for sin, every time the consecration is
performed; which, in most churches, is almost every morning in the
year. Its merit attaches not only to the offerer and the partaker,
but to all the faithful, living and dead; especially to those who,
by paying the priest, or by some other service, have their names
mentioned in the prayers that form a part of the ceremony.

Thus a ministry to offer sacrifices is substituted for a ministry to
feed the flock of God with sound doctrine, and the spiritual worship
of God is converted into the formal adoration of a wafer. Preaching
is nowhere regarded as the leading duty of the clergy, but to say
mass. By exalting the eucharist into an expiatory sacrifice, the
partaking of the elements by the people came to be considered quite
unessential, and is generally neglected. They need not understand,
nor even hear the language of the officiating priest. It is enough,
if they see and adore. A bell warns them when to make the needful
genuflections and crosses. Nor can there be a reasonable doubt, that
the adoration of the host (which is required on pain of
excommunication in the Romish Church) is the grossest species of
idolatry.

But there are deadly, as well as venial, sins; and these expose the
soul to eternal punishment. When these are committed after baptism,
they can be remitted only by auricular confession, or the sacrifice
of penance, of which confession forms an essential part. To the
efficacy of this ceremony, contrition of heart is supposed, in
theory, to be essential; but its necessity is rarely taught, and the
great mass of the community go away from the confessional fully
satisfied that their sins are canceled by the mere external form.

Pardon by the priest is not, however, absolute. Grace is restored,
and eternal punishment remitted, but there must be a temporary
punishment,--certain penances, such as fasting, alms-giving, saying
prayers, and the like. The fasts are merely the substituting of a
less for a more palatable and nutritious diet. Alms are more for the
spiritual benefit of the giver, than for the relief of the receiver.
The supposed efficacy of prayer has no connection with the sincerity
of the offerer. For in none of the Oriental Churches, excepting the
Arabic branch of the Greek Church, are the prayers in a language
understood by the people.

They believe that all who die before baptism, or after baptism with
deadly sins unconfessed, are lost forever; but if one d