Part 10

But time works changes. As the story of the crucifixion of Christ receded with the lapse of lengthening years and became a distant tradition in Church history, the desire possessed men's minds for something tangible to nail their faith to; the desire was to bring Christ back again somehow into touch with living men and women. The blank of the long, silent ages grew intolerable. The chilling doubt of Thomas haunted men afresh; the longing to see and touch the wounded Christ gathered force. To gratify the religious devotion of the people, art did its best to portray in coloured pictures Jesus Christ the man who walked in Galilee and died in Jewry; and the Fathers of the Church responded promptly to the longing, and found to hand a ready-made mystery which answered the purpose and helped to stay the profound religious hunger of the day--a mystery which could be amplified to meet every expanding need of the people, and the people accepted with greedy faith the doctrine of the indwelling bodily presence of Jesus Christ in the bread and wine on the altar. These elements, they were assured, became changed into the real flesh and blood of Christ when consecrated by the priest, and the people acclaimed with reverent joy the wonderful transformation which brought Christ so near, and drew what religious consolation they could from the sacred illusion imposed upon them. The olden gods were returning in a new form.

The people did not know and did not want to know the truth about their creed. They had neither the leisure nor the brains to think for themselves. The cake is baked; it is eaten with relish. Hungry men at table do not analyze their food; they eat it and are thankful. The people did not know, but the people had feeling. The Church stirred their feelings to the uttermost, played upon the heart-strings of joy and sorrow, hope and fear, faith and love, until their tumultuous emotions were aroused and they believed blindly according to priestly orders. We would make neither more nor less importance of the Lord's Supper, only just what Christ made of it to His disciples and to plain people through all time. Let us try and possess the ancient feeling that possessed the disciples when they sat at table with the Master, and, stripped of ecclesiastical emblazonment, we touch the Supper in its primitive simplicity as instituted in the upper room with the shadow of death shrouding the Founder of the Feast. He commanded His disciples after His death to meet together thus and to break bread in remembrance of Him.

It is in memory of Christ, if the New Testament report of it is correct. Christ appointed the solemn rite to be an ever-living witness to His own love to man, and we in response make it our pledge of undying love and devotion to Him. It is the Sacrament of the ages. It never varies in purpose; it never stales by observance. The Lord's Table is the prepared place on earth where the Church Catholic should assemble to commemorate the great Sacrifice of Golgotha, and to commune with one another in spiritual fellowship and brotherly unity. It is a commemorative act, and as such, uncorrupted and undefiled by human inventions, it should have come down to us, but the Church has tampered with the holy thing. Christ did not intend us to idolize the bread and wine. It is the legend of the Brazen Serpent repeating itself in modern version. Human folly boasts of little originality. It borrows its sins from its ancestors and charges them up to the children's children. The Brazen Serpent that Moses lifted on a pole in the wilderness for the healing of the people was a symbol of God's saving mercy to the nation. Alas! the people turned the brass image into an idol and in course of time worshipped it, and so did evil in the sight of the Lord. Christ did not intend us to idolize the Sacrament; Christ commanded us to eat and drink the bread and wine, not to worship it. The Sacrament is in memory of Christ's sacrifice: it is not a repetition of it.

To many Churchmen it is the simplicity of the service that savours of an offence. Human vanity dearly loves display, pomp, emotion, with which to salt its devotion to the Almighty and make it palatable to the Deity and to itself. Naaman the Syrian is not the only man who demands splendour of ceremony to colour a religious function in which he engages. His pampered soul feeds on fulsome flattery, and if he does not get it he is angry to the uttermost.

BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD, ENGLAND.

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*OUR VILLA IN ITALY*

*BY JOSEPH LUCAS*

_New and Revised Edition. With 25 full-page Illustrations. Cloth, 5s. net._

"Full of the lure of Florence and, indeed, of all Italy.... Mr. Lucas has written a book which will delight every English lover of that country."--_The Guardian_.

"Mr. Lucas has much to tell us of the Italian people, and the descriptions of his neighbours and servants bring them very vividly before us."--_The Outlook_.

"The author has a good knowledge of Italian furniture, which is rare even among Italians.... His account of his search for rare 'cassoni' and Tuscan sideboards, chests of drawers ('cassettoni') and chairs is delightful; and the photographs of his finds, which include a noble 'cassapanca' and two very fine tables, are among the most interesting features of his book."--_The Athenaeum_.