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Meditations on the holy sacrament of the Lords last Supper Written many years sinceMeditations on the holy sacrament of the Lords last Supper Written many yeares since
Meditations on the holy sacrament of the Lords last Supper Written many years since by Edward Reynolds then fellow of Merton College in Oxford.Meditations on the holy sacrament of the Lords last Supper Written many yeares since by Edvvard Reynolds then fellow of Merton College in Oxford.
London: printed by Felix Kyngston for Robert Bostock, 1638
MEDITATIONS ON THE HOLY SACRAMENT OF THE LORDS LAST SUPPER. › Chapter 14
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Of three other Ends of the holy Sacrament, the fellowship or union of the faithful, the obsignation of the Covenant of Grace, and the abrogation of the Passover.
Of three other Ends of the holy Sacrament, the fellowship or union of the faithfull, the obsignation of the Covenant of Grace, and the abrogation of the Passeover.
NOW as the same nourishment which preserveth the Union between the Soul and Body, or head and members, doth in like manner preserve the Union between the members themselves: even so this Sacrament is as it were the sinew of the Church, whereby the faithful, being allc animated by the same Spirit that makes them one with Christ, are knit together in a bond of Peace, conspiring all in a unity of thoughts and desires, having the same common Enemies to withstand, the same common Prince to obey, the same ⟨p. 103⟩common rule to direct them, the same common way to pass, the same common Faith to vindicate, and therefore the same mutual engagements to further and advance the good of each other; so that the next immediate effect of this Sacrament is to confirm the Union of all the members of the Church each to other in a Communion of Saints, whereby their prayers are the more strengthened, and their adversaries the more resisted: for as in natural things,d Union strengtheneth motions natural, and weakeneth violent; so in the Church, Union strengtheneth all spiritual motions, whether upward as meditations and prayers to God, or downward as sympathy, and good works towards our weak Brethren, and it hindereth all violent motions, the strength of sin, the darts of Satan, the provocations of the World, the Judgements of God, or whatever evil may be by the flesh either committed or deserved. And this Union of the faithful is both in the Elements and appellations, and in the ancient ceremonies, and in the very act of eating and drinking most significantly represented.