N00426:38
A companion for communicants. Discourses upon the nature, the design, and the subject of…
A companion for communicants. Discourses upon the nature, the design, and the subject of the Lords Supper; with devout methods of preparing for, and approaching to that blessed ordinance. / By Cotton Mather, Pastor of a church at Boston. ; [Seven lines from Augustine]
Boston: printed by Samuel Green for Benjamin Harris, 1690
Invitations to the SUPPER of the LORD, With a DISCOURSE on the Natu… › Proposition 1
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.
We may rather observe, That the Effects of Bread and Wine, most Elegantly answer the Effects of our Approaches to the Lord Jesus in the Sacrament. If Bread nourish & strengthen the Body, if Wine Refresh and Comfort the Body, much more will the Lord Jesus do so, to the Souls of them, who draw near unto Him. Besides, I conceive, That our Lord would Ordain Sacraments, which required not the Occision of any Creature, because no Creature was after this to Die for the Sin of Man. He did as it were say herein concerning the whole work of Sacrificing for sin, It is finished. We may also herein Remark the Wisdom and Goodness of our Lord Jesus Christ, in choosing of Bread and Wine for this End; inasmuch as there is hardly any place in the world, which they cannot easily be obtained at. Whether it be not in the Sacrament lawful to Substitute something else equivalent where Bread and Wine cannot be had? Whether in those Countries that cannot procure Bread and Wine, that Food which is the Bread, ⟨p. 18⟩and that Juice which is the Wine of the Country, may not be allowed for the Sacrament? It is a question that I am not fond of discussing; but it were easy to quote Renowned and Judicious Divines, who deliver it as their Sentiment, That this were no Aberration from the mind of the Lord Jesus Christ:
We may rather observe, That the Effects of Bread and Wine, most Elegantly answer the Effects of our Approaches to the Lord Jesus in the Sacrament. If Bread nourish & strengthen the Body, if Wine Refresh and Comfort the Body, much more will the Lord Jesus do so, to the Souls of them, who draw near unto Him. Besides, I conceive, That our Lord would Ordain Sacraments, which required not the Occision of any Creature, because no Creature was after this to Dy for the Sin of Man. He did as it were say herein concerning the whole work of Sacrificing for sin, It is finished. We may also herein Remark the Wisdom and Goodness of our Lord Jesus Christ, in choosing of Bread and Wine for this End; inasmuch as there is hardly any place in the world, which they cannot easily be obtained at. Whether it be not in the Sacrament lawful to Substitute something else equivalent where Bread and Wine cannot be had? Whether in those Countreys that cannot procure Bread and Wine, that Food which is the Bread, ⟨p. 18⟩and that Juice which is the Wine of the Country, may not be allow'd for the Sacrament? It is a question that I am not fond of discussing; but it were easy to quote Renowned and Judicious Divines, who deliver it as their Sentiment, That this were no Aberration from the mind of the Lord Jesus Christ: