Romanists say that they teach and prove the doctrine of transubstantiation. Cardinal Wiseman, in his Lectures on the Eucharist (lect. v.), contends that if our Lord had intended to teach that the bread represented his body, he would have said This bread is my body :' just as it is said, The seven good kine are seven years,' and The seven horns are seven kings.' But Jesus said, This ' (not this bread, but 'this,' whatever it be) is my body.' He intentionally avoided calling it bread, because when he spake it was not bread, but his own body. This,' says the Cardinal, is nothing, and it repre sents nothing, it means nothing until it is identified the close of the sentence with the substance named.' The Cardinal should have explained how it was that, if our Lord carefully avoided calling that substance bread which was not bread, St. Paul did not follow his example when he said, ` As often as ye eat this bread ;' and again, ` Whosoever shall eat this bread of the Lord unworthily ;' words which, if literally interpreted, are, according to the CardinaPs own argument, subversive of the doc trine of transubstantiation. Considering, moreover, how great respect Romanists pay to the au thority of the fathers, he might have offered some sort of explanation of the language of the Latin fathers, as of Tertullian, who says, ` Christ called the bread his body ' G4dv. .id.); of Cyprian, who says, The Lord called the bread, which is consti tuted of many grains, his body ' (Ep. ad ltiag. Nix.); and of Augustine, who uses the same lan guage, ` The Lord calls the bread his body.' These venerable men never thought of the reason which the Cardinal has discovered for the words of our Lord, This ' (not this bread) is my body.' Christ's words, literally interpreted, seem less appropriate to the Romish doctrine of transub stantiation than to some other forms in which the doctrine of the real presence has been propounded. Dr. Wiseman says, in his Lectures on the Catholic Church (lect. xiv., p. 136) —‘ The blessed Eu charist, which was originally bread and wine, is by the consecration changed into the substance of the body and blood of our Lord together with his soul and divinity, in other words, his complete and entire person.' See also the notes to the Rheims Testament on John vi. 54, and the Acts of the Council of Trent, Sess. xiii., c. 4. The doctrine of the Catholic Church is, that the priest, on pro nouncing with a good intention the words `//oc at corpus meum,' tmnsubstantiates the bread not only into the body, but also into the soul and divinity of Christ, that is, into his whole and com plete person, human and divine. If it be so, why did our blessed Lord call that substance his body which included his soul and divinity ? The priest who can change bread into the spiritual and divine nature of Christ has certainly marvellous power; but the authorities by which the Latin Church is bound for ever, distinctly, and in express language, attribute this power to the officiating priest, and repudiate in the strongest terms any other explana tion or modification of the doctrine. However Catholics may differ on almost all other subjects— as on the authority and power of the Pope, the immaculate conception of the Virgin., worship of saints and angels, the doctrines of predestination and grace, on the entire transubstantiation of the bread into the whole person, human and divine, of Christ—there can be no difference between Dominicans and Franciscans, Jansenists and Je suits, or Cismontanists and Ultramontanists. The authority of the Council of Trent is here de cisive.
Our purpose is not controversy. If it were, we might propose the inquiry how and when the great and mysterious power of transubstantiation left the original Syriac or Greek words of our Lord and came to belong to the Latin words Hoc est corpus meum !' 'Whether on that occasion Jesus spake Syriac or Greek is an inquiry we may not be able to answer ; but certainly those Latin words are no more like the words he used than are the corresponding words of the French, German, or English language.
The words This is my body ' have been thought by some more appropriate to the Lutheran doctrine of consubstantiation, or to the old notion of impanition, according to which the consecrated bread becomes by incOrporation a new body for the Spirit of Christ, or to the undefined form of a real presence, which is held by some Episcopalians, who renounce transubstantiation as being, in the words of the twenty-ninth article, repugnant to the plain words of Scripture.' The reformed churches interpret the words of our Lord as figurative, that is, just as the Latin fathers interpreted them. They say, as Tertullian, Cyprian, and Augustine said long before them, The Lord called the bread his body.' The passover was a commemorative service by appro priate emblems ; and so was ` the Lord's Supper instituted in connection with, or immediately after, its celebration. As the paschal lamb, the un leavened bread, the bitter herbs, the cups of wine, were significant memorials, so is ` the cup of bless ing which we bless the communion of the blood of Christ,' and the bread which we break the com munion of the body of Christ.' According to this interpretation the words of our Lord mean This represents my body which is given for you.' ill the extract from Justin Martyr a sentence occurs of considerable importance, if theologians could agree about its meaning, in enabling us to ascertain the prevalent opinion of Christians in the second century respecting the change which was supposed to be wrought in the bread and wine. of the Eucharist. We do not receive these as common bread and common drink ; but in what manner Jesus Christ, having become incarnate by the Word of God, had flesh and blood for our salvation, in that manner also we have been taught that the Eucharistic food, by the pray-er of the word, from which our flesh and blood are nourished by transmutation (Kara AerctOoX0), is also the flesh and blood of the incarnate Jesus.' Is this the doctrine of transubstantiation ? Or is it consubstantiation ? Or is it impanition ? Or is it highly figurative language ? Or is it absolute nonsense ? The last inquiry is that of the late Principal Cunningham, who boldly auswers it in the affir mative, and assures us that if we could call up its author, and interrogate him on the subject, he would be utterly unable to tell us what he meant when he wrote it ' (Theology of the Reformation, p. 232). As we cannot call him before us, and are not bold enough to dismiss him in quite so summary a manner, we must be content to let every party make what it can of his somewhat obscure language.
As he speaks of a transmutation, Roman Catho lics universally claim the sanction of his venerable authority. But the words, by a transmutation (Karat kteragoXilv), refer not to any transmutation of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ , but to the change which takes place by the assimi lation of bread and wine in the nourishment of our bodies. This being considered, the passage does not appear so favourable as many think to the doctrine of transubstantiation. It should also be observed, that Justin calls the Eucharistic elements bread and wine, when he distinguishes them from cornmeal bread and wine ; but Dr. Wiseman says, that to call the elements bread and wine after they are consecrated is subversive of transubstantiation.
As Justin calls the Eucharistic elements, as they are after the thanksgiving, bread and wine, and also the flesh and blood of Jesus, Lutheran divines have very confidently claimed his testimony as being decidedly in favour of consubstantiation.