[American Lutheranism Vindicated; or, Examination of the Lutheran Symbols, on Certain Disputed Topics by Samuel Simon Schmucker]@TWC D-Link book
American Lutheranism Vindicated; or, Examination of the Lutheran Symbols, on Certain Disputed Topics

CHAPTER V
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It will also be recollected that this view of the mass as a sacrifice, and as vicarious, is strongly denounced in the Augsburg Confession, whilst the charge of having rejected the rite itself with these and other modifications, is flatly denied, in these words: "It is _unjustly_ charged against our churches, that they have abolished the mass," (Art.XXIV., p.

21 of the Platform,) a thing never charged against them in reference to the eucharist, for from the very beginning of the Reformation, they charged the Papists with having mutilated it, and claimed the restoration of the cup also to the laity.
5.

In a _letter_ of September 20, 1530, addressed _to Justus Jonas_, one of the theologians at the diet, Luther thus expresses himself: "For, what else do our opponents, (the Papists,) presume to propose, than that they shall not yield a hairsbreadth, but that we not only yield on the subject of the canon, _the mass_, the _one kind_, (in the eucharist,) celibacy, (of the clergy,) and jurisdiction (of the bishops); but shall also admit that they have taught the truth, and acted properly in all things, and were falsely accused by us." [Note 15] Here the mass is again distinguished from the eucharist in one kind.

He then adds: "If we will get at it (yielding to the Papists,) let us yield only the canon, and the closet masses; and either of these two is sufficient fully to deny our doctrine and to confirm theirs." The _canon_ was that part of the ritual of the mass which contained the forms of transubstantiation, which were positively rejected by the reformers, the closet masses are rejected in the Augsburg Confession; but Luther says nothing against the public mass, qualified as it is in the Confession.
6.

In his _Exhortation to the Sacrament_ of the body and blood of Christ, published in 1530, he says: "If the Papists do, as usual, quibble at my language, and boast that I myself here make a sacrifice in the _sacrament_, although I have hitherto contended that the _mass_ is no sacrifice; then you shall answer thus: I make _neither the mass nor the sacrament_ a sacrifice, ("Ich mache _weder_ Messe _noch_ Sacrament zum opfer,") but the remembrance of Christ," [Note 16] &c.
Here the two are distinguished as clearly as language can discriminate between two separate objects, and even placed in antithesis to one another: and let it be remembered, that all the examples are taken from works published either before or in the very year in which the Augsburg Confession was written.


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