and yet we can give no assured credit to History or immemorial testimonies of whole Countrys Moreover we finding by the experience of the Age we live in that though fabulous stories be told and printed too yet we easily distingnish betwixt them and true Histories of the present times For that true Histories gain an universal credit amongst persons of the best understanding and the Historigraphers that write them are commended to Posterity as faithful witnesses of Truth whereas fables and fictions every one of ordinary capacity looks upon them as such nor do we give any other Recommendation of them to Posterity then as of fabulons Romances This we experiencing in the present Age persons of humility and solid judgment deem the like to have happen'd in the daies of their Fore-fathers and consequently give another kind of credit to Stories how strange so ever recounted by a S. Bernard a venerable Bede or a S. Bonaventure then they do to the fictions of a Don Quixot a Guy of Warwick c. And he that will consult what has happen'd in the World will find mens eyes and other senses to have been as often mistaken as he will find whole Towns and Countries to have confidently told a Lye to their Posterity which they evidently knew to be a Lye And this the Atheists of our days would do well to reflect on when they so senselesly call in question the History of Moyses or Book of Exodus concerning the wonders wrought by Almighty God in Aegypt And Dr. N. N. too must one day give a sad account for all his Drollery as merry as he makes himself with the History of Lorretto and other stories registred by persons of noted sanctity and integrity And would he reflect a little on the difficulty of making whole Countrys believe a Lye contrary to the evidence of their senses he would find it a greater miracle that the whole Territory of Lorretto should so immemorially believe so great a Lye as he would make his Reader think they do then the wonder it self he sacrilegiously scoffs at To wit the Translation of the House in which our B. Lord was conceived by his Holy Mother at Nazareth out of the Holy Land first into Dalmatia and then afterwards into Italy Let the Dr. cause a house to be built in a Night in S. James's Park and then tell the Citizens of London it was brought thither by Angels out of a forreign Country and see if he can make them so universally to believe it as they shall no body contradicting make their Posterity believe as much and I perswade my self he may with the same ease bring such a House from Geneva or New-England in a Night as make the numerous multitude believe such a notorious Lye O England England dear Native Soyl at length open thine Eyes and acknowledge the illimited goodness of the divine Majesty to be such that not contenting himself with giving us prodigies of sanctity for the first Planters of Christianity and with confirming their sublime and holy doctrins with evident signs and wonders he is ever now and then awakening the drowsie world with a S. Dominick a S. Francis or a S. Xauerius and ceases not by undeniable miracles to confirm the languishing Faith of tepid Christians The sight of present miracles strangely strengthens our Faith of wonders past and done long since And believe it 't is a next disposition to Antichristianism and Atheism freely to give our selves the liberty to scoff at all miracles though attested by never so grave Authors except such as are recorded in the four Gospels and to laugh at all lives of Christian Saints as ridiculous but those of the twelve Apostles though to an impartial considerer one Egg does not more resemble another then do the persons we so freely deride express the first followers of our dear Redeemer in their holy and divine Conversations 4. Consider the force of S. Austins Argument to prove the truth of Christianity The world has actually submitted to Christianity as to a Religion taught from Heaven From whence the Saint argues thus The world believed the high mysterious doctrins of Christianity either upon miracles wrought by the first teachers of them or without miracles If upon miracles then you who doubt have reason also to believe them Or if the world submitted their Faith to believe such strange mysteries without any miracles this is the greatest miracle of all that such vast multitudes and innumerable of these of ripe judgement and quick understanding should believe such strange things upon the Authority of the Proposer without a miracle Apply this to our present mystery Two hundred years ago the whole Christian world believed the H. Eucharist to be our B. Saviours body and adored it as such Hereupon I argue These vast multitudes and many of them of great learning and judgement began to believe this strange mystery either for miracles wrought by the first Teachers of it or without miracles If upon miracles then you ought to believe it also If without miracles this is the greatest miracle of all that such vast multitudes and these innumerable of them well cultivated with learning besides their natural ripeness of judgment and sharpness of wit should believe so strange a mystery without any miracles wrought by those who first demanded their belief of it Finally consider with your self how many millions there are who believe this mystery and would sooner part with their life then their Faith of it and these if you have the least grain of humility such as you have reason to think them of as good Learning Wit and Judgment as your self Add as good Christians as your self for either piety to God or Charity to their indigent Neighbor or mortification to themselves Imagin you saw all these as holy and as wise as your self in the several Christian Countrys of the whole world all upon their knees adoring a seeming Wafer-Cake as their Creator and God Bishops Priests Doctors of Divinity in vast numbers Kings and Princes Men and Women of all degrees and condition And can you now think all these people to be in their wits and not have some strong Reasons and Arguments which induce them to such a Faith and such a practice Had you and I been in the Stable of Bethlehem in the Night of our Lord's Nativity and S. Joseph should have told us that the little Infant we saw there sucking his Mothers Breast was the Maker of Heaven and Earth we should no doubt have found great difficulty to believe him But should we have staied there a while and have seen the Shepherds come in and fall down upon their knees before him by the admonition as they pretended of an Angel that had appeared to them as they were keeping watch over their Flocks this doubtless would a little have enclined us to think that at least there was something extraordinary in the new born Babe But had we staied till the comeing of the three Kings
or changed her first belief And if you 〈◊〉 make use of a Book to guide you in your Faith as the Catholick Church also does you must resolve to interpret it if you will be sure not to mistake as she does that is in that sense in which it was understood by your Fathers and not in that sense it shall seem to bear to you if contrary to the sense it seemed to bear to your Ancestors Pardon Sir this long digression I hope it will conduce to your more full satisfaction And take notice that wheresoever Transubstantiation is believed the believers of it profess to have been so taught by their Fore-fathers uninterruptedly from the Apostles wheresoever this mystery is denied the deniers of it do not profess to have been taught to deny it by their Fathers uninterruptedly from the Apostles but only by their Ancestors for about a hundred and fifty years and that their Ancestors about the year fifteen hundred had more light than their Progenitors for about a thousand years who were all in darkness and had left the right Faith taught by the Apostles and for the first fix hundred years of Christianity An evident conviction this that the denial of Transubstantiation is a Novelty and the asserting of it the antient verity For had Transubstantiation been a new Doctrin and never heard of before the seventh or eighth Age the Assertors of it must have been forced to plead for it after the manner its Opposers plead against it by saying their Fore fathers only for so long for example for eight hundred years had believed it but in the year eight hundred their Ancestors had more light than their Fore-fathers and they by reading the Holy Scriptures and Fathers of the first Century came to understand that our Saviours true body was in the Holy Eucharist and that their immediate Progenitors for five or six hundred years had left the first Apostolical doctrin as to this mystery If you remember I supposed from the confession of our Adversaries that the Christian Doctrin remained pure and incorrupt for some Centuries of years after its first planting which I now shall endeavor to prove And indeed whosoever maturely considers the genius and temper of the Christian Doctors and Bishops for the first Centuries after our Saviour will find it impossible for all the power of Hell to impose a Novelty upon them especially such an one as would make them all Idolaters For they were not like the seeming Zelots of our Age pretenders to new lights but their profession was not to correct Antiquity not to deliver to Posterity doctrine of their own devising but carefully to keep what they had received from their Fore-fathers and faithfully to teach their Children what they had been taught by their Fathers And their great Answer to Introducers of new Doctrirs or Practices was Nihil nouandum nisi quod traditum est We must innovate nothing but stick close to what has been delivered to us by our Fore-fathers As for pretenders to discover new Truths by reading of the holy Scriptures it s easily conceivable how such persons may be imposed upon by subtil Sophisters and made to believe erroneous doctrins to wit by bad and new Interpretations of good and antient Scriptures But on the other fide how shall a Teacher of Novelties deceive a Christian Country which is resolved to hold fast whatsoever doctrin was taught them by their immedate Progenitors who received the same doctrin by an uninterrupted delivery from Father to Son from the Apostles Let him pretend Scriptures and bring a thousand places out of the Law Psalms Prophets and Apostles what will the Reply be The Scriptures you alledge we reverence and have ever been taught to reverence them as divine but we have been taught to interpret and understand them in another manner and sense than you alledge them Let him pretend Authority of Doctors as Learned as Origen as Holy as Cyprian nay if he will of a whole Provincial Council as numerous as that in Africa which determin'd Rebaptization of persons Baptized by Hereticks they Reply we must not Innovate we must hold to what was taught us by our Ancestors What means then to make persons thus disposed to leave their anâ—ient Faith and admit of a Novelty You must prove to them that you and they and other Christians in several Countrys have been taught so to believe by your immediate Predecessors and uninterruptedly From Father to Son from the Apostles but then you cease to be a Teacher of Novelties contrary to the supposition Now that such was the disposition of the Primitive Centuries of Christianity hear S. Vincent Lerinensis who lived in the fifth Age who testifies that often asking of very many his Contemporaries famous for their Sanctity and Learning how he might be able to discern the truth of the Catholick Paith from the falsity of Heretical prayity he always received this Answer in a manner from them all That if he desired to remain sound in his Faith he must fortifie it first with the Authority of the divine Law and then with the Tradition of the Catholick Church That is as he explicates himself afterwards he must examin what has always all over the Christian Church and by all Christian Doctors or in a manner by all been believed and hold to that Against all Novelty though defended by private Doctors never so Holy or never so Learned or producing never so many Scriptures for themselves if interpreted after a new manner But saies the same S. Vincent chap 2. Here perhaps some body may ask seeing the Canon of the Scriptures is perfect and is it self sufficient and more than sufficient for all things what need is there to add to it the Authority of the Ecclesiastical or Churches understanding of it Because the Holy Scripture by reason of its depth is not by all taken in one and the same sense For Photinus expounds it one way Sabellius another Donatus another Arrius another And ch 41. He tells us how the third general Council held in his days at Ephesus proceeding according to this rule condemn'd Nestorius For the Fathers of that Christian Synod in number about 200 having consulted the Sentiment of their Predecessors the eminent Doctors of the Oriental and Western Churches S. Peter of Alexandria S. Athanâ—sius S. Theophilus S. Gregory Nazianzen S. Basil S. Gregory Nâ—ssen S. Felix S. Julius S. Cyprian concerning their controversie in debate they resolved to hold their doctrin to follow their Counsel to believe their testimony to obey their Judgment Quae tandem c What were at length saies S. Vincent the Voices and Votes of them all but that what was antiently delivered should be kept what was of late invented should be exploded After which we admired and proclamed the great humility and sanctity of that Council In which so many Priests in a manner as to the greater part were so many Metropolitans and of so great Erudition and Learning as
Doctors to whom we appeal then judged concerning this our cause when no body could say they had favor or ill will for either party They had neither friendship nor enmity with you or us We did not as yet appeal with you to them as Judges and our cause was decided by them Neither you nor we were known to them and we recite their sentence given for us against you We did not yet contest with you and they pronouncing sentences for us we have overcome you Or will my Calvinist have the impudence to accuse as some do thâ—se grave Doctors of blindness A multitude of blind men forsooth avails nothing to find out the Truth and these were the errors and mistakes of those learned Prelates What an Age are we fal'n into Truth must be called error and error truth light darkness and darkness light S. Augustin S. Ambrose S. Crysostom S. Hierom are blind but Calvin and Stillingfleet see These Doctors I have called a Council of were persons of such Learning and Sanctity that if a Synod of Bishops were gathered out of the whole world it would be much if so many and such Doctors could be found to sit in it Neither indeed were these all at one time but God Almighty as pleases him and as he judges to be expedient scatters a few more excellent and faithful dispensers of his mysteries in several Ages and distances of places By such Planters Waterers Builders Pastors nursing Fathers after the Apostles the holy Church has encreased Now what an imprudence and what an impudence must it be for any to presume to accuse of the horrible crime of Idolatry so many holy egregious and memorable Doctors of the Catholick Verity and moreover together with them the whole Church of Christ to which divine Family they faithfully Ministring spiritual Food flourished with great glory in our Lord. Nay further they who dare to oppose the manifest Sentiment not of so many Platonical Aristotelieal or Zenonical Doctors but of so many Saints and illustrious Prelates in the Church of God and these some of them singularly endowed with human litterature and all of them eminently learned in the Sacred Letters have reason not so much to fear them as him who made them profitable Vessels to himself These Judges by how much the more desirable they ought to be unto thee if thou didst hold the Catholick Faith by so much thou hast more reason to fear them because thou opposest the Catholick Faith which they ministred to little and great and manifestly and stoutly defended against its Enemies yea against you then not as yet born For not only when they lived did they by their words but also by their writings which they left to Posterity did they strenuously defend the Catholick Faith that they might break in pieces your Arguments Hitherto S. Augustin l. 1. et 2. Contra Julianum I thought fit to adjoyn this Reflexion of S. Augustin though superabundant to the force of my Argument it being sufficient for my purpose to prove that the doctrin of the Real presence was generally believed in the Primitive Centuries of Christianity and so much evidently follows from the Authorities above cited For though some may be so self-conceited as to confess that S. Ambrose S. Crysostom and the rest of the holy Fathers Greek and Latin believed the doctrin of the Real presence but they with humble submission deemed it to be an Idolatrous and damnable doctrin yet few I think but have so much regard for thâ—se Primitive Doctors as to allow them so much iudgement as to know what was the belief of their several Churches in their daies and so much fidelity as to write the Truth as to this particular which is sufficient for the purport of my discourse Unless you can think that these holy Fathers were of one Faith and their several Flocks who reverenced them as Saints of another An Answer to an Objection But you will say if there be such a miraculous change wrought in the bread and wine in the holy Eucharist why does it not appear to our senses as well as other miraculous works of our Lord Jesus did When he turn'd water into wine it appeared such to the sight and tast of the Guests at the Marriage-Feast He did not barely tell them the water was turn'd into wine and exact their belief of his word contrary to the evidence of all their senses but convinced them that it was so by their very senses Why then in our present case if he turn wine into his blood does it not appear to our fight to be blood But barely to tell us that it is his blood and yet to let it tast and appear as it did how is this credible How is it not contrary to one but to all the Miracles that ever he wrought And this Argument is further strengthned for that it would hence follow we might call in question the whole mystery of Christianity For we therefore believing in our Lord Jesus as one indeed sent from God to teach us nothing but Truth because of his Miracles and we having no assurance of his Miracles but from our senses if our senses may be mistaken how can we tell but those who were eye-witnesses of his wonders were illuded and water for example was not turned by him into wine but only seemed wine to the tast and sight of those which were present and indeed remained water as before For why may not water remain water and yet seem to my tast wine as well as wine be changed into blood and yet seem to my tast and sight to remain wine For Answer to this Objection we must distinguish two sorts of Miracles with the ends for which they are wrought Some Miracles are wrought by Almighty God to draw the world to the Christian Faith and these must necessarily be the object of our senses else it could not reasonably be expected they should work their intended effect in them for whose sakes they are wrought For example If any one will by Miracle prove he is sent from God by raising a dead man to life or by turning water into wine he must make it evident to my senses that the man who was dead is alive and the water now wine and not barely tell me so Else he will be derided as an Impostor and impudent Lyer instead of being admired and received as a Messenger from Heaven and Oracle of Truth There are other Miracles which are wrought by the Almighty not as a motive to induce us to receive the true Faith but to sanctifie us when we have received it or for the necessity of working the salvation of the world Such are the Miracles of the Incarnation of the Son of God and all the spiritual effects wrought in the souls of Christians by any of the Sacraments Now these miraculous effects are not the object of our senses nor is there any reason they should be For the Church of Christ does not urge these to