nding from heaven, in this
manner, to enter into the bread. Nevertheless, the angels declared
that he should descend from heaven in the same manner as he went up
into heaven."
I found, in the same book, "that the heavens must receive Jesus Christ
till the time of the restitution of all things." Acts, 3:21. "He is
then," said I, "no longer corporeally on the earth." I found, in the
Epistle to the Colossians, that "Christ sitteth on the right hand of
God;" chap. 3:1; from whence I drew the inference that he certainly
cannot be actually present on so many altars, or in so great a number
of wafers, as the doctrine of the real presence necessarily supposes.
I found, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapters 9 and 10, the
strongest declarations, not only against the real presence, but
against the whole system of the mass, by which it is pretended daily
to renew the passion and sacrifice of our Saviour. When the apostle
says that "Christ is entered into heaven itself;" Heb. 9:24; when he
says that "unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time
without sin unto salvation;" ver. 28; lastly, when he says it is the
will of God to sanctify us "through the offering of the body of Jesus
Christ once made," chap. 10:10, and that "this man, after he had
offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down at the right hand of
God," ver. 12, having "by one offering perfected for ever them that
are sanctified," ver. 14, it appeared to me to prove, with the most
unanswerable evidence, that the doctrine of the real presence, and all
connected with it, was as far removed from the creed of the apostle as
the east is from the west, or as heaven from hell.
Finally, my dear children, the very words of the institution of the
Lord's Supper, related by St. Paul, 1 Cor. 11, and to which I paid
particular and repeated attention, did not leave a shadow of doubt on
my mind that the doctrine of the Romish church, on the subject of the
Eucharist, is utterly devoid of any foundation in the Gospel, and
must, consequently, have been derived from some other source. In fact,
all that our Saviour says on the occasion of instituting the Lord's
Supper, clearly shows that it was a _memorial of himself_ which he
established, and which he wished to leave behind him. After having
taken, blessed, and broken the bread, he commands that it should be
eaten _in remembrance of him._ Having given them the cup to drink, he
adds, "This do ye, as oft as ye drin
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