VI

The Guild of Corpus Christi in the city of York was founded in the year 1408. The register book of the Guild, now in the British Museum, contains a discourse on the text “This is My body” prefixed to the list of members. This discourse may be cited as an instance of teaching given popularly in the fifteenth century. In it the following passage occurs:—

“ ‘The Father of mercies, and Lord of all comfort, who comforteth us in all our affliction’ ‘sent His only begotten Son,’ who humbled Himself by taking our flesh, and most meekly bore all kinds of insults to increase our merit, and as time went on wrought many miracles in the glory of His pity, so that at last He restored the whole human race to the unity of peace by the most health-giving suffering of His body. Therefore, because the one body of Christ, offered in sacrifice for our sins, sustained by the light of the majesty of God, scourged and crucified by the Jews, was a most fitting means, and because … we daily fall by the weight of sin, this body, now impassible, is daily consecrated in the Church under the species of bread and wine for the cure of sins, and is left to all Christians as a memorial sign.… This offering is repeated daily, though Christ by once for all suffering in the flesh once for all saved the world by His one and the same endurance of death. From this death He rose to life, and ‘death shall no more have dominion over Him’; and because we daily fall, Christ is daily sacrificed in mystery, and the passion of Christ is mystically set forth as of Him who once for all conquered death by His death and daily pardons our recurring offences and sins by means of this Sacrament of His body and blood. Moreover, this precious Sacrament is daily repeated to keep in mind the prayer that, as Christ united the members with the Head by His precious passion, so we may be united by faith and hope and love.”