yevadjuevoc of the original, the word 
 used in Acts x. 10 where Peter on the 
 housetop " became hungry and desired to 
 eat.*' Nowhere in the text is there any 
 suggestion of a purely ceremonial eating, 
 the mere imitation of a meal. 
 
 The fact that this breaking of bread at 
 Troaswas at a church gathering has been 
 cited to prove that the breaking of bread 
 is 5^/^/^ a church ordinance. But it shows 
 no such thing, any more than the holding 
 of a church prayer-meeting or praise- 
 service would show that the members 
 did not pray or sing except in church 
 assembly. Disciples who sing and pray 
 by themselves will also find pleasure in 
 assembling to pray and sing to Christ, and 
 
Apostolic Precedent. 8 1 
 
 so those who remember Christ in the 
 breaking of bread at home will be moved 
 to assemble to break bread in united re- 
 membrance of him. But the fact that 
 the brethren at Troas *' came together" 
 to break bread does not show that the 
 breaking of bread is solely a church or- 
 dinance any more than is praise or prayer. 
 
X. 
 
 Unio7i with Christ, 
 
 THE breaking of bread is mentioned 
 in the tenth chapter of First Corin- 
 thians. The apostle bids the disciples 
 flee from idolatry and also to be cautious 
 about eating meat which has been conse- 
 crated to idols. He acknowledges that a 
 heathen deity is only an imaginary being 
 and that the flesh of an animal sacrificed 
 to one of these false gods is not affected 
 thereby ; wherefore if a believer in Jesus, 
 going into the market to buy meat for 
 his household, finds a desirable piece, he 
 need not raise the question whether it has 
 not been cut from a sacrificed animal ; 
 and in dining with a heathen neighbor, if 
 he thinks it well so to do, he need not be 
 troubled at the possibility that some of 
 the food on the table has been dedicated 
 to idol gods. 
 
Union with Christ, 83 
 
 But if it be expressly pointed out to 
 him that a given piece of meat has been 
 consecrated to a heathen deity and in 
 eating thereof he might seem to unite in 
 the respect paid this false god, the case 
 is somewhat different. He who eats in 
 honor of a given deity joins himself to 
 that deity and becomes partaker of the 
 nature of that deity. When the believer 
 in Jesus breaks bread and drinks the cup 
 in remembrance and worship of Christ 
 he becomes a partaker of the body and 
 blood — that is, of the nature — of Christ, 
 entering into union with him. When the 
 ancient Israelite ate of the sacrifice to 
 Jehovah he entered into union with Je- 
 hovah. But what the heathen sacrifice 
 they sacrifice to demons, and the ser- 
 vant of Jesus in eating of these sacrifices 
 will be entering into a participation 
 in the nature of demons, a union with 
 demons, which he would not have them 
 do. 
 
 In this passage as in the others ex- 
 amined there is nothing to suggest that 
 
84 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 the bread and cup were merely ceremo- 
 nial, not parts of an actual meal. On the 
 other hand since the feast at an idol sac- 
 rifice was an actual feast, and when the 
 Israelite ate of the sacrifice to Jehovah 
 he ate an actual meal, it is more natural 
 to understand that the communion with 
 Christ, which is compared to these, was 
 in an actual taking of food. 
 
 Nor do we find here any necessary ref- 
 erence to a church supper as distinguished 
 from a household meal. The term " cup 
 of blessing " Avas a common one for the 
 third cup of the paschal supper, which 
 as has been remarked was not a public 
 and general but a household meal, and it 
 would apply also to the daily cup on 
 which was asked the divine blessing. In 
 like manner the words " the bread which 
 we break " may refer here as it does in 
 many cases elsewhere to the bread of the 
 private meal. Moreover, the fact that 
 directions are given regarding the pur- 
 chase in the shambles of meat for the 
 home table, and that the feast at the 
 
Uiiioji with CJirist. 85 
 
 house of the heathen friend is a priv- 
 ate feast, shows that communing with 
 demons in eating meat offered to idols 
 could be done in the ordinary meal, and 
 this again implies that a communion 
 with Christ could also be eaten at the 
 home table. 
 
 As to the words (Rev. Vers.), — *' See- 
 ing that we, who are many, are one bread, 
 one body [ijiargin, ' seeing that there is 
 one bread, we, who are many, are one 
 body ' ] : for we all partake of the one 
 bread \inargin, * loaf ']," — it is too broad to 
 refer to the local church. The Oriental 
 *' loaf "was but a little cake, so that to 
 partake of " one " loaf would be impossi- 
 ble for all the members of the large 
 church at Corinth. Again the ' we " in- 
 cludes the apostle himself, who was not a 
 member of that local church but was now 
 far separated from them. We must un 
 derstand therefore, w^th Edwards, that 
 017:07.101 are not the assembled ''many" 
 but the scattered believers throughout the 
 whole world, who by union with their 
 
86 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 common Lord are united to each other. 
 As in praying, each one by himself, 
 
 " Though sundered far. by faith we meet 
 Around one common mercy seat " ; 
 
 so in remembering Christ, each one by 
 himself, in the breaking of bread, widely 
 separated Christians are brought together 
 into " one body." There is no necessary 
 reference to a local church assemblage. 
 
 When the apostle says, ** Ye cannot 
 drink a cup of the Lord and a cup of 
 demons ; ye cannot partake of a table of 
 the Lord and a table of demons," — (the 
 original is not tJie table, tJic cup, but a), — 
 it impairs the force of the solemn words 
 to make them refer merely to a church 
 ceremony. He does not mean that a 
 man cannot take part in a Christian rite 
 to-day and a heathen festival to-morrow; 
 that alas is too often done. His assertion 
 is that we cannot make one and the 
 same feast a table of the Lord and a 
 table of demons ; that one cannot drink 
 his cup in communion with Christ and in 
 
Union with Christ. 87 
 
 communion with demons at the same 
 time. And if we understand the com- 
 mand for a holy supper to be that each 
 meal is to be eaten in remembrance of 
 Christ, the food of the soul, and so in 
 communion with him, we see that we 
 cannot keep that command if we let evil 
 enter the meal. If we allow our table to 
 become a scene of quarreling, of gluttony, 
 of lewd conversation, of godless revelry, 
 we are communing with demons and so 
 cannot be communing with Christ. But 
 if we indeed make the loaf of each daily 
 repast a remembrancer of Christ, the 
 bread of heaven, then the daily table will 
 be kept free from all evil, it will be a 
 place of sacred thought, and we shall eat 
 our meat in the " gladness " of a constant 
 communing with our Lord. 
 
 It is from verse 16 of this chapter that 
 to the breaking of bread has been given 
 the name of " The Communion." In 
 the original, however, and also the Re- 
 vised Version, it not the but a commun- 
 ion, one of several forms of drawing near 
 
88 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 to Christ. It is but another survival of 
 the doctrine of the Real Presence which is 
 seen in the idea that the church meal is 
 " the holy of holies of Christian worship, 
 the highest and closest union the church 
 can ever enjoy on earth with her heavenly 
 head," and considers admission to the 
 church table a more solemn thing than 
 to permit one to unite with us in prayer 
 or praise to the Lord. A good statement 
 of the New Testament doctrine is found 
 in the Articles of Religion of the Re- 
 formed Episcopal Church : — ** We feed 
 on Christ only through his Word, and only 
 by faith and prayer ; and we feed on 
 him, whether at our private devotions, or 
 in our meditations, or on any occasion of 
 public worship, or in the memorial sym- 
 bolism of the Supper." 
 
XL 
 
 Love to tJie Brethren. 
 
 WE now come to the familiar passage 
 in I Corinthians xi. At Corinth 
 as at Troas there is an agape or church 
 meal. But Paul declares that they so 
 conduct it that it is ''not for the better 
 but for the worse" and that though 
 designed as such it cannot truly be con- 
 sidered " a supper of the Lord." 
 
 It is from a mistranslation in this 
 clause that the term '' The Lord's 
 Supper" has come to be applied to the 
 Breaking of Bread. This is the only 
 passage in which occurs the term Kvpiamv 
 f)£iKvov and as it is not preceded by the 
 definite article it cannot be considered a 
 specific appellative. Therefore, the ren- 
 dering should be not " T/ie Lord's 
 Supper" but, "a supper of the Lord," 
 that is, a repast eaten in the spirit of 
 
90 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 Christ. Meyer's construction of the 
 passage is, — "There does not take place 
 an eating of a Lord's supper," that is, 
 " a meal belonging to the Lord, conse- 
 crated to Christ." See also Cambridge 
 Bible and the translation of the Ameri- 
 can Baptist Publication Society. 
 
 The article on the " Lord's Supper " in 
 Blunt's Dictionary of Historical and 
 Doctrinal Theology speaks of it as *' a 
 term originally belonging to the love- 
 feast " and adds, " It can scarcely be 
 said to have been known as a name for 
 the Eucharist in ancient times;" and 
 again, " In early English whenever this 
 name was used it was applied either to 
 the Last Supper or to the marriage 
 supper of the king in the parable." " In 
 1530 the term Cavia Domini is used in 
 the Confession of Augsburg, which, and 
 its adoption by Calvin, points perhaps to 
 the origin of its popular use " — this being 
 declared "a novel and inexact use of the 
 term." 
 
 Prof. H, G. Weston of Crozer Theolog- 
 
Love to the Brethren. 91 
 
 ical Seminary in his Ecclesiology says : 
 — ''The ordinance is not called 'The 
 Lord's Supper' in the New Testament. 
 In I Cor. xi. 20 where the phrase occurs, 
 the apostle is not giving a proper name ; 
 if he were, the order of the Greek words 
 would be different * - '^ ^H7Tvov cannot 
 mean a morsel of food and a sip of wine." 
 
 The reason for the apostle's severe de- 
 nunciation is given in verse 18, — and be 
 it carefully noted that only one reason is 
 given, namely, that there are "divisions" 
 among them. 
 
 From early Christian writings we find 
 that the ancient churches provided for 
 their church meals much as we do for 
 the church sociable and Sunday-school 
 picnic of modern times, the well-to-do 
 families bringing liberal gifts of provisions 
 and those of limited means contributing 
 according to their ability, while the poor 
 were excused from bringing anything; 
 but all was to be put into the common 
 stock, so that poor and rich should share 
 alike. It seems, however, that in the 
 
9 2 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 wealthy church at Corinth lines of divi- 
 sion had been drawn so that the rich 
 members sat apart by themselves with 
 their sumptuous viands, leaving their 
 poorer brethren not only hungry but also 
 cruelly slighted. 
 
 The Cambridge Bible says : — " The divi- 
 sions among the Corinthian Christians 
 were of the kind w'hich we denominate 
 'sets in a small society, — cliques and co- 
 teries, which w^ere the product not so 
 much of theological as of social antag- 
 onism. Thus the members of the Corin- 
 thian Church were accustomed to share 
 their provisions with members of their 
 own 'set' to the exclusion of those who, 
 having an inferior social position had 
 few provisions or none to bring. Hence 
 while one was only too well provided with 
 food, another had none." 
 
 Dr. Charles Hodge says : — " It is evi- 
 dent that agreeably to a familiar Grecian 
 custom the persons assembled brought 
 their own provisions, wdiich being placed 
 on the table formed a common stock. It 
 
Love to the Brethren. 93 
 
 was however essential to the very idea of 
 a Christian feast that it should be a com- 
 munion, that all the guests at the table 
 of their common Lord should be on terms 
 of equality. Instead of this fraternal 
 union, there were divisions among the 
 Corinthians even at the Lord's table, the 
 rich eating by themselves the provisions 
 which they had brought and leaving their 
 poorer brethren unsatisfied and hungry." 
 
 When thus they were guilty of " a 
 cruel perversion of a feast of love into a 
 means of humiliating and wounding their 
 poorer brethren," what wonder that the 
 apostle should declare that their meal 
 was not "a supper of the Lord," a repast 
 pervaded with Christlike love, — that it 
 was not ''for the better" as it might 
 have been but '' for the worse," an evil 
 instead of a blessing, and that they might 
 better have no church meal at all than 
 such an unfraternal assembling! 
 
 To show how inconsistent their conduct 
 was with that fellowship which should 
 rule among those who profess to believe 
 
94 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 in the same Saviour, the apostle recounts 
 the incidents of Christ's command to eat 
 and drink in remembrance of him. He 
 reminds them of what he had before ** de- 
 livered," that on his very last night with 
 the disciples the Lord pointed it out that 
 the bread which sustains the body is a 
 symbol of him, the support of the soul, 
 and that the blood of the grape is an 
 image of his shed blood, and that he then 
 commanded that henceforth always in 
 eating bread and drinking the fruit of the 
 vine they should be reminded of him and 
 his death for them. Now if the wealthy 
 Corinthians in eating their rich feast had 
 been by it put in memory of the more 
 precious bread of heaven, and drinking 
 their red wine had been reminded by it 
 of Christ's redeeming blood, they would 
 also have thought with tenderness of 
 their poorer brethren, Christ's little ones, 
 servants of the same Lord and partakers 
 of the same salvation. Wherefore he 
 bids them " tarry one for another," shar- 
 ing their meal in love, remembering that 
 
Love to the Brethren. 95 
 
 all are one in Christ who died to save 
 poor and rich alike. 
 
 There is lack of warrant for the com- 
 mon assertion that the meal at Corinth 
 was marked by " excesses." This idea 
 has arisen entirely from the phrase, — 
 " another is drunken." But this stands 
 contrasted, not with — one is sober, but 
 with — one is hungry. The word used is 
 that in John ii. 10 — " When men have well 
 drunk." This may mean — not, are in- 
 toxicated, — but, are sated, are cloyed. 
 Godet says; — ''The word [^^^i^^v usually 
 signified to be intoxicated, but it may 
 also be applied to eating, in the sense in 
 which we say, — to eat his fill, — and so to 
 form a contrast, as is the case in this 
 passage, to Treaaz-^ /^ ^^^ Jiungryr The 
 passage might be construed as meaning 
 merely, — another feasts, banquets, rev- 
 els ; the allusion being to the profusion 
 placed before the sitter rather than to an 
 immoderate participation therein. It is 
 not in " another is drunken " but in the 
 " one is hungry " that the gravamen of 
 
96 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 the apostle's charge is found ; the wrong 
 being not so much in the abundance 
 enjoyed by the one as in the co-existence 
 of that profusion with his neighbor's 
 destitution. The banqueting of the rich 
 is not the subject of an additional charge 
 but merely an illustration of the original 
 charge, that of unfraternal " divisions." 
 
 And furthermore, had there been actual 
 drunkenness the apostle would certainly 
 have alluded to it again in telling them 
 how they should conduct their meal. 
 He does not however charge them to 
 drink less or eat less, but only to ''wait 
 one for another," to let all share alike. 
 Surely, he did not intend that all should 
 become intoxicated ! 
 
 Nor can we understand that the apos- 
 tle condemns them for having an actual 
 meal as distinguished from a " make-be- 
 lieve " supper. If the scholars quoted in 
 a previous chapter were found to be cor- 
 rect in saying that the breaking of bread 
 at Jerusalem, and at Troas, was an agape, 
 an actual meal, should we be ready to 
 
Love to the Bretkre?i. 97 
 
 say therefore that the disciples in those 
 cities ate and drank damnation to them- 
 selves? Cannot one " discern the body" 
 and remember the Lord in an actual sup- 
 per? Will not the loaf and cup of a true 
 meal " shew " or " proclaim " the Lord's 
 death? Just how meagre must a repast 
 be in order that it may be eaten " in re- 
 membrance " ? 
 
 So far from intimating that there should 
 have been served only a morsel of bread 
 and one sip of wine to each, which would 
 have been no supper at all, the apostle's 
 complaint is that the "hungry" brother 
 (v. 21) was left hungry instead of being 
 given a full satisfying meal. And again, 
 the direction to *' tarry one for another," 
 that is to share their supper, would have 
 no pertinence whatever if there was to be 
 really no meal to share, nothing which a 
 selfish person would be tempted to take 
 " before other" for himself alone. 
 
 As to the passage, ** If any man hun- 
 ger, let him eat at honie/' it must be 
 construed in connection with the arraign- 
 
98 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 ment in verse 21, — "one is hungry." 
 Here is one who did *' hunger," but does 
 the apostle mean to censure this poor 
 brother that he did not get his supper 
 before coming ? Does he not the rather 
 imply that this destitute saint ought to 
 have found in the church gathering a 
 good hearty meal such as his own poor 
 dwelling would not afford ? The meaning 
 of the passage is simply this that if the 
 rich man cares for nothing but feasting, if 
 he has no desire for loving fellowship 
 with his brethren, he had better feast at 
 home, and not come to the church assem- 
 bly to display his lack of fraternal spirit. 
 In like manner the question, " Have ye 
 not houses to eat and to drink in?" is 
 explained by the further inquiry whether 
 they wish to ** shame them that have 
 not." Now, however costly viands the 
 rich members had brought they would 
 not have shamed their poorer brethren 
 had tliey cordially invited the latter to 
 sit down with them and share this boun- 
 tiful provision. The putting to shame 
 
Love to the Brethren. 99 
 
 was done, not in providing a rich feast 
 but in eating that feast by themselves 
 " before," right in the presence of, their 
 humbler brethren but leaving them out 
 of it. And the apostle tells these 
 wealthy members that if all they care for 
 is to banquet with their rich friends they 
 had better do it in their own elegant 
 houses, where at least they will not be 
 giving their poorer brethren the cut 
 direct and thus insulting the church of 
 God in its tenderest emotions through 
 an insult to its '' little ones." 
 
 The apostle says, (Rev. Vers.), — '' For 
 as often as ye eat this bread and drink 
 the cup, ye proclaim the Lord's death 
 till he come. Wherefore whosoever 
 shall eat the bread or drink the cup of 
 the Lord unworthily shall be guilty -of 
 the body and the blood of the Lord. 
 But let a man prove himself, and so let 
 him eat of the bread and drink of the 
 cup. For he that eateth and drinketh 
 eateth and drinketh judgment unto him- 
 self if he discern not the body." 
 
loo Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 The loaf and cup of their agape, an ac- 
 tual meal, served to "proclaim the Lord's 
 death " (p. 52), and could be called the 
 bread and cup *' of the Lord," for the 
 Lord himself had pointed out the symbol 
 of himself which resided in every loaf 
 and ever}^ cup. And in taking of them a 
 man should *' prove himself," searching 
 with care whether he was indeed gather- 
 ing from them the lesson they set before 
 him. 
 
 By ''the body" some understand the 
 Church, which is Christ's body, member- 
 ship in which makes honorable the hum- 
 blest disciple. Those did not " discern the 
 body " who deemed it a thing of no im- 
 port that their poorer brethren were en- 
 rolled with them in the Church of Christ. 
 And this is practically the meaning even 
 though the direct reference be to Christ 
 himself, for if we duly reverence Christ 
 we shall honor all who have been exalted 
 by salvation through him. He who de- 
 spises Christ's little ones despises Christ 
 whose glory they share. And when the 
 
Love to the Brethre?t. lol 
 
 rich Corinthians failed to have a proper 
 judgment of the honor due their poorer 
 brethren, they ate and drank judgment 
 against themselves. 
 
 It is not eating and drinking unworth- 
 ily to remember Christ in an actual meal ; 
 but to eat and drink with a wrong spirit. 
 To " discern not the body " : — this is not 
 for one to see an image of Christ the bread 
 of heaven in food taken to satisfy hunger 
 as truly as in the loaf of ecclesiastical 
 ceremony; it is to eat in a temper of mind 
 which by sin against Christ reveals for- 
 getfulness of him. It is not a rnistake 
 concerning the significance of a bit of 
 ritual, but a wrong state of heart, on 
 which condemnation is here pronounced. 
 It was not ill-chosen forms, but an un- 
 christly spirit, which aroused the apostle's 
 indignation. 
 
 The Corinthians ate and drank un- 
 worthily not in having a liberal repast 
 but in neglecting to share it with their 
 poorer brethren. Says Chrysostom on 
 this passage, — " For how can it be other 
 
102 Christ in t lie Daily Meal. 
 
 than unworthily when one neglects the 
 hungry and puts him to shame ? " and, — 
 " Thou hast tasted the blood of the Lord 
 and not even then dost thou acknowledge 
 thy brother. If even before this thou 
 didst not know him thou oughtest to 
 have recognized him at the table, but now 
 thou dishonorest the table itself, for 
 though thy poor brother has been deemed 
 worthy a seat thereat thou judgest him 
 not worthy of thy meat." 
 
 What the apostle condemns in the 
 supper of the Corinthians is not an injudi- 
 ciously bountiful bill of fare but a viola- 
 tion of the spirit of Christian love. In- 
 stead of being " a supper of the Lord," 
 a KvprnKov de'iTTvov, a suppcr eaten in the spirit 
 of Christ, it was a man's " own supper," 
 TO idiov dei-vov, a supper eaten in the spirit of 
 one's own selfishness. The blame is not 
 for having a sumptuous repast but for not 
 sharing it in love. The evil was not in 
 the meal itself but in the spirit in which 
 it was eaten. 
 
 We find then in this chapter not only 
 
Love to the Bret /wen. 103 
 
 that the church meal at Corinth was an 
 actual repast but also that Paul sanc- 
 tions this, the only fault he finds bein<j 
 that the "hungry" are not filled thereat. 
 His concluding injunction, — "Wherefore 
 my brethren, when ye come together to 
 eat, tarry one for another," — implies his 
 approval of their continuing to have a 
 liberal supper, provided only it be shared 
 in true Christian fellowship. 
 
 To sum up : as we read the book of 
 Acts and the Epistles, zue find no cJuirch 
 supper bnt the Agape. This was not a 
 " ceremony," it was a true repast. No- 
 where in Scripture is it taught that the 
 remembrance of Christ should be only in 
 the sinnilacriivi of a meal. Nor does the 
 remembrance of Christ in a church supper 
 imply that he could not be remembered 
 also in the home meal, any more than 
 the holding of a church prayer-meeting 
 implies that one should not pray by him- 
 self alone, 
 
XII. 
 
 Hislorzcal. 
 
 SO far this discussion has been strictly 
 biblical. It has rigidly confined it- 
 self to the question, — What is the mean- 
 ing of these passages of Scripture which 
 refer to the breaking of bread ? The 
 conclusion reached has been that the 
 modern ecclesiastical supper, the taking 
 of a morsel of bread and one swallow of 
 wine, directly and solely for memorial 
 purposes, is not what Jesus instituted ; 
 that his command, his *' Ordinance," was 
 a remembrance of him in every meal. 
 But though it were made plain beyond 
 question that the New Testament con- 
 tains neither prescription nor precedent 
 for the modern church supper, many 
 would still be unable to divest themselves 
 of the belief that what has been the 
 usage for so long a time must certainly 
 
Historical. 105 
 
 have come down from the Apostles. 
 And the question will be asked, — Do 
 you really mean to say that the whole 
 church has been in error for so many 
 centuries ? 
 
 But if we assert this our boldness will 
 not be without precedent. The Baptists 
 do not hesitate to declare that nearly 
 the whole church fell into error regarding 
 the subjects of baptism ; the Presby- 
 terians affirm the same regarding orders 
 in the ministry, and the Congregation- 
 lists make the same assertion concerning 
 church government ; and these, certainly, 
 cannot declare it a thing incredible that 
 there should have arisen in like manner 
 the most widespread error concerning the 
 breaking of bread. 
 
 Be it observed, moreover, that for 
 nearly four centuries the " whole Church " 
 has not held any one doctrine on this 
 subject. The Roman Catholics have 
 taught one thing, the Lutherans another, 
 and in the Reformed Churches still 
 other views have prevailed. Each of 
 
io6 Clirist in the Daily Meal. 
 
 these conflicting theories has been held 
 by godly and learned men, which is say- 
 ing also that each opinion in its turn has 
 been condemned by men of deepest piety 
 and profoundest erudition. When there- 
 fore the church doctors have thus nulli- 
 fied each others' authority, we are at 
 perfect liberty to form our own opinion ; 
 indeed, their mutual condemnations have 
 left us no resource whatever but to turn 
 to the New Testament for ourselves, and 
 take that view of its teachings which 
 shall seem to us the correct one. 
 
 And, by the way, the appeal in this 
 matter to Church authority is not one 
 which Evangelical Protestants can well 
 make, for the only one of these conflict- 
 ing doctrines which that authority would 
 in any way seem to support is the theory 
 of transubstantiation, this being the only 
 one which could make even the remotest 
 claim to have been held semper et ttbique. 
 
 That a usage is ancient does not prove 
 that it was Apostolic. Even within a 
 hundred years after the death of the 
 
Historical. 1 07 
 
 Apostles we find in the churches ideas 
 and practices which Evangelical Protes- 
 tants will declare to be without Apostolic 
 sanction. The conception of the Eucha- 
 rist as a sacrifice is found early in the 
 Second Century. As early as the days of 
 Justin Martyr we see the elements in 
 the church supper sent to absent mem- 
 bers, and in the writings of Ignatius, 
 Irenseus and Tertullian we find supersti- 
 tious views concerning baptism, the me- 
 morial eating and other usages. Good 
 men very soon began to mix error v/ith 
 Christian faith. 
 
 We have seen that the memorial eat- 
 ing in the Apostolic churches was an 
 ordinary meal of Christian fellowship. 
 The expression in the Didache (x), " Now 
 after that ye are filled," kii7z}.7]c6iivai, would 
 indicate that this was still the case in 
 the Second Century. But there soon 
 arose a superstitious confounding of 
 symbol with substance, and there came 
 to be a separation between the meal of 
 fellowship or the " love-feast " and the 
 
io8 Christ hi the Daily Meal. 
 
 memorial eating and drinking, though 
 the latter was still observed at the same 
 sitting as the former, preceding or fol- 
 lowing it. In time the two were fully 
 separated, and still later the love-feast 
 was wholly abandoned, the actual supper 
 becoming entirely a tiling of the past, 
 and there remained only a fictitious eat- 
 ing and drinking. Thus the mere simu- 
 lacrum of a meal which is all that is 
 found in the modern church, even in 
 ultra Protestant communions, is derived 
 not from Apostolic usage but from eccle- 
 siastical superstitions. The current con- 
 ception of the proper form of eating in 
 remembrance of Christ is as destitute of 
 support in church history as in Scripture. 
 In the course of centuries the idea 
 gained full currency that the declaration, 
 — " This is my body," — meant that the 
 loaf was Christ's body in constituent sub- 
 stance, becoming such when the priest 
 pronounced these words of the Saviour. 
 The dominance of this conception con- 
 firmed the change of the memorial eating 
 
Historical. 109 
 
 into a purely ecclesiastical institution. 
 If only that bread is Christ's body which 
 becomes such under the hands of the 
 priest, no man can eat the holy supper 
 except a priest minister to him. The 
 sacred meal may be served to a single 
 person but only a priest can dispense it. 
 
 On the other hand the Evangelical 
 Churches when they discarded the doc- 
 trine of the Real Presence should have 
 discarded also the idea of the necessity of 
 a sacerdotal ministration. If the loaf be 
 Christ's body only in symbol, a layman can 
 preside at the breaking of bread the same 
 as at a prayer meeting, for any disciple is 
 competent to declare that the bread and 
 wine are emblems of Christ's body and 
 blood. 
 
 The Roman Catholic conception sur- 
 vives, however, even in ultra Protestant 
 circles. The Westminster Confession rec- 
 ognizes only " ministers " as competent to 
 "bless the elements," and give them to 
 the people. And though Baptist writ- 
 ers on church polity all say that a church 
 
1 10 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 could properly call on a deacon or private 
 member to preside at the breaking of 
 bread, this, in the United States at least, 
 is seldom or never done ; but a church 
 will go for months without the memorial 
 eating, if no *' regularly ordained minis- 
 ter " is at hand to '' officiate." Not even 
 a licensed preacher and candidate for or- 
 dination will be allowed to act, but the 
 good people will send miles away and 
 bring some retired clergyman, a respecta- 
 ble old gentleman who has been for years 
 engaged in school teaching or farming, 
 and whose ordination like his vaccination 
 must have run out long ago. This is 
 akin to the superstition which still lingers 
 in many Protestant Churches, that only 
 an ''ordained minister" can "pronounce 
 the benediction." 
 
 And is it not a lingering of the medi- 
 eval idea that the bread on the Church 
 table is Christ's actual body and must be 
 approached with special awe, which makes 
 the demand for a "preparatory lecture " 
 or other special service to precede the 
 
Historical, 1 1 1 
 
 memorial eating? Of course we should 
 proceed thoughtfully in all religious acts 
 and there could be no objection if the 
 prayer-meeting were opened with certain 
 "preparatory" remarks. But the New 
 Testament nowhere makes communion 
 with Christ in the breaking of bread any 
 more solemn an occasion than drawino- 
 near to him in prayer or praise or other 
 Christian exercises. 
 
 Our inherited superstitions extend even 
 to the utensils employed in the memorial 
 eating. Preaching once in a little prairie 
 church in Southern Illinois, and being 
 called on to preside at the breaking of 
 bread, I found on the table plates of com- 
 mon blue stone ware with ordinary glass 
 tumblers, the wine being in a small 
 pitcher from the every day table. I was 
 shocked at such rustic informality. But 
 on second thought I asked myself whether 
 I had ever before seen a church table 
 furnished so nearly like that of our Lord's 
 Last Supper. For on that table in the 
 " upper room " must have been merely 
 
1 1 2 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 the cups and plates of daily household 
 use ; and I felt ashamed that, pretending 
 to know something of New Testament 
 history, I had mentally demanded a spe- 
 cial *' flagon " and " chalice " such as the 
 Saviour certainly did not use. 
 
 How shocked should we be if at a 
 church sociable where there was a short- 
 age of dishes some one should propose to 
 bring out the " Communion Service " ! 
 But the cup the Lord used that solemn 
 night was doubtless put on the breakfast 
 table the next morning. Numberless are 
 the legends of the Holy Grail, the cup of 
 the Last Supper, which the old Knights 
 roamed the wide world over to seek. 
 But there can be little doubt what be- 
 came of the holy grail. It was used in 
 the home service the next day, and the 
 next, and so on for years, till battered and 
 broken it was cast away ; and as it lay 
 there on the rubbish heap its fragments 
 were sacred not alone because it had been 
 pressed by the hands of the Lord, but 
 also in that it had served a thousand 
 
Historical. 1 1 3 
 
 times to slake the thirst of toil and to 
 bear the cooling draught to the fevered 
 lips of the sick and in a multitude of 
 other ways to do God's work in the world, 
 till angel eyes could read upon it the 
 " Holiness to the Lord." The cup of the 
 Last Supper was the cup of the daily 
 meal, and we add not to its sanctity when 
 we dissociate it from the sacred services 
 of the home life. And we shall show a 
 more intelligent understanding of that 
 Last Supper as a whole if we strive to re- 
 member Christ in every meal, as he then 
 bade his disciples do. 
 
 Very many are the mistaken concep- 
 tions which have grown up in the Church 
 in the course of the centuries, and it Is 
 difficult for us to get back to primitive 
 views. As the shell long survives the 
 death of the creature on which it grew, 
 so erroneous ecclesiastical ideas and cus- 
 toms will remain in full force when the 
 false doctrines in which they originated 
 have been discarded for centuries. Even 
 in ultra Evangelical circles there remains 
 
1 14 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 much of " Romish" conception, and the 
 medieval doctrine of the Real Presence 
 still controls our procedure in the church 
 meal. Though we claim that " the Bible 
 alone is the religion of Protestants," the 
 Agape, which is undeniably Apostolic, 
 has no place in our church life, while the 
 supper of ritual which is unknown to the 
 New Testament and has no warrant ex- 
 cept in ecclesiastical usage is regarded 
 with an awe nearly if not quite super- 
 stitious. 
 
 As in Milton's description of the bring- 
 ing forth of the beasts by the earth 
 we see " the tawny lion, pawing to get 
 free his hinder parts," so even the stout- 
 est Protestantism needs to struggle and 
 pull a little longer to disengage itself en- 
 tirely from Roman Catholic ideas. 
 
XIII. 
 PracticaL 
 
 BUT what is the practical outcome of 
 the doctrine of the preceding 
 pages? — for it is by this alone that many 
 will judge it. It may be answered most 
 emphatically that there is nothing there- 
 in to which the most timid conservative 
 can object. 
 
 It is merely proposed that a believer 
 in Jesus sitting down to his daily bread 
 shall ask a blessing substantially as fol- 
 lows, — " Oh Lord, I thank thee for this 
 food which supports my mortal life, and 
 now beholding in it a symbol of the bread 
 of heaven, I pray that as I eat this which 
 thou hast provided to sustain my bodily 
 powers, my soul may feed on Christ the 
 spiritual bread." Certainly no one can 
 object to such a " grace before meat." 
 But do you not see that this is in sub- 
 
1 1 6 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 stance the prayer to be offered over the 
 bread in church ? We may say then 
 with all boldness that the prayer made 
 over the loaf in church may and should 
 be, for substance, the " blessing" over the 
 daily meal, and the meditations in the 
 mind of the one who devoutly eats in 
 church should be in our minds as we eat 
 our daily food. And if to the invalid 
 his physician has prescribed the drinking 
 of the fruit of the vine, which, still un- 
 fermented, the most temperate may drink, 
 why may he not behold in it an image 
 of Christ's shed blood, and drink it with 
 the same prayer and thoughts that at- 
 tend the drinking in the church meal ? 
 Who shall say that it is a profanation if 
 in every meal one reminds himself of 
 Christ and his death the same as in the 
 church supper ? 
 
 Let it be noted that it is not here in 
 any way suggested that the church meal 
 be less honored, but only that the home 
 meal also be made sacred. There is no 
 wish nor willingness to degrade the 
 
Practical. I T 7 
 
 church ceremonial, but only to lift up the 
 daily repast to an equal sacredness, to 
 secure that the blessed thoughts which 
 characterize the former shall pervade the 
 latter also. It is not proposed to level 
 down, but only to level up. Let the 
 church supper continue to be a holy occas- 
 ion but let it not be the only sacred hour. 
 Why should it not rather be considered 
 a "model" meal and object lesson, set- 
 ting forth the spirit in which every meal 
 shall be eaten, a " rehearsal " in which we 
 learn more fully how properly to eat each 
 week-day repast ? And if it would not 
 " degrade " the Sabbath did we seek to 
 carry its spirit through the whole week 
 how, pray, will it make the ecclesiastical 
 meal less venerable if one resolves to 
 make every breaking of bread as solemn, 
 to give to every repast the sacredness 
 which marks the supper in church ? 
 
 Some will urge that it is impossible to 
 make the family meal so sacred an occa- 
 sion for we often get to talking, say of 
 politics, and disputing, and then are 
 
1 1 8 CJirist in the Daily Meal. 
 
 aroused angry feelings which banish all 
 religious emotion. Now it is certainly 
 true, as the apostle said, that '* a table of 
 demons " cannot be also ** a table of the 
 Lord " but happily there remains one 
 solution of the difficulty, namely, to ab- 
 stain from all unkind words and to admit 
 to the family repast only those lovely emo- 
 tions which are perfectly consistent with 
 thoughts of Christ. 
 
 The objection may still be pressed un- 
 der the modified form that it is allowable 
 and often necessary that the conversation 
 at the daily table shall be on topics al- 
 together non-religious. But even when 
 the mind is engaged with secular thoughts 
 there may be in it a spiritual undertone. 
 Take the emotion of gratitude for God's 
 mercies : it is sincerely to be hoped that 
 it does not entirely vanish from our minds 
 with the last word of the " blessing." 
 Through the talking and laughing of the 
 Thanksgiving Dinner may there not re- 
 main in the mind a spirit of praise to Him 
 who has crowned the year with his good- 
 
Practical. 119 
 
 ness? Beneath the hilarities of the 
 Christmas feast may there not be many a 
 sweet thought of the Christ-child of Beth- 
 lehem? Is it true that Christians can eat 
 their daily bread only in the purely secu- 
 lar spirit of heathen men and publicans? 
 Why should not every meal be eaten not 
 only in physical but also in spiritual 
 " gladness "? 
 
 The reformer Melancthon writes to a 
 friend, — " There is not a day nor a night 
 for more than ten years that I have not 
 meditated on the holy supper." Possibly 
 some of his thoughts were only polemic, 
 for there was then waged an exciting and 
 even acrimonious controversy on this 
 topic. But why should not a disciple of 
 to-day be able to declare that " for more 
 than ten years " he has not sat down to 
 a meal, when in taking bread for the sup- 
 port of his body he has not thought of 
 Christ the food of his soul? 
 
 Some one may suggest that the memo- 
 rial eating would lose its sacredness and 
 become an empty form if we sought to 
 
1 20 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 remember Christ in every meal. But 
 this is the old argument of certain good 
 Scotch Presbyterians against having the 
 '' sacrament " oftener than once in three 
 months. (See John M. Mason's Frequent 
 Communion). — Now would Christ's res- 
 urrection be celebrated more solemnly 
 if we strove to remember it not so often 
 as once a week but only in an annual 
 Easter or on a Lord's Day once in five 
 years? Should we be more devout in 
 family prayer if we observed it but fort- 
 nightly, or in '' grace before meat," if it 
 was said only once a month ? Would it 
 be better to " consider the lilies " only 
 at very rare intervals ? May it not be 
 that in religion, as in other things, that 
 which is done oftenest will be done easi- 
 est ? 
 
 The question is this, — May we not 
 have substantially the same thoughts in 
 the daily meal that we have in the 
 Church Supper? And should we not? 
 Unless a man says that we ougJit not to 
 try to remember Christ in every meal he 
 
PracticaL 121 
 
 cannot object to the practical side of the 
 doctrine of the foregoing pages. 
 
 " Is not this the carpenter ? " said the 
 men of Nazareth ; — " this young man 
 whose family we all know, can he be the 
 great Messiah?" And soasks some one, 
 — " Can the daily meal be eaten in re- 
 membrance of Christ? Meat and pota- 
 toes, — can they remind us of the food of 
 our souls?" But blessed is that disciple 
 who is not " offended " at the fact that 
 with the leaven and the mustard seed and 
 the salt and the hen, lowly objects of 
 every day life, Jesus has made the 
 homely fare on the cottage board a sym- 
 bol of the loftiest divine realities. 
 
XIV. 
 
 The C/mrck Stepper, 
 
 IN the preceding pages no objection has 
 been raised to the present custom as 
 to the ecclesiastical breaking of bread. 
 To be sure there is no Scripture precedent 
 for the imitation meal of the modern 
 church, but neither is there for a Christ- 
 mas service, nor for the minister's wear 
 ing a peculiar gown in preaching or bap- 
 tizing, nor for the ceremonial giving of 
 " the right hand of fellowship " to new 
 members of the church. The Apostolic 
 churches never set out to do every single 
 thing which would possibly be profitable 
 in any congregation in all the future ages. 
 If therefore, the modern church meal is 
 found to be edifying, it may properly be 
 continued even without exact Scripture 
 precedent. 
 
The Church Supper. 123 
 
 It is not proper however to intimate 
 that the church meal is the one and only 
 supper of the Lord, that the loaf and cup 
 on the church table are the only body 
 and blood of Christ and that we have no 
 right to remember Christ in any eating 
 except that of church ceremony. The 
 bread of the home meal is Christ's sym- 
 bolic body just as truly as the loaf of the 
 church supper, and if a disciple makes 
 the daily loaf and cup a reminder of 
 Christ's body and blood he obeys the 
 command, " This do in remembrance of 
 me," just as truly as do those who eat 
 in church, and his repast is just as truly 
 " a supper of the Lord." 
 
 Nor if we would employ strictly Bibli- 
 cal phraseology shall we use the term, — 
 The Lord's Supper, — The Lord's table, 
 or, — The Communion. The New Testa- 
 ment says merely, — <t supper of the Lord, 
 — a table of the Lord, — and a communion, 
 (see pp. 86, 87, 89, also the original 
 of I Cor. X. 16, 21, and xi. 20;) it ap- 
 points no one repast but every meal to be 
 
124 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 eaten in remembrance of Christ and the 
 '* gladness" of communion with him. 
 
 The only name the New Testament 
 gives to the sacred eating is the Jewish 
 designation of the daily meal, namely, 
 "the breaking of bread." As the Greeks 
 called a supper, a symposium or a drink- 
 ing together, the eating being implied, so 
 the Jews called it a breaking of bread, 
 the drinking being understood. But 
 when the disciples '' came together to 
 break bread " we understand that it was 
 not merely to eat together in friendship 
 but also to remember Christ in so doing. 
 Therefore a proper announcement of the 
 church supper will be that the church 
 will assemble for " the breaking of bread 
 in remembrance of Christ '* ; or still bet- 
 ter, — " The Remembrance of Christ in 
 the Breaking of Bread." Let the spirit- 
 ual exercise rather than the physical act 
 be made prominent in the designation. 
 
 And since no change is to be wn'ought 
 by priestly manipulation in the bread 
 and wine on the church table, since all 
 
The Church Supper. 125 
 
 that needs doing is to recognize that 
 these, like the loaf and cup of the daily 
 meal, are symbols of spiritual things, and 
 to ask that they be blessed to the par- 
 takers as such, it is no more necessary 
 that a particular ecclesiastical official 
 preside at the church meal than that 
 such a one be brought to *' say grace " at 
 the home table. Nor need it be thought 
 that only a " deacon " can distribute the 
 bread and wine. Whoever can properly 
 " ask the blessing " and pass the food at 
 the home table can do so in the church 
 meal. 
 
 And let a welcome to the church sup- 
 per be given to all devout persons, bap- 
 tized or unbaptized. 
 
 Very early in the Church arose the 
 doctrine of baptismal regeneration. It 
 was held that one was " christened " or 
 made a Christian, was brought into the 
 spiritual life, in baptism and only in bap- 
 tism ; and then, since only those who 
 possess the spiritual life can commune 
 with Christ, it was declared that none 
 
126 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 but baptized persons could be admitted 
 to the church table. 
 
 In that very ancient writing, the Did- 
 ache, (Ch. ix) we read, — " But let no one 
 eat of your eucharist except those bap- 
 tized into the name of the Lord, for con- 
 cerning this the Lord hath said, — Give 
 not that which is holy to the dogs." 
 Here is the first enunciation of the rule 
 of '* close-communion," and the reason 
 for it is plainly stated, namely, that a 
 person not yet baptized is not spiritually 
 fitted for the sacred eating. For fifteen 
 centuries no other ground was pleaded 
 for demanding baptism before the sup- 
 per. Any medieval theologian would 
 have given this reason alone for the rule. 
 And the case is the same in nine-tenths 
 of Christendom at the present time, for 
 any Greek, Roman, Lutheran or Angli- 
 can authority of to-day will take the same 
 position in denying the holy supper to 
 the unbaptized. 
 
 Evangelical Protestants, however, who 
 have renounced the doctrine of baptismal 
 
TJie Church Supper. 127 
 
 regeneration, ought logically to renounce 
 also the close-communion rule which 
 flowed from that idea. But usages will 
 long survive the doctrines which gave 
 them rise, and so to-day a Presbyterian 
 Church celebrating the ''sacrament" 
 would not invite to the table a new con- 
 vert still awaiting baptism. And as sheep 
 follow those going before them, Baptists 
 also have unthinkingly adopted the course 
 of the Roman Catholics and of Protes- 
 tant Pedo-baptists, and they also stoutly 
 declare that baptism is an " essential 
 pre-requisite" to the church meal. 
 
 The refusal to admit the unbaptized to 
 the table has in Pedobaptist churches no 
 practical effect, for almost never would 
 admission be desired by one who has not 
 received what they will recognize as bap- 
 tism. Baptists, however, finding in Scrip- 
 ture no baptism but a burial in water on 
 profession of faith, are compelled under 
 this rule to withhold the invitation from 
 the great mass of their Christian brethren 
 since these being merely sprinkled or 
 
128 Christ in the Daily Meal, 
 
 poured upon, and that in unconscious in- 
 fancy, are in Baptist eyes only unbaptized 
 converts. 
 
 It will be seen at a glance how unrea- 
 sonable and how unjust is the outcry 
 against the Baptists for '* close-commun 
 ion " as if they had some rule in this mat- 
 ter which others have not. The Baptists 
 do merely what all churches do, namely, 
 they refuse to invite to the table those 
 who, in their view, have never been bap- 
 tized. In the communion invitation it- 
 self, the Baptists have no restriction 
 wdiich the other churches do not main- 
 tain. They differ from others only on 
 the question to whom this restriction ap- 
 plies. They merely refuse to admit that 
 sprinkling in infancy is New Testament 
 baptism. To condemn them for not in- 
 viting Presbyterians and Methodists to 
 sit down with them at the table is simply 
 to condemn them for refusing to admit 
 that Presbyterians and Methodists have 
 been baptized ; it is merely to declare that 
 they have no right to their opinion as 
 Baptists. 
 
The Chiirclt Supper. 129 
 
 But on the other hand the Baptists can- 
 not fully defend themselves by pleading 
 that ''all other churches" exclude the 
 unbaptized. That argument is merely 
 ad Jwininem ; it may be sufficient as 
 against Episcopalians and- Presbyterians, 
 but it does not touch the principle. Why 
 do Pedobaptist Protestants demand bap- 
 tism before the Supper? It is because 
 they are historically related to the Church 
 of Rome, exhibiting in infant baptism 
 and some other usages a survival of the 
 Roman doctrine that one is "christened," 
 that is, made a Christian, in baptism. 
 For Roman Catholics and for "high 
 church " Protestants holding the doctrine 
 of baptismal regeneration, it is logical to 
 hold to close communion, but the Baptists 
 have always declared that a man is " chris- 
 tened " by faith alone, entirely apart from 
 baptism, and so Baptists have no ground 
 for withholding the Supper till after bap- 
 tism. 
 
 The Baptist "logic of close commun- 
 ion " is faulty in this, that it rests on 
 
130 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 one Pedobaptist premise. The idea that 
 baptism is an '' essential pre-requisite " 
 to the sacred eating is not a Baptist doc- 
 trine, but, like infant baptism, it is an 
 outcome of the idea of baptismal regener- 
 ation. In following " the other denom- 
 inations " in adopting the close-commun- 
 ion rule, the Baptists have made a colossal 
 surrender of their distinctive tenets. Let 
 Baptists adhere strictly to their own prin- 
 ciples, and they leave for '' close com- 
 munion " no basis whatever. 
 
 It is urged that in the New Testament 
 we find no unbaptized person at the 
 church supper. But neither do we find 
 such a one asked to preach. In the Apos- 
 tolic churches all who were invited into 
 the pulpit were welcomed to the table. 
 
 Be it granted that baptism, which 
 symbolizes the beginning of the new life, 
 should precede the memorial eating in 
 which is symbolized its maintenance. 
 But to say that the band should head the 
 procession is not to say that if the band 
 has failed to put in an appearance the 
 
The Church Supper. 131 
 
 line shall not move without it. To ad- 
 mit that baptism should precede the 
 memorial eating is not to admit that the 
 latter is unlawful unless so preceded. 
 
 It is urged that the Commission puts 
 the " baptizing them " before the " teach- 
 ing them to observe all things." But no 
 Baptist pastor would hesitate to teach an 
 unbaptized convert to hold family prayer 
 nor to do any other Christian act, unless it 
 be to eat ** in remembrance." And now 
 by what exegetical sleight of hand can the 
 " all things " be narrowed down to this 
 one thing, so that though a disciple still 
 unbaptized may be taught to join us in 
 every other Christian exercise he must 
 not be welcomed to unite with us in 
 breaking bread in remembrance of 
 Christ ? 
 
 He who accepts the Baptist principle 
 cannot say that baptism is a pre-requisite 
 to the memorial eating as faith is to bap- 
 tism. If, as the Baptists hold, regenera- 
 tion is not wrought, but only symbolized, 
 in baptism, then to baptize one who is 
 
132 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 not yet regenerate is an unreasonable act, 
 an unmeaning rite. But if one be regen- 
 erated before baptism, then he, though still 
 unbaptized, can make a '' remembrance " 
 of Christ as genuine as that of his bap- 
 tized brother, and it is not an unmeaning 
 and unreasonable act for him to eat bread 
 and drink wine to assist such remem- 
 brance. 
 
 What is the object of the church sup- 
 per ? It is to aid us in our remembrance 
 of Christ. But ought not our unbaptized 
 brother also to remember the Saviour? 
 We have already noted the statement 
 that the Supper is " a symbol of the soul's 
 feeding upon Christ " and now let us ask, 
 concerning the disciple still unbaptized, 
 whether it be not proper for Hts soul also 
 to feed on Christ ; and if this be proper 
 who can object to the outward symbol- 
 izing of his spiritual act ? Why cannot 
 one remember Christ in the breaking of 
 bread just as truly, as reasonably and as 
 profitably before baptism as after? But 
 if it be proper for the unbaptized disciple 
 
The CJmrch Supper. 133 
 
 to remember Christ and also to assist his 
 remembrance by a breaking of bread, why 
 should we not invite him to unite with us 
 in the church when we are doing the 
 same thing? 
 
 If as we were sitting down to a week- 
 day meal with a convert not yet baptized 
 he should say, — " Lo, this bread which sus- 
 tains our mortal bodies is a symbol of 
 Christ the bread of heaven, and now as 
 we eat this material food let us think of 
 Christ the heavenly manna," would it be 
 incumbent on us to refuse to go on with 
 the repast ? But if we can unite with an 
 unbaptized person in remembering Christ 
 in the home meal, why may we not wel- 
 come him to remember the Lord with us 
 at the church table ? 
 
 If an unbaptized person said, " Let us 
 sit down together and think of Christ," 
 we might be willing so to do. Should 
 he point to a picture of the crucifixion 
 saying, — " Let us gaze at that picture on 
 the wall that it may help us to think of 
 Him," we might not object. If he drew 
 
1 34 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 from his pocket a crucifix saying, — '' Let 
 us look on this that it may assist our 
 thoughts," even a rigid Protestant might 
 still consent. And now if he said, — " To 
 remind ourselves of Christ, the bread of 
 heaven, let us eat a piece of material 
 bread, and to remind us of his shed blood 
 let us drink of this red juice of the grape," 
 why should we at last refuse? If we 
 are willing to join with an unbaptized 
 person in remembering Christ, why 
 should we not consent to join with him 
 in any reasonable act that will assist such 
 remembrance? 
 
 What is the " Ordinance " of Christ ? 
 It is a Remembrance of him. The break- 
 ing of bread is simply a means thereto : 
 it is the Remembrance itself that is the 
 end, the essential thing. But ecclesiasti- 
 cal legalists have squarely reversed the 
 divine idea. Says one party, — " We will 
 cheerfully remember Christ with you, but 
 we positively will not do it in the break- 
 ing of bread." The other party responds, 
 — '' We care not a fig for your remem- 
 
TJie Church Slipper. 135 
 
 bering Christ with us so long as you will 
 not do it in the breaking of bread/' 
 Each party makes the outward act, the 
 means, more important than the spirit- 
 ual exercise which is the end. 
 
 It is an Ordinance of" Christ that we 
 commune with him in the breaking of 
 bread. It is another Ordinance of his 
 that we commune with him in prayer, and 
 it is still another that we commune with 
 him in praise. Now we find nowhere in 
 Scripture or in common sense any ''terms 
 of communion " in the breaking of bread 
 beyond what may be called for in a com- 
 munion with Christ and our fellow^ disci- 
 ples in prayer or the service of praise. 
 The invitation to the memorial eating 
 may be as wide as the welcome to join us 
 in any other Christian exercise. 
 
 Therefore as the minister may say, — 
 '* We are about to engage in prayer in 
 the name of Christ and we urge all pres- 
 ent to unite with us therein," or, — " We 
 are now about to sing a hymn of praise to 
 Christ and all who will devoutly join 
 
136 CfirisT in the Daily Meal, 
 
 with us are invited so to do," so let him 
 say^ — " We are now about to engage in 
 a remembrance of Christ through the 
 breaking of bread, and all who would find 
 a pleasure in so doing are joyfully wel- 
 comed to join us therein." Whether the 
 unbaptized disciple be a member of the 
 Society of Friends, rejecting all water 
 baptism, or an accepted candidate for bap- 
 tism still awaiting the rite, or some pious 
 but misguided brother who has taken up 
 with a pseudo-baptism in the place of the 
 New Testament ceremony, he is as capa- 
 ble of a true *' remembrance " of Christ as 
 we are, and we may properly ask him to 
 join us in such remembrance. 
 
XV. 
 
 ** In Conclusion'^ 
 
 ^^ D UT " asks some one — " will all the 
 i— ^ churches accept the foregoing 
 doctrine, which is so different from their 
 present ideas?" Certainly not. 
 
 If to those who are in the wroncr on 
 the doctrine of the Real Presence there 
 were read an essay showing them most 
 conclusively their error, would they all 
 and at once abandon it? If to those who 
 are astray in the matter of the act and 
 subjects of Baptism there were presented 
 a treatise making it plain from Scrip- 
 ture and history and reason how entirely 
 they are mistaken, would they instantly 
 and as one man change their practice? 
 Nay, established conceptions are not so 
 easily uprooted. Macaulay has remarked 
 that no Catholic nation becomes Protes- 
 tant and no Protestant country becomes 
 
138 Christ in the Daily Meal. 
 
 Catholic. So, even with all the tracts 
 and volumes written, no Baptist Church 
 becomes Presbyterian nor Presbyterian, 
 Baptist ; no Episcopalian Church be- 
 comes Congregational and no Congrega- 
 tional Church, Episcopalian. We may 
 think that we ourselves always follow 
 pure reason, but we see plainly that our 
 fellow men are influenced very little by 
 argument as compared with hereditary 
 predisposition, habitual training, and per- 
 sonal prejudice. Therefore, though every 
 unbiased reader declared the argument 
 in the foregoing pages as conclusive as a 
 demonstration in Euclid, one could not 
 expect it to have any very great effect. 
 Nevertheless, argument is not always en- 
 tirely thrown away ; wherefore, if the rea- 
 soning in the preceding pages be indeed 
 sound, it may give to here and there a 
 disciple, and even to many a one, some 
 suggestion which will return to his mind 
 again and again, and which will serve to 
 make for him his daily table " a table of 
 the Lord." 
 
BOOKS OF BIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Preacher and Teacher: The Life of Thomas 
 
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 the history of Prince Bismarck is really 
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 pages as from the platform where he 
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 profit.''— Rev. Julius H. Seelye, D.D., 
 President of A viherst Cotlege, Mass, 
 
 Life and Letters of John H. Raymond. Organizer 
 
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 Sir Philip Sidney: His Life and Times. A memo- 
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 " Compels the readers attention, and 
 
 leaves upon his mind impressions more 
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 We long to see the story of Sidney's life 
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 (New YorkJ. 
 
 FORDS, HOWARD, 
 47 JEast Tenth St. 
 
 & HULBERT, 
 
 yew YorJc. 
 
THE AMERICAN VERSION 
 
 Of the New Testament is recognized as the best translation 
 of the best Greek text yet given to the world. That of the Book 
 of Psalms brings out the noble rhythm aad beauty of the Hebrew 
 poetry, and is recognized as the finest text for Responsive Readings. 
 
 The American Version 
 
 Gives in each case the Readings and Renderinfrs preferred by the Amer- 
 ican Revisers incorporated into the text^ insiead of being relegated to the 
 
 ppendix (as in the English Version of Oxford and Cambridge, and the 
 American reprints of them); while the English preferences or adoptions are 
 given in the Appendix^ eacn difiference being separately noted, instead of ail 
 bemg condensed into " Classes of Passages." 
 
 IHE New TEST.AMENT. TUE BOOK OF PSALMS. 
 
 Edited by Rev. Roswell D. Hitch- 
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 logical Seminary, New York City. 
 '• Our supreme duty is to ascertain, 
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 Crosby, D.D. 
 
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 tian scholars. . . Furthermore, this 
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 The Life of Jesus the Christ. 
 
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 Either vol., singly — cloth, J3 ; half mor., ^5. 
 I Lectures to Young Men. 
 
 I On Various Important Subjects. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 Royal Truths. 
 Reported from his Spoken Words. Fourth American from Sixth 
 English Edition. Cloth, $1 25. 
 
 Beecher as a Humorist. 
 
 Selections of Wit and Humor from his Works. Compiled by 
 Eleanor Kirk- Vellum cloth, $1. 
 
 Norwood. 
 A Tale of Village Life in New England. Mr. Beecher's 
 Only Novel. Cloth, Popular Edition, $1.25; paper, 50 cts. 
 
 Faith. 
 Last Morning' Sermon preached by Mr. Beecher, Sunday, 
 Feb. 27, 1887. Portrait. Embossed paper, 20c ; leather, 45c. 
 
 FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT, 
 
 4:7 East Tenth St., New York. 
 
Books of Literary Interest. 
 
 The Human Mystery in Hamlet : An Attempt to 
 
 Say an Unsaid Word: with Suggestive Parallelisms from the 
 Elder Poets. By Martin W, Cooke, A. M. President of the 
 New York State Bar Association. i6mo. Vellum cloth, gilt top, 
 uncut edges, $i.oo. 
 
 "Whether or not the author of 
 'Hamlet' had a conscious purpose to 
 give a concrete embodiment of the uni- 
 versal human truth which you have so 
 ably expounded this is unquestionably 
 to be found in the play. Genius often 
 builds better than it knows, and I be- 
 lieve Shakespeare often did. It is this 
 frasp that apprehends the universally 
 uman which distinguishes a classic 
 from an ephemeral composition. It is 
 
 the ability to discern a rich meaning 
 where common men see only a common- 
 place one that marks ihe true' critic."— 
 From D.AViD J. Hill, President Uni- 
 versity of Kachester, 
 
 '• I have read [it] with interest and 
 admiration, interest in a theme whose 
 infini;e variety custom cannot stale, and 
 admiration for the earnestness and skill 
 wherewith Mr. Cooke pleads for his 
 theory.''— Horace Howard Furness^ 
 
 Henry Ward Beecher. Record of a Memorial Service 
 
 held in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, on Sunda)', March 8, iSgi, by 
 
 bv Thomas 
 
 the Plymouth Sunday School. 
 G. SHEARM.A.N, Superintendent. 
 
 The peculiar interest of this little 
 brochure is that Mr. Shearman was not 
 only for thirty years a member of Ply- 
 mouth Church, but he was an intimate 
 friend and valued counseller of Mr. 
 Beecher, and in this brief address has 
 
 Including an address 
 Paper, 25 cents. 
 
 told many things characteristic of the 
 great preacher which others had not 
 noted. It is terse, suggestive, admir- 
 ably put, and should be read by all 
 who seek knowledge of that wonderful 
 man. 
 
 Bryant and His Friends : Reminiscences of the 
 
 Knickerbocker Writers. By Gen. James Grant Wilson, Author 
 of ''Poets and Poetry of Scot/and," "Life and Letters of Fitz- 
 Greefie Halleck" Editor Appleton's " Cvciopedia of Biography,'' etc. 
 Illustrated with Steel Portraits, MSS. Fac- Similes, etc. Cloth 
 beveled gilt top, $2.00. 
 
 Remainder of LARGE PAPER EDITION, limited to 195 
 copies. Cased in Cloth gilt top, uncut edges, $15 00. Furnished 
 in Sheets, for those who wish to add illustrative plates, at the same 
 price as cloth-cased. Bound in Full Turkey Morocco, gilt, I25.00. 
 [All styles in Boxes.] 
 
 Biographical and Anecdotal Sketches of Bryant, Paulding, Irving, 
 Dana, Cooper. Halleck and Drake ; together with Poe, Willis. 
 and Bayard Taylor. Also concluding chapter on "The Knicker- 
 bocker Literature," shorter notices of others, who. making their fame 
 in the first half of the century, were the pioneers of American literature. 
 
 " I have read it with interest and 
 pleasure, following your words often 
 with my memory, and, under your 
 guidance, recalling delightful hours 
 and famous men." — George William 
 
 " A standard volume of literary his- 
 tory. . . . Especially valuable in the 
 vigor and graphic pictorial power with 
 which those days and scenes, gone from 
 all save memory, are brought to life and 
 light SigdXvi.''''— Boston Ev'g Traveller. 
 
 Curtis. 
 
 FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT, 
 47 JEast lOth St., New York, 
 

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