I With respect to the numerous Sacraments of the Romish Church, the Apology contains such an able and incontrovertible exposition, that we must refer our readers to it for our opinions on that point: but there has from its infancy existed a practice in the Church of Rome, which calls for the most unqualified condemnation: we allude to the system of mutilating MSS. and expunging all those passages from the writings of the Ancient Fathers, which can be in any way interpreted to their disadvantage,

In the * printed editions of St. Isidore these words are omitted: "Now Bread and Wine are therefore compared to the Body and Blood of Christ, because, as the substance of this visible Bread and Wine feeds and nourishes the outward man; so the Word of God, which is the Living Bread, doth refresh the Souls of the Faithful by the receiving thereof." ↑

* Ratramiri liber, Geneva, A.D. 1541.

+ Panis vero et Vinum ideo Corpori et Sanguini Domini comparantur, quia sunt visibilis hujus Panis Vini que substantia exteriorem nutrit et inebriat hominem, ita Verbum Dei, qui est Panis Vivus participatione sui fidelium recreat mentes.

Isidor. Orig. lib. vi. c. 19.

In a defence of the Book of Bertram, published anonymously, and dedicated to the Right Honorable Henry Coventry, one of the Privy Counsellors to King James II. the following remarkable confirmation of the facts above stated occurs, to which some reference is made in the Apology; "Rabanus, Archbishop of Mentz, whom Baronius styles the brightest Star of Germany, in his 'Penitentials' makes strong allusions to Paschasius and his followers, who had entertained false sentiments touching the sacraments of the Lord's Body and Blood; saying, that this very Body

of our Lord, which was born of the Virgin Mary, in which our Lord suffered on the Cross, and rose again from the grave, is the same which we receive from the Altar." These last words were, as Baluzius* and F. Mabillon observe, razed out of the MS. from whence Stevartius published that Epistle of Rabanus; which I take notice of, because Mr. Arnaud's modest Monk of St. Genouefte makes so much difficulty to believe Archbishop Usher, who tells of a passage of the same importance razed out of an old MS. Book of Penitential Canons, in Bennet College Library, Cam

* Baluzius in notis ad c. xxxiii. Ad Calcem Reginonis.

bridge, though he had seen it himself, and, no doubt, the other MS. also, out of which the lost passage was restored.

This passage is an authority of the tenth Cen

*

tury, confirming Bertram's Doctrine, which I shall transcribe; "But this sacrifice is not the Body in which he suffered for us, nor his Blood which he shed for us: but it is spiritually made his Body and Blood, like the Manna rained down from Heaven, and the Water which flowed from the Rock." These words some had razed out of the Worcester book, but they are restored again out of a book of Exeter Church, as is noted in the margin, by the first publishers of this Epistle, and the Saxon Homily: they are both one Author's work, viz. "Elfric's." Thus the reader may be satisfied how the passage was recovered; and that Bishop Usher did not invent it: which, had it been lost utterly, might also have been restored out of the Saxon Epistle printed immediately before it.

And now I am speaking of such detested prac

* At the end of the Saxon Homily, printed by J. Day.

tices, I cannot but add what, for the sake of such a passage, hath befallen St. Chrysostom's Epistle to Cæsarius. The passage runs thus: * As before the Bread is consecrated, we call it Bread; but after the divine Grace hath consecrated it, by the Ministry of the Priest, it is freed from the name of Bread, and honoured with the name of the Lord's Body; though the nature of Bread remaineth in it, and we do not teach two Bodies, but one Body, of the Son; so, &c." This Epistle Peter Martyr found in the Florentine Library, and transcribed several copies of it, one of which he gave to Archbishop Cranmer. The copies of this Epistle being lost, the world was persuaded by the Papists that the passage was a Forgery committed by Peter Martyr. This past current for about a century; till, at last, Emericus Bigotius found it, and printed the whole Epistle

* Sicut enim antequam Sanctificetur Panis, Panem nominamus, Divina autem illud sanctificante Gratia, mediante Sacerdote liberatus est ab Appellatione Pauis: dignus autem habitus est Dominici Corporis appellatione, etiam si natura Panis in ipso permansit, et non duo Corpora, sed unum Corpus Filii prædicamus, sic, &c.

Apud Steph. Le Moine inter Varia Sacra, Tom. 1. p. 532.

with the Life of St. Chrysostom, and some other little things: but when it was finished, this Epistle was taken out of the book, and not suffered to see light.

The place out of which this Epistle was expunged is visible in the Book by a break in the signature at the bottom, and the numbers at the top of the page. But at length it is published by Mr. Le Moine, among several other ancient pieces, at Leyden, 1685.

So that notwithstanding the French Monk's indignation at the learned Usher, for charging the Papists with the Razure of an old MS., it is plain that such tricks have not been unusual with them: that they are more ancient than their public Expurgatory Indices, and more mischievous; and that some of their great Doctors, at this day, make no conscience of stifling ancient testimonies against their corruptions when it lies in their power.

* Palladii Vita Chrysostomi, Gr. Lat. &c. 4to. Paris, 1680. Inter paginas 235-245. In schodis Signatis, G.g. H.h. + Vide Expostulationem trac. de re edita, 4to. London, 1682. The Defence of the Book of Bertram, 12mo. London, 1685, pp. 115-120.