THE FIRST MASS.

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I trust you will consider my arguments with the candour which the importance of the subject demands that you will prove all things, and hold fast that which is good. If it be your duty to prove all things, then it is manifest there must be a judging faculty to be exercised, and a standard with which it compares the doctrinal and moral subjects that are brought before it. These things are necessary to our accountability. Where there is no law, there is no transgression; and where there is no conscience, transgressions are not imputed. We shall refer, then, "to the law and the testimony."

A person who had learned his theology only from the Bible, would be sadly puzzled on meeting the word Mass. What can it mean? And why should we look in vain for a word so important in a book which is said to contain the mystery which it denotes ? The name is no where to be found; but it is contended that the thing is contained in the institution of the Lord's Supper. Who could have thought that? In the Douay Catechism, and in the Grounds of the Catholic Doctrine, it is stated that CHRIST said the first Mass !-and we are referred to the Last Supper for proof. Now, have the goodness to turn to Matth. xxvi. 26, Luke xxiv. 30, and 1 Cor. xi. 23-25, and tell me, candidly, do

these passages contain any thing like the Mass When you go next to chapel, observe attentively every thing the Priest does, and if you can dis cover a similitude, I think you must draw largely on your imagination. He took bread, and when he had given thanks, he brake it, and gave it to the disciples, saying, "Take, eat." In like manner he took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he said, " Drink ye all of this." Is this saying Mass? Did the Redeemer hereby "offer himself to God as a true propitiatory sacrifice"? It might be a eucharistic, or thanksgiving offering; but an atoning sacrifice it could not be. There was no bloodshed, and the shedding of blood both Jews and Gentiles regarded as essential to a propitiatory sacrifice. Indeed, this is the doctrine taught us by the Holy Spirit "Without shedding of blood there is no remission," Heb. ix. 22. Cain confessed no sin, and obtained no pardon by offering" of the fruits of the ground" while Abel offered by faith "a more excellent sacrifice," " of the firstlings of his flock."

But a sacrifice must be offered to God; the bread and wine, however, were offered to the disciples. Take, eat," was said to them.

"Do this in remembrance of me."

rial of a sacrifice is not a sacrifice.

The memo

Besides, if

UNBLOODY SACRIFICE.

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Christ offered himself at the Last Supper, it is admitted that he offered himself again on the Cross; therefore, he offered himself twice. If so, St. Paul must have been greatly mistaken, when he said, "Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many;"" We are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all," Heb. ix. 28, and x. 10. Here is a contradiction. Which shall we believe, the church or the Apostle? If Jesus offered himself on the table, why should he offer himself on the cross ? If a true, proper and propitiatory sacrifice was offered in an upper room, what need of another on Calvary?

But the Apostle argues that, if he were "offered often, then must he often have suffered," Heb. ix. 26. Does not this set aside your church's distinction, between a bloody and an unbloody sacrifice? "A sacrifice unbloody and yet propitiatory! Who ever heard of such a thing? What Jew?-what Pagan? A sacrifice for atonement cannot be unbloody, for "without shedding of blood there is no remission." Could sin be pardoned by mere doing without suffering? by mere action without pas sion? Is it not a truth written, as it were, with the finger of God on the heart of man-that the pardon of sin requires the death of a victim?

If a sacrifice may be unbloody and yet propitiatory, wherefore did the blood of animals stream for ages on Jewish altars, according to Divine appointment? But, above all, why did the Son of God die a death so cruel, if an unbloody offering would have sufficed to save the souls of men ? If the doctrine of an unbloody atonement were true, would it not then have been possible for the bitter cup to pass from the Redeemer ? I entreat your impartial and earnest attention to these questions.

I have carefully examined the Bible, and I find not the slightest mention of any offering of Christ but one as an atonement or propitiation for sin. I have also examined the writings of your own divines, and I have never met a proof of any such offering, either before or after the crucifixion. Was it not my duty, therefore, to reject the Mass as a doctrine of man's invention? But I have more to say on this dogma of your Church.

Where there is a sacrifice there must be a Priest; and your clergymen profess to be priests in the strict sense of the word. Now what do you say to the fact, that the ministers of the Gospel are never once called Priests in the New Testament? Jewish ministers had bloody sacrifices to offer, and are therefore called Priests.

The same may be said of the Pagans. In allusion to the Jewish Priesthood, Christians, as such (including the laity, of course), are figuratively called Priests. Thus Peter (1 Peter ii. 5, 9) calls believers a "holy Priesthood"-" a royal Priesthood"-"to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ." See also, Rev. i. 6 and v. 10, where all the redeemed in heaven are said to be made “kings and Priests unto God." But it is a remarkable fact, which members of your Church should weigh deliberately, that the word Priest is never applied in Scripture to any one of the apostles, evangelists, prophets, or pastors of the New Testament. In the present Dispensation, there is no Priest but JESUS CHRIST.

I know you will reply that Melchisedek is called the Priest of the most High God, though he offered only bread and wine. But to whom did he offer these? Manifestly not to God as a sacrifice, but to Abraham as refreshment, when he had returned from the slaughter of the kings; or if to God on Abraham's account, it must have been to give thanks for his victory, and not to atone for his sins. (Gen. xiv. 18—20.) He blessed Abraham, and received as a gift the tenth of the spoils, because he was a Priest of the most High God, and a remarkable type of