


I. Our Lord Jesus, in the night wherein he was betrayed, instituted
the sacrament of his body and blood, called the Lord's Supper,
to be observed in his church, unto the end of the world, for
the perpetual remembrance of the sacrifice of himself in his
death; the sealing all benefits thereof unto true believers,
their spiritual nourishment and growth in him, their further
engagement in and to all duties which they owe unto him; and,
to be a bond and pledge of their communion with him, and with
each other, as members of his mystical body.
II. In this sacrament, Christ is not
offered up to his Father; nor any real sacrifice made at all,
for remission of sins of the quick or dead; but only a commemoration
of that one offering up of himself, by himself, upon the cross,
once for all: and a spiritual oblation of all possible praise
unto God, for the same: so that the popish sacrifice of the
mass (as they call it) is most abominably injurious to Christ's
one, only sacrifice, the alone propitiation for all the sins
of his elect.
III. The Lord Jesus hath, in this ordinance,
appointed his ministers to declare his word of institution to
the people; to pray, and bless the elements of bread and wine,
and thereby to set them apart from a common to an holy use;
and to take and break the bread, to take the cup, and (they
communicating also themselves) to give both to the communicants;
but to none who are not then present in the congregation.
IV. Private masses, or receiving this
sacrament by a priest, or any other, alone; as likewise, the
denial of the cup to the people, worshiping the elements, the
lifting them up, or carrying them about, for adoration, and
the reserving them for any pretended religious use; are all
contrary to the nature of this sacrament, and to the institution
of Christ.
V. The outward elements in this sacrament,
duly set apart to the uses ordained by Christ, have such relation
to him crucified, as that, truly, yet sacramentally only, they
are sometimes called by the name of the things they represent,
to wit, the body and blood of Christ; albeit, in substance and
nature, they still remain truly and only bread and wine, as
they were before.
VI. That doctrine which maintains a
change of the substance of bread and wine, into the substance
of Christ's body and blood (commonly called transubstantiation)
by consecration of a priest, or by any other way, is repugnant,
not to Scripture alone, but even to common sense, and reason;
overthroweth the nature of the sacrament, and hath been, and
is, the cause of manifold superstitions; yea, of gross idolatries.
VII. Worthy receivers, outwardly partaking
of the visible elements, in this sacrament, do then also, inwardly
by faith, really and indeed, yet not carnally and corporally
but spiritually, receive, and feed upon, Christ crucified, and
all benefits of his death: the body and blood of Christ being
then, not corporally or carnally, in, with, or under the bread
and wine; yet, as really, but spiritually, present to the faith
of believers in that ordinance, as the elements themselves are
to their outward senses.
VIII. Although ignorant and wicked
men receive the outward elements in this sacrament; yet, they
receive not the thing signified thereby; but, by their unworthy
coming thereunto, are guilty of the body and blood of the Lord,
to their own damnation. Wherefore, all ignorant and ungodly
persons, as they are unfit to enjoy communion with him, so are
they unworthy of the Lord's table; and cannot, without great
sin against Christ, while they remain such, partake of these
holy mysteries, or be admitted thereunto.


