SECTION III.

The Hiftory of the Eucharift, from the Time of Pafchafius to the Reformation.

WE are now arrived to the most diftinguished æra in the hiftory of the eucharift; after having feen how much the euchariftical elements in this age of darkness had gained in point of facredness and folemnity, and how awful a thing the act of communicating was generally apprehended to be; fo that commonly the priest alone communicated, and the people very feldom, except at the time of the greater feftivals, and especially at Eafter.

This was in confequence of the people in ge neral being impreffed with a confused notion that the eucharistical elements were, in fome fense or other, the body and blood of Chrift, and therefore that Chrift himself was present in them. But in what manner he was prefent they seem to have had no clear idea. This general notion, however, paved the way for the capital addition that was made to the doctrine of the eucharift by Pafchafius Radbert, a monk of Corbie in France, who undertook to explain the manner in which the body of Chrift is present in the eucharist.

This he did in a treatise published in the year 818, in which he maintained that not only the bread and wine were changed by confecration, into the real body and blood of Chrift; but that it was the fame body that had been born of the virgin Mary, and that had been crucified and raifed from the dead. It was in fupport of this opinion that he wrote the two books on the Delivery of the Virgin Mary, which I had occafion to mention before; in which he maintained, that it was performed in a miraculous manner, without any opening of the womb.

This opinion Pafchafius himself feems to have been fenfible was bold and novel. For the first time that he mentions it, after calling the eucharistical elements the body of Chrift in general, he adds, "and to fay fomething more furprising and "wonderful (Ut mirabilius loquar) it is no other "flesh than that which was born of the virgin c Mary, which fuffered upon the cross, and which "was raised from the gravet."

Not depending intirely upon the reafons which he was able to allege in favour of fo extraordinary an opinion, he likewife produced in fupport of it, what was no uncommon thing with the monks, and what had no fmall weight with the common people, in that ignorant age, namely an

*Sueur, A. D. 818. + Ibid.

D3

apparition,

apparition, which for its fingular curiofity, and as a specimen of the impofitions of those times, I fhall relate.

upon

A priest whose name was Plecgills officiating at the tomb of St. Ninus, wifhed, out of love, and not infidelity, to fee the body of Jefus Chrift; and falling upon his knees, he afked of God the favour to fee the nature of the body of Jefus Chrift, in this myftery, and to hold in his hands. the form of that little child which the virgin had borne in her lap; when an angel cried to him, "Get up, quickly, and look at the infant, which "that holy woman hath carried, for he is cloathed "in his corporeal habit." The priest declared, that being quite terrified he looked up, and saw the altar the child that Simeon had held in his arms, that the angel told him he might not only fee but touch the child, and that accordingly he took him and preffed the breast of the child to his own, and after embracing him frequently, he kiffed the God, joining his lips to the lips of Jefus Christ. After this, he replaced the beautiful limbs of the God upon the altar, praying to God that he might refume his former figure, and that he had scarcely finished his prayer, when rifing from the ground, he found that the body of Jefus Christ was restored to its former figure, as he had requested.

* Sueur, A. D. p. 818.

Notwithstanding

Notwithstanding this miracle, and every thing elfe that Pafchafius could allege in favour of his doctrine, it excited great astonishment, and was opposed by many perfons of learning and eminence. Among others, the emperor Charles the Bald was much offended at it, and by his particular order, the famous Bertram, or Rattram, wrote against the new opinion of Pafchafius, and at the fame time against his particular notion concerning the delivery of the virgin.

In confequence of this, the doctrine of Pafchafius, though published in the ninth century, does not appear to have gained many advocates till the eleventh, when it was opposed by Berenger archdeacon of the church of Angers in France, (whom I mentioned before as one of the most eminent scholars of his age) and his writings on this fubject made a great impreffion on the minds of many; fo that though no less than ten or twelve councils were held on this fubject, in all of which the doctrine of Berenger was condemned, Matthew of Westminster fays, that it had infected almost all France, Italy, and England; and though, when he was threatened, he was weak enough to fign a recantation of his opinion, he certainly died in the belief of it. Berenger was followed by Peter and Henry de Bruis, whofe difciples were called Petrobruffians, and by the Albigenfes in general; who in the twelfth century feparated from the church of Rome. Arnold of Breffia also taught

the fame doctrine in Italy, and for this, and his declaiming against the church of Rome in general, he was burned at Rome, in 1155*.

It is remarkable that for two centuries the popes did not interfere in the controversy about Pafchafius. Moft probably they thought with his adversaries; and as very few joined him at first, and he was openly oppofed by the learned men of the age, it feemed as if his opinion would have died away of itself. As foon, however, as it was perceived that the doctrine went down with the common people, and that it promised to give a high idea of the dignity and power of the priesthood, the popes were ready enough to enforce it by their decrees, as we have seen in the cafe of Berenger. It was not, however, till the beginning of the thirteenth century that this doctrine was made an article of faith, viz. by a decree of Innocent III. at the council of Lateran, in 1215, the term tranfubftantiation having been first used by Stephen bishop of Autun, in the beginning of the twelfth century.

Even notwithstanding this decree, feveral divines openly maintained a different opinion, thinking it fufficient to acknowledge the real prefence, though they explained the manner of it differently from Innocent, and the followers of Pafcha

*Larroche, p. 473.