this Section proceeds to guard this important truth from abuse, by carefully showing upon what this grace-conveying efficacy of the sacraments does not, and upon what it does, depend.

1st. This grace is not contained in the sacraments themselves, nor " is it conferred by any power in them."

According to the Romish and Ritualistic view, the grace signified is contained in the sacrament itself, as qualities inhere in substances, and it is together with the outward sign presented as a real objective sense to every recipient, whether believer or unbeliever. They hold also that the sacrament confers this grace upon every recipient who does not positively resist, as an ojpus operatum — by the sole force of. the sacramental action, as hot iron burns.*

This whole view is explicitly rejected as false by our Confession. And the whole efficacy of the sacrament is said to depend not upon any part of it separately, nor upon the whole together, but upon the sovereign power of the Holy Ghost, who is always present and uses the sacrament as his instrument and medium.

2d. The efficacy of the sacraments does not depend upon either the personal piety or the *' intention" of the person who administers them.

The Romanists admit that the efficacy of the sacraments does not depend upon the personal piety of the administrator, but they insist that it depends (a) upon the fact that the administrator is canonically authorized; (b) upon the fact that the administrator exercises at the moment of administration the secret " intention" of doing thereby what the Church intends in the definition of the sacrament.f The priest may outwardly pronounce every word and perform every action prescribed in the ritual, and the recipient may fulfil every condition required of him, and yet if the priest fails in the secret intention of conferring the grace through the

* Cone. Trident., Sess. vii., Cans. 6 and 8.

t Ibid., Sess. vii.. Can. 11. Dens, vol. v. p. 127.

sacrament then and there, the recipient goes away destitute of the grace he supposes himself to have received, and which the priest has ostensibly professed to confer,

3d. But the efficacy of the sacraments depends — (a.) Upon their divine appointment as means and channels of grace. They were not devised by man as suitable in themselves to produce a moral impression. But they were appointed by God, and we are commanded to use them as means of grace, and hence God virtually promises to meet every soul who uses them rightly in the sacrament. Christ seals his gracious covenant by them, and hence in their use invests with the grace of that covenant every soul to which it belongs. (6.) The efficacy of the sacrament resides in the sovereign and everpresent personal agency of the Holy Ghost, who uses the sacraments as his instruments and media of operation. The Spirit is the executive of God. He takes of the things of Christ and shows them unto us. Through him even the humanity of Jesus is virtually omnipresent, and all the benefits secured by his sacrifice are revealed and applied.

The word sacrament is not found in the Scriptures, but is derived from the Latin language. It was used by the Romans to signify their military oath, or the oath by which soldiers bound themselves to be faithful to their general, and not to desert his standard; and it is supposed to have been applied to the symbolical institutions of the Church, because in these we, as it were, enlist in the service of Christ, the Captain of our salvation, and engage to follow him whithersoever he leads us. But it may be remarked, that the early Christian writers employed the term sacrament {sacramentum); as equivalent to the scriptural term mystery {fiuffrnoiov); and in the Vulgate the latter word is always translated by the former. There is reason to think that the term mysteries was early applied to baptism and the Lord's supper, partly be- * Dick's Lectures on the Acts of the Apostles, lect. iii.

280 CONFESSION OF FAITH. [[CHAP. XXVII.

cause, under external symbols, spiritual blessings were vailed, and partly also on account of the secrecy with which Christians, in times of persecution, were obliged to celebrate them; and as the Latins used the word sacrament as synonymous with mystery, it has been thought that we are in this way to account for its application to these symbolical institutions.

The express institution of God is essentially requisite to constitute a sacrament. No ordinances ought to be observed in the Christian Church but such as have been appointed by Christ, her alone king and head. He only can have authority to institute sacraments, who has power to confer the blessings which are thereby represented and applied. No rite, therefore, can deserve the name of a sacrament, unless it bear the stamp of divine institution.

Socinians represent the sacraments as being merely solemn i badges by which the disciples of Jesus are discriminated 1 from other men. It is readily granted that they are badges | of the disciples of Christ, by which they are distinguished from Jews, Mohammedans, and Heathens; but this is not their chief design. They are principally " signs and seals of the covenant of grace." Circumcision is expressly called a sign and seal of the righteousness of faith (Rom. iv. 11); and the same description is equally applicable to the sacraments of the New Testament. As signs, they represent and exhibit Christ and the blessings of the new covenant to us; as seals, they ratify our right to them, and confirm our faith.

The principal uses and ends of the sacraments are, to represent Christ and his benefits — to confirm the believer's interest in Christ and his blessings — to distinguish between 1 the members of the visible Church, and those that are with- l out — and solemnly to engage them to the service of God in Christ, according to his Word.