This holy council instructed by the Holy Ghost, who is the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and godliness,[1] and following the judgment and custom of the Church,[2] declares and teaches that laymen and clerics when not offering the sacrifice are bound by no divine precept to receive the sacrament of the Eucharist under both forms, and that there can be no doubt at all, , that communion under either form is sufficient for them to salvation. For though Christ the Lord at the last supper instituted and delivered to the Apostles this venerable sacrament under the forms of bread and wine,[3] yet that institution and administration do not signify that all the faithful are by an enactment of the Lord to receive under both forms. Neither is it rightly inferred from that discourse contained in the sixth chapter of John that communion under both forms was enjoined by the Lord, notwithstanding the various interpretations of it by the holy Fathers and Doctors. For He who said: <Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you>,[4] also said: ;[5] and He who said: <He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath life everlasting,>[6] also said: ;[7] and lastly, He who said: <He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, abideth in me and I in him>,[8] said, nevertheless: [9]
