N02341:265
Ratio disciplinae fratrum Nov-Anglorum. A faithful account of the discipline professed and practised; in…
Ratio disciplinae fratrum Nov-Anglorum. A faithful account of the discipline professed and practised; in the churches of New-England. : With interspersed and instructive reflections on the discipline of the primitive churches. : [Seven lines from Ezekiel]
Boston: printed for S. Gerrish, 1726
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
Then filling out the Wine from the Flagons into the Cups, [Though the Pouring out of the Wine is not properly one of the Sacramental Actions, and if there stand any Tankards on the Table ready filled, it is accordingly omitted there;] he proceeds to speak unto this Effect, Our Lord JESUS CHRIST hereupon GAVE the CUP to His Disciples, saying, This Cup is the New Testament in my Blood, which is shed for you and for many for the Remission of Sins; TAKE it, and all you DRINK of it, and do it in Remembrance of me. Wherefore in the Name of that most Gracious Lord, I invite you to TAKE and DRINK hereof, and to do it in Remembrance of Him. So he himself Takes and Drinks of the Wine, and the Deacons do Dispense and Disperse the Cups among the Communicants; who still using the Table Posture of sitting, do in a devout Manner Take and Drink thereof. The Deacons return with their emptied Cups unto the Pastor, who again fills them, till there be no more Occasion. And when all seem to be served he inquires, Whether any to whom that Cup of the Lord, and of Blessing, hen belonged, had been omitted in the Dispensation? ⟨p. 101⟩— The Deacons then sit down and partake as before.
A Psalm chose (and in some Places read) by the Pastor, is hereupon Sung by the Communicants. This in the Primitive Churches was usually done before the last Prayer. Some of ours do it after.
The Pastor now (as Tertullian says, Oratio Convivium dirimit) passes on to a third Prayer; consisting of the most Raised Thanksgiving to GOD, and Assurance of the Blessings in the New Covenant, sealed by this Ordinance. And as Chrysostom tells us, one had need have the ΠΑΡΡΗΣΙΑ, the Confidence, the Liberty, and the Enlargements of a Moses or Elijah, to Pray as they did use to do in the Primitive Times at the Eucharist; It may now be said, That some of the Pastors often pray with very much of the Spirit of a Moses, or an Elijah, on these Eucharistical Occasions. Or, the same Account may be given of them, that Nazianzen gives of the Prayers made by his Venerable Father in the Celebrating of the Eucharist; They have been made, ΠΑΡΑ ΤΟΥ ΑΓΙΟΥ ΠΝΕΥΜΑΤΟΣ, by the Holy Spirit of GOD.