[Footnote 5:  Matt. iii. 11; Mark i. 8; Luke iii. 16; John i. 26, iii. 5; Acts i. 5, 8, x. 47.]

[Footnote 6:  Acts ii. 1-4, xi. 15, xix. 6.  Cf.  John vii. 39.]

[Footnote 7:  John xv. 26, xvi. 13.]

[Footnote 8:  To Peraklit was opposed Katigor, ([Greek:  kategoros]), the “accuser.”]

[Footnote 9:  John xiv. 16; 1st Epistle of John ii. 1.]

[Footnote 10:  John xiv. 26, xv. 26, xvi. 7, and following.  Comp.  Philo, De Mundi opificio, Sec. 6.]

[Footnote 11:  John xiv. 16.  Comp. the epistle before cited, l.c.]

It is unnecessary to remark how remote from the thought of Jesus was the idea of a religious book, containing a code and articles of faith.  Not only did he not write, but it was contrary to the spirit of the infant sect to produce sacred books.  They believed themselves on the eve of the great final catastrophe.  The Messiah came to put the seal upon the Law and the Prophets, not to promulgate new Scriptures.  With the exception of the Apocalypse, which was in one sense the only revealed book of the infant Christianity, all the other writings of the apostolic age were works evoked by existing circumstances, making no pretensions to furnish a completely dogmatic whole.  The Gospels had at first an entirely personal character, and much less authority than tradition.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Papias, in Eusebius, Hist.  Eccl., iii. 39.]

Had the sect, however, no sacrament, no rite, no sign of union?  It had one which all tradition ascribes to Jesus.  One of the favorite ideas of the master was that he was the new bread, bread very superior to manna, and on which mankind was to live.  This idea, the germ of the Eucharist, was at times expressed by him in singularly concrete forms.  On one occasion especially, in the synagogue of Capernaum, he took a decided step, which cost him several of his disciples.  “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven."[1] And he added, “I am the bread of life:  he that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst."[2] These words excited much murmuring.  “The Jews then murmured at him because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven.  And they said, Is not this Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I came down from heaven?” But Jesus insisting with still more force, said, “I am that bread of life; your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead.  This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die.  I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever:  and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world."[3] The offence was now at its height:  “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” Jesus