vor, or much less suppose that any peculiar quality resides in
what is eaten and drank, or any peculiar virtue in the act of eating and
drinking by which any peculiar privilege can be attained. In these last
suppositions all our body are agreed, since no intimation can be found
in the Scriptures that the sacramental bread and wine were at any time
used otherwise than as merely emblematical of the sacrifice of Christ.
It was the practice of the early Christians to assemble for the supper,
each carrying his portion of the feast, which was eaten like any other
feast, and frequently with excess on the part of the rich, while his
poorer neighbor hungered. 'When ye come together,' says the Apostle (1
Cor. xi. 20-23,), it is not to eat the Lord's Supper; for in eating,
every one taketh before another his own supper, and one is hungry and
another is drunken. What? Have ye not houses to eat and drink in? Or
despise ye the Church of God, and shame them that have not?' (v. 33.)
'Wherefore, my brethren, when ye come together to eat, wait one for
another. And if any man hunger, let him eat at home; that ye come not
together unto condemnation.'--It is not conceivable that these
Christians had any notion that what they ate and drank was in itself
sacred, or that the Apostle was aware of any other purpose of the rite
but that of 'showing forth the Lord's death till he came.'

This rite was usually practised on the first day of the week, when the
disciples met to commemorate the resurrection of their Lord, and to
worship together. The custom of meeting on a stated day for worship has
been continued ever since; and the day has been wisely set apart for
purposes of rest and refreshment to body and mind. An institution so
simple for purposes so salutary will probably, however abused, be of
very long standing, even after it is more generally allowed than at
present, not to be a Divine appointment. The Jewish Sabbath was a Divine
ordinance for the use of the Jews; and by them alone has the last day of
the week been regarded as sacred. The Lord's Day, or, as it sometimes
called, the Christian Sabbath, is a totally different institution, and
one which is professedly arbitrary, though subservient to very important
objects. If the Jews were encouraged by their Messiah to look to the
final purposes of their sabbatical institution, much more ought we, the
subjects of a more enlarged dispensation, to bear in mind that all
external observances are bu