Our chain of argument is therefore not complete until we add
another link, and prove that the Reformers employed the word mass in
its specific and proper signification, in the disputed passages of the
Augsburg Confession, as they did in the numerous passages above cited,
and as the Papists themselves understood them to do.
_Second Inquiry_.
Let us now, in _the second_ place, inquire, _Whether the Reformers
employed the word mass in its proper and specific meaning in the
disputed passages of the Augsburg Confession_.
The affirmative of this question is, we think, certain, from a variety
of evidences.
1. Because we find _two different articles of the Confession, the one
with mass (Messe) for its caption, and the other headed:_ OF THE HOLY
SUPPER (vom Heiligen Abendmahl.) Now, if mass here signified Holy
Supper, the probability is that one or the other term would have been
used in both places. The design of captions prefixed to a chapter or
article, is to indicate the general contents of such article; and a
diversity of caption or title, naturally raises the presumption that
different subjects are discussed. The most natural method of deciding
this question concerning the meaning of the caption, is to inquire what,
are the subjects discussed in each article. If the subjects discussed in
both articles are the same, then the captions are or ought to be
synonymous, and as the Lord's Supper never signifies mass in its
specific sense, it follows that mass would have to mean Lord's Supper.
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