of many grains ioyned together his Body to shew the Union of our People which he bore upon himself and calls the Wine which is pressed out of many Grapes and Berries his Blood he signifies our Flock which is joyned together in the mixture of an united Multitude And writing against those who only put Water in the Chalice Epist. 63. he says Since Christ said I am the true Vine the Blood of Christ is not only Water but Wine neither can we see his Blood by which we are redeemed and quickened in the Chalice when Wine is not in it by which the Blood of Christ is shewed And that whole Epistle is all to the same purpose Epiphanius in Anchorat says Christ in the Supper rose and took these things and having given Thanks said This is my c. Now we see it is not equal to it nor like it neither to his Incarnate Likeness nor his invisible Deity nor the Lineaments of his Members for it is round and without feeling as to its Vertue And this he says to shew how Man may be said to be made after the Image of God though he be not like him Gregory Nyssen in Orat. de Bap. Christ. shewing how common things may be sanctified as Water in Baptism the Stones of an Altar and Church dedicated to God he adds So also Bread in the Beginning is common but after the Mystery has consecrated it is said to be and is the Body of Christ so the Mystical Oyl so the Wine before the Blessing are things of little value but after the Sanctification of the Spirit both of them work excellently He also adds That the Priest by his Blessing is separated and sanctified from which it appears he no more believed the Change of the Substance of the Bread and Wine than of the consecrated Oil the Altar or the Priest Ambrose Lib. De Bened. Patriarc cap. 9. speaking of Bread which was Asher's Blessing says This Bread Christ gave his Apostles that they might divide it to the People that believed and gives it to us to day which the Priest consecrates in his Words this Bread is made the Food of the Saints St. Chrysostome Homil. 24. in Epist. ad Cor. on these Words The Bread which we brake is it not the Communion of the Body of Christ says What is the Bread The Body of Christ. What are they made who take it The Body of Christ. From whence it appears he thought the Bread was so the Body of Christ as the worthy Receivers are which is not by the Change of their Substance but by the Sanctification of their Natures St. Ierom Epist. ad Hedib says Let us hear the Bread which Christ brake and gave his Disciples to be the Body of our Lord. And he says Comment S. Mat. c. 26. After the Typical Pascha was fulfilled Christ took Bread that comforts the Heart of Man and went to the true Sacrament of the Pascha that as Melchisedeck in the Figure had done offering Bread and Wine so he might also represent the Truth of his Body and Blood Where he very plainly calls the Elements Bread and Wine and a Representation of Christ's Body and Blood St. Austin as he is cited by Fulgentius de Baptismo and divers others in his Exhortation to these that were newly baptized speaking of this Sacrament says That which you see is the Bread and the Cup which your Eyes witness but that which your Faith must be instructed in is that the Bread is the Body of Christ and the Cup is his Blood And then he proposes the Objection how that could be And answers it thus These things are therefore called Sacraments because one thing is seen and another is understood What you see has a bodily Appearance but what you understand has a Spiritual Fruit and if you will understand the Body of Christ hear what the Apostle says to the Faithful Ye are the Body of Christ and his Members If therefore you be the Body and Members of Christ your Mystery is placed on the Table of the Lord and you receive the Mystery of the Lord. And at large prosecutes this to shew how the Faithful are the Body of Christ as the Bread is made up of many Grains from whence it appears that he believed that the conscrated Elements were still Bread and Wine And speaking of St. Paul's breaking Bread at Troas he says Epist. 86. being to break Bread that night as it is broken in the Sacrament of the Body of Christ. He also says Serm. 9. De Divers The Eucharist is our daily Bread but let us so receive it that not only our Belly but our Mind be refreshed by it Besides in a great many places St. Austin calls the Eucharist the Sacrament of Bread and Wine And speaking of things made use of to signify somewhat else he adds for one Lib. 3. De Trinit c. 10. The Bread that is made for this is consumed in our receiving the Sacrament He also says Lib. 17. De Civ Dei To eat Bread is in the New Testament the Sacrifice of Christians He likewise says Lib. Cont. Donat. c. 6. Both Iudas and Peter received a part of the same Bread out of the same hand of our Lord. And thus from twelve Witnesses that are beyond all Exception it does appear That the Fathers believed the Elements to be still Bread and Wine after the Consecration We have not brought any Proofs from the Fathers that are less known or read for then we must have swelled up this Paper beyond what we intend it One thing is so considerable that we cannot forbear to desire it be taken notice of and that is That we see those great Fathers and Doctors of the Church call the consecrated Elements without any mincing of the matter Bread Wine but when they call it the Body and Blood of Christ they often use some mollifying and less hardy Expression So St. Austin says Serm. 53. De Verb. Dom. Almost all call the Sacrament his Body And again says Lib. 3. De Trinit c. 4. We call that only the Body and Blood of Christ which being taken of the Fruits of the Earth and consecrated by the Mystical Prayer we rightly receive for our Spiritual Health in the Commemoration of the Passion of our Lord for us And he says Epist. 23. ad Bonifac. After some sort the Sacrament of the Body of Christ is his Body and the Sacrament of his Blood is the Blood of Christ. And also says Serm. 2. in Psal. 33. He carried himself in his own Hands in some sort when he said This is my Body St. Chrysostom says Epist. ad Caesar. The Bread is thought worthy to be called the Body of our Lord. And on these Words The Flesh lusteth against the Spirit among the improper acceptions of Flesh says Comm. in Epist. ad Galat. c. 5. The Scriptures use to call the Mysteries by the name of Flesh and sometimes the whole Church saying She is the Body of Christ.
Tertullian says Lib. 4. cont Marc. c. 40. Christ calls the Bread his Body and a little after he names the Bread his Body Isidore Hispal says Orig. lib. 6. c. 9. We call this after his Command the Body and Blood of Christ which being made of the Fruits of the Earth is sanctified and made a Sacrament Theodoret says Dialog 1. In the giving of the Mysteries Christ called the Bread his Body and the mixed Cup his Blood And says Dialog 1. He who called his Natural Body Corn and Bread and also calls himself a Vine likewise honoured these visible Symbols with the names of his Body and Blood But we now go to bring our Proofs for the next Branch of our first Proposition in which we assert That the Fathers believed that the very Substance of the Bread and Wine did remain after the Consecration By which all the Proofs brought in the former Branch will receive a further Evidence since by these it will appear the Fathers believed the Substance of the Elements remained and thence we may well conclude that wherever we find mention made of Bread and Wine after Consecration they mean of the Substance and not of the Accidents of Bread and Wine For proof of this we shall only bring the Testimonies of four Fathers that lived almost within one Age and were the greatest Men of the Age. Their Authority is as generally received as their Testimonies are formal and decisive And these are Pope Gelasius St. Chrysostom Ephrem Patriarch of Antioch and Theodoret whom we shall find delivering to us the Doctrine of the Church in their Age with great Consideration upon a very weighty Occasion So that it shall appear that this was for that Age the Doctrine generally received both in the Churches of Rome and Constantinople Antioch and Asia the less We shall begin with Gelasius who though he lived later than some of the others yet because of the Eminence of his See and the Authority those we deal with must needs acknowledge was in him ought to be set first He says in lib. de duab nat Christ. The Sacraments of the Body and Blood of Christ are a Divine thing for which reason we become by them Partakers of the Divine Nature and yet the Substance or Nature of Bread and Wine does not cease to be and the Image and Likeness of the Body and Blood of Christ are indeed celebrated in the action of the Mysteries therefore it appears evidently enough that we ought to think that of Christ our Lord which we profess and celebrate and receive in his Image that as they to wit the Elements pass into that Divine Substance the Holy Ghost working it their Nature remaining still in its own Property So that principal Mystery whose Efficiency and Virtue these to wit the Sacraments represent to us remains one entire and true Christ those things of which he is compounded to wit his two Natures remaining in their Properties These words seem so express and decisive that one would think the bare reading them without any further Reflections should be of force enough But before we offer any Considerations upon them we shall set down other Passages of the other Fathers and upon them altogether make such Remarks as we hope may satisfy any that will hear Reason St. Chrysostom treating of the two Natures of Christ against the Apollinarists Epist. ad Caesar. monach who did so confound them as to consubstantiate them he makes use of the Doctrine of the Sacrament to illustrate that Mystery by in these Words As before the Bread is sanctified we call it Bread but when the Divine Grace has sanctified it by the mean of the Priest it is freed from the name of Bread and is thought worthy of the name of the Lord's Body though the Nature of Bread remains in it and yet it is not said there are two Bodies but one Body of the Son so the Divine Nature being joyned to the Body both these make one Son and one Person Next this Patriarch of Constantinople let us hear Ephrem the Patriarch of Antioch give his Testimony as it is preserved by Photius Cod. 229. who says thus In like manner having before treated of the two Natures united in Christ the Body of Christ which is received by the Faithful does not depart from its sensible Substance and yet remains inseparated from the Intellectual Grace So Baptism becoming wholly Spiritual and one it preserves its own sensible Substance and does not lose that which it was before To these we shall add what Theodoret Dialog 1. on the same occasion says against those who from that place the Word was made Flesh believed that in the Incarnation the Divinity of the Word was changed into the Humanity of the Flesh. He brings in his Heretick arguing about some Mystical Expressions of the Old Testament that related to Christ At length he comes to shew how Christ called himself Bread and Corn so also in the delivering the Mysteries Christ called the Bread his Body and the mixed Cup his Blood and our Saviour changed the Names calling his Body by the name of the Symbol and the Symbol by the name of his Body And when the Heretick asks the reason why the Names were so changed the Orthodox answers That it was manifest to such as were initiated in Divine things for he would have those who partake of the Mysteries not look to the Nature of those things that were seen but by the Change of the names to believe that Change that was made through Grace for he who called his Natural Body Corn and Bread does likewise honour the visible Symbols with the name of his Body and Blood not changing the Nature but adding Grace to Nature And so goes on to ask his Heretick whether he thought the holy Bread was the Symbol and Type of his Divinity or of his Body and Blood And the other acknowledging they were the Symbols of his Body and Blood He concludes that Christ had a true Body The second Dialogue is against the Eutychians who believed that after Christ's Assumption his Body was swallowed up by his Divinity And there the Eutychian brings an Argument to prove that Change from the Sacrament it being granted that the Gifts before the Priest's Prayer were Bread and Wine He asks how it was to be called after the Sanctification the Orthodox answers the Body and Blood of Christ and that he believed he received the Body and Blood of Christ. From thence the Heretick as having got a great advantage argues That as the Symbols of the Body and Blood of our Lord were one thing before the Priestly Invocation and after that were changed and are different from what they were So the Body of our Lord after the Assumption was changed into the Divine Substance But the Orthodox replies that he was catched in the Net he laid for others for the Mystical Symbols after the Sanctification do not depart from their own Nature for they continue in
the Sons of God have eternal Life or that by Faith only we are the Sons of God M. W. said He would admit of no consequences how clear soever they seemed unless he brought him the express words of Scripture and asked if his consequences were infallible D. S. said If the Consequence was certain it was sufficient and he desired all would take notice that they would not yield to clear Consequences drawn from Scripture which he thought and he believed all impartial People would be of his Mind was as great an advantage to any cause as could be desired So we laid aside that Argument being satisfied that the Article of our Church which they had called in question was clearly proved from Scripture Then N. N. insisted to speak of the corporal presence and desired to know upon what grounds we rejected it M. B. said If we have no better reason to believe Christ was corporally present in the Sacrament than the Jews had to believe that every time they did eat their Pascha the Angel was passing by their Houses and smiting the first born of the AEgyptians then we have no reason at all but so it is that we have no more reason N. N. denied this and said we had more reason M. B. said All the reason we had to believe it was because Christ said This is my body but Moses said of the Paschal festivity This is the Lords Passover which was always repeated by the Jews in that Anniversary Now the Lords Passover was the Lords passing by the Israelites when he slew the first born of AEgypt If then we will understand Christs words in the strictly literal sense we must in the same sense understand the words of Moses But if we understand the words of Moses in any other sense as the commemoration of the Lords Passover then we ought to understand Christs words in the same sense The reason is clear for Christ being to substitute this Holy Sacrament in room of the Jewish Pascha and he using in every thing as much as could agree with his blessed designs forms as near the Jewish Customs as could be there is no reason to think he did use the words this is my body in any other sense than the Jews did this is the Lords Passover N. N. said The disparity was great First Christ had promised before-hand he would give them his body Secondly It was impossible the Lamb could be the Lords Passover in the literal sense because an action that had been past some hundreds of years before could not be performed every time they did eat the Lamb but this is not so Thirdly The Jewish Church never understood these words literally but the Christian Church hath ever understood these words of Christ literally Nor is it to be imagined that a change in such a thing was possible for how could any such Opinion have crept in in any Age if it had not been the Doctrine of the former Age M. B. said Nothing he had alledged was of any force For the first Christ's promise imported no more than what he performed in the Sacramental institution If then it be proved that by saying This is my body he only meant a Commemoration his promise must only relate to his Death commemorated in the Sacrament To the second the literal meaning of Christ's words is as impossible as the literal meaning of Moses's words for besides all the other impossibilities that accompany this corporal Presence it is certain Christ gives us his body in the Sacrament as it was given for us and his Blood as it was shed for us which being done only on the Cross above 1600 years ago it is as impossible that should be literally given at every Consecration as it was that the Angel should be smiting the AEgyptians every Paschal Festivity And here was a great mistake they went on securely in that the body of Christ we receive in the Sacrament is the Body of Christ as he is now glorified in Heaven for by the words of the Institution it is clear that we receive his Body as it was given for us when his Blood was shed on the Cross which being impossible to be reproduced now we only can receive Christ by Faith For his third difference that the Christian Church ever understood Christ's words so we would willingly submit to the decision of the Church in the first six Ages Could any thing be more express than Theodoret who arguing against the Eutychians that the Humanity and Divinity of Christ were not confounded nor did depart from their own substance illustrates it from the Eucharist in which the Elements of Bread and Wine do not depart from their own Substance M. W. said We must examine the Doctrine of the Fathers not from some occasional mention they make of the Sacrament but when they treat of it on Design and with Deliberation But to Theodoret he would oppose S. Cyril of Ierusalem who in his fourth Mist. Catechism says expresly Though thou see it to be bread yet believe it is the Flesh and the Blood of the Lord Jesus doubt it not since he had said This is my Body And for a proof instances Christ's changing the Water into Wine D. S. said He had proposed a most excellent Rule for examining the Doctrine of the Fathers in this matter not to canvase what they said in eloquent and pious Treaties or Homilies to work on Peoples Devotion in which case it is natural for all Persons to use high Expressions but we are to seek the real sense of this Mystery when they are dogmatically treating of it and the other Mysteries of Religion where Reason and not Eloquence takes place If then it should appear that at the same time both a Bishop of Rome and Constantinople and one of the greatest Bishops in Africk did in asserting the Mysteries of Religion go downright against Transubstantiation and assert that the substance of the Bread and Wine did remain he hoped all would be satisfied the Fathers did not believe as they did M. W. desired we would then answer the Words of Cyril M. B. said It were a very unreasonable thing to enter into a verbal Dispute about the Passages of the Fathers especially the Books not being before us therefore he promised an Answer in Writing to the Testimony of S. Cyril But now the matter was driven to a point and we willingly undertook to prove that for eight or nine Centuries after Christ the Fathers did not believe Transubstantiation but taught plainly the contrary the Fathers generally call the Elements Bread and Wine after the Consecration they call them Mysteries Types Figures Symbols Commemorations and Signs of the body and blood of Christ They generally deliver that the wicked do not receive Christ in the Sacrament which shews they do not believe Transubstantiation All this we undertook to prove by undeniable Evidences within a very few days or weeks M. W. said He should be glad to see it D. S. said Now
meaning of this by and so by a progress for ever we must contend about the true meaning of every Place Therefore when we enquire into the sense of any controverted place we must judge of it by the rules of common Sense and Reason of Religion and Piety and if a meaning be affixed to any Place contrary to these we have good reason to reject it For we knowing all external things only by our Senses by which only the Miracles and Resurrection of Christ could be proved which are the means God has given us to converse with and enjoy his whole Creation and evidence our senses give being such as naturally determines our Perswasions so that after them we cannot doubt if then a sense be offered to any place of Scripture that does overthrow all this we have sufficient reason on that very account to reject it If also any meaning be fastened on a place of Scripture that destroys all our Conceptions of things is contrary to the most universally receiv'd Maxims subverts the Notions of matter and accidents and in a word confounds all our clearest Apprehensions we must also reject every such gloss since it contradicts the evidence of that which is God's Image in us If also a sense of any place of Scripture be proposed that derogates from the glorious Exaltation of the humane Nature of our blessed Saviour we have very just reasons to reject it even though we could bring no confirmation of our meaning from express words of Scripture therefore this Dispute being chiefly about the meaning of Christ's Words he that shews best Reasons to prove that his sense is consonant to Truth does all that is necessary in this case But after all this we decline not to shew clear Scriptures for the meaning our Church puts on these words of Christ. It was Bread that Christ took blessed brake and gave his Disciples Now the Scripture calling it formally bread destroys Transubstantiation Christ said This is my Body which are declarative and not imperative words such as Let there be light or Be thou whole Now all declarative words suppose that which they affirm to be already true as is most clear therefore Christ pronounces what the Bread was become by his former blessing which did sanctifie the Elements and yet after that blessing it was still bread Again the reason and end of a thing is that which keeps a proportion with the means toward it so that Christ's words Do this in remembrance of me shew us that his Body is here only in a vital and living Commemoration and Communication of his Body and Blood Farther Christ telling us it was his Body that was given for us and his Blood shed for us which we there receive it is apparent he is to be understood present in the Sacrament not as he is now exalted in Glory but as he was on the Cross when his Blood was shed for us And in fine if we consider that those to whom Christ spake were Jews all this will be more easily understood for it was ordinary for them to call the Symbol by the Name of the Original it represented So they called the Cloud between the Cherubims God and Iehovah according to these words O thou that dwellest between the Cherubims and all the symbolical Apparitions of God to the Patriarchs and the Prophets were said to be the Lord appearing to them But that which is more to this purpose is that the Lamb that was the symbol and memorial of their Deliverance out of Egypt was called the Lord's Passover Now though the Passover then was only a Type of our Deliverance by the Death of Christ yet the Lamb was in proportion to the Passover in Egypt as really a Representation of it as the Sacrament is of the Death of Christ. And it is no more to be wondered that Christ called the Elements his Body and Blood though they were not so corporally but only mystically and sacramentally than that Moses called the Lamb the Lord 's Passover So that it is apparent it was common among the Jews to call the Symbol and Type by the Name of the Substance and Original Therefore our Saviour's Words are to be understood in the sense and stile that was usual among these to whom he spake it being the most certain rule of understanding any doubtful Expression to examine the ordinary stile and forms of speech in that Age People and Place in which such Phrases were used This is signally confirmed by the Account which Maimonides gives us of the sense in which eating and drinking is oft taken in the Scriptures First he says it stands in its natural signification for receiving bodily Food Then because there are two things done in eating the first is the destruction of that which is eaten so that it loseth its first form the other is the increase and nourishment of the substance of the Person that eats therefore he observes that eating has two other significations in the Language of the Scriptures the one is destruction and desolation so the Sword is said to eat or as we render it to devour so a Land is said to eat its Inhabitants and so Fire is said to eat or consume The other sense it is taken in does relate to Wisdom Learning and all Intellectual Apprehensions by which the form or soul of man is conserved from the perfection that is in them as the body is preserved by food For proof of this he cites divers places out of the Old Testament as Isa. 55. 2. come buy and eat and Prov. 25. 27. and Prov. 24. 13. he also adds that their Rabbins commonly call Wisdom eating and cites some of their Sayings as come and eat flesh in which there is much fat and that whenever eating and drinking is in the Book of the Proverbs it is nothing else but Wisdom or the Law So also Wisdom is often called Water Isa. 55. 1. and he concludes that because this sense of eating occurs so often and is so manifest and evident as if it were the primary and most proper signification of the Word therefore Hunger and Thirst do also stand for a privation of Wisdom and Understanding as Amos. 8. 21. To this he also refers that of thirsting Psal. 42. 3. and Isa. 12. 3. and Ionathan paraphrasing these Words Ye shall draw water out of the Wells of Salvation renders it Ye shall receive a new Doctrine with joy from the select ones among the Iust which is farther confirmed from the words of our Saviour Iohn 7. 37. And from these Observations of the Learnedest and most Judicious among all the Rabbins we see that the Iews understood the Phrases of eating and eating of flesh in this spiritual and figurative sense of receiving VVisdom and Instruction So that this being an usual form of Speech among them it is no strange thing to imagine how our Saviour being a Iew according to the Flesh and conversing with Iews did use these Terms and Phrases
in a sense that was common to that Nation And from all these set together we are confident we have a great deal of Reason and strong and convincing Authorities from the Scriptures to prove Christ's words This is my Body are to be understood spiritually mystically and sacramentally There remains only to be considered what weight there is in what N. N. says He answered to D. S. That Christ might be received by our senses though not perceived by any of them as a bole is swallowed over though our taste does not relish or perceive it That Great Man is so very well furnished with Reason and Learning to justifie all he says that no other body needs interpose on his account But he being now busie it was not worth the giving him the trouble to ask how he would reply upon so weak an Answer since its shallowness appears at the first view for is there any comparison to be made between an Object that all my senses may perceive if I have a mind to it that I see with mine eyes and touch and feel in my mouth and if it be too big and my Throat too narrow I will feel stick there but only to guard against its offensive taste I so wrap or convey it that I relish nothing ungrateful in it and the receiving Christ with my senses when yet none of them either do or can though applied with all possible care discern him So that it appears D. S. had very good reason to say it seemed indeed strange to him to say that Christ was received by our senses and yet was so present that none of our senses can perceive him and this Answer to it is but mere trifling Here follows the Paper we promised wherein an Account is given of the Doctrine of the Church for the first Eight Centuries in the point of the Sacrament which is demonstrated to be contrary to Transubstantiation written in a Letter to my Lady T. Madam YOur Ladiship may remember That our Meeting at your House on the Third Instant ended with a Promise we made of sending you such an account of the sense of the Fathers for the first six Ages as might sufficiently satisfie every impartial Person That they did not believe Transubstantiation This Promise we branched out in three Propositions first That the Fathers did hold That after the Consecration the Elements of Bread and Wine did remain unchanged in their substance The second was that after the Consecration they called the Elements the Types the Antitypes the Mysteries the Symbols the Signs the Figures and the Commemorations of the body and blood of Christ which certainly will satisfie every unprejudiced Person That they did not think the Bread and Wine were annihilated and that in their room and under their accidents the substance of the body and blood of Christ was there Thirdly we said That by the Doctrine of the Fathers the unworthy Receivers got not the body and the blood of Christ from which it must necessarily follow That the substance of his body and blood is not under the accidents of Bread and Wine otherwise all these that unworthily receive them eat Christ's body and blood Therefore to discharge our selves of our Promise we shall now give your Ladiship such an account of the Doctrine of the Fathers on these Heads as we hope shall convince those Gentlemen that we had a good warrant for what we said The first Proposition is The Fathers believed that after the Consecration the Elements were still Bread and Wine The Proofs whereof we shall divide into three branches The first shall be That after the Consecration they usually called them Bread and Wine Secondly That they expresly assert that the substance of Bread and Wine remained Thirdly That they believed the Sacramental Bread and Wine did nourish our bodies For proof of the first we desire the following Testimonies be considered Iustin Martyr says These who are called Deacons distribute the blessed Bread and Wine and Water to such as are present and carry it to the absents and this nourishment is by us called the Eucharist And a little after We do not receive these as common Bread or common Drink for as by the word of God Iesus Christ our Saviour being made Flesh had both Flesh and Blood for our Salvation so we are taught that that food by which our blood and flesh are nourished by its change being blessed by the word of Prayer which he gave us is both the flesh and the blood of the Incarnate Iesus Thus that Martyr that wrote an hundred and fifty years after Christ calls the Elements Bread and Wine and the nourishment which being changed into Flesh and Blood nourishes them And saying it is not common Bread and VVine he says that it was still so in substance and his illustrating it with the Incarnation in which the Humane Nature did not lose nor change its substance in its union with the eternal Word shews he thought not the Bread and Wine lost their substance when they became the flesh and blood of Christ. The next Witness is Irenaeus who writing against the Valentinians that denied the Father of our Lord Jesus to be the Creator of the World and also denied the Resurrection of the Body confutes both these Heresies by Arguments drawn from the Eucharist To the first he says If there be another Creator than the Father of our Lord then our offering Creatures to him argues him covetous of that which is not his own and so we reproach him rather than bless him And adds How does it appear to any of them that that Bread over which thanks are given is the body of his Lord and the Cup of his blood if he be not the Son of the Creator And he argues against their Saying our bodies should not rise again that are fed by the body and blood of Christ for says he that bread which is of the Earth having had the Invocation of God over it is no more common bread but the Eucharist consisting of two things an earthly and an heavenly so our Bodies that receive the Eucharist are no more corruptible having the Hope of the Resurrection Tertullian Lib. 1. adv Marc. c. 14. proving against Marcion that Christ was not contrary to the Creator among other Proofs which he brings to shew that Christ made use of the Creatures and neither rejected Water Oil Milk or Hony he adds neither did he reject Bread by which he represents his own Body And further says Lib. 3. adv Marc. c. 19. Christ calls Bread his Body that from thence you may understand that he gave the Figure of his Body to the Bread Origen says Lib. 8. cont Celsum We eat of the Loaves set before us with Thanks giving and Prayers over what is given to us which by the Prayer are become a certain holy Body that sanctifies those who use them with a sound purpose St. Cyprian says Epist. 76. Christ calls the Bread that was compounded
their former Substance Figure and Form and are both visible and palpable as they were before but they are understood to be that which they are made and are believed and venerated as being those things which they are believed to be And from thence he bids the Heretick compare the Image with the Original for the Type must be like the Truth and shews that Christ's Body retains its former Form and Figure and the Substance of his Body though it be now made Immortal and Incorruptible Thus he And having now set down very faithfully the Words of these Fathers we desire it may be considered that all these Words are used to the same Effect to prove the Reality of Christ's Body and the Distinction of the two Natures the Divine and the Human in him For though St. Chrysostom lived before Eutyches his days yet in this Point the Eutychians and the Apollinarists against whom he writes held Opinions so like others that we may well say all these Words of the Fathers we have set down are to the same purpose Now first it is evident that if Transubstantiation had been then believed there needed no other Argument to prove against the Eutychians that Christ had still a real Body but to have declared that his Body was corporally present in the Eucharist which they must have done had they believed it and not spoken so as they did since that alone well proved had put an end to the whole Controversy Further they could never have argued from the Visions and Apparitions of Christ to prove he had still a real Body for if it was possible the Body of Christ could appear under the accidents of Bread and Wine it was as possible the Divinity should appear under the accidents of an Humane Body Thirdly They could never have argued against the Eutychians as they did from the absurdity that followed upon such a substantial mutation of the Humane Nature of Christ into his Divinity if they had believed this substantial conversion of the Elements into Christ's Body which is liable unto far greater Absurdities And we can as little doubt but the Eutychians had turned back their Arguments on themselves with these Answers if that Doctrine had been then received It is true it would seem from the last Passage of Theodoret that the Eutychians did believe some such change but that could not be for they denied the Being of the Body of Christ and so could not think any thing was changed into that which they believed was not Therefore we are to suppose him arguing from some commonly received expressions which the Father explains In fine The design of those Fathers being to prove that the two Natures might be united without the change of either of their substances in the Person of Christ it had been inexcusable Folly in them to have argued from the sacramental Mysteries being united to the Body and Blood of Christ if they had not believed they retained their former Substance for had they believed Transubstantiation what a goodly Argument had it been to have said Because after the Consecration the Accidents of Bread and Wine remain therefore the Substance of the Humanity remained still tho united to the Divine Nature in Christ Did ever Man in his Wits argue in this fashion Certainly these four Bishops whereof three were Patriarchs and one of these a Pope deserved to have been hissed out of the World as Persons that understood not what it was to draw a Consequence if they had argued so as they did and believed Transubstantiation But if you allow them to believe as certainly they did that in the Sacrament the real Substances of Bread and Wine remained tho after the Sanctification by the Operation of the Holy Ghost they were the Body and Blood of Christ and were to be called so then this is a most excellent illustration of the Mystery of the Incarnation in which the Human Nature retains its proper and true Substance tho after the Union with the Divinity Christ be called God even as he was Man by virtue of his Union with the Eternal Word And this shews how unreasonable it is to pretend that because Substance and Nature are sometimes used even for accidental Qualities they should be therefore understood so in the cited places for if you take them in that sense you destroy the force of the Argument which from being a very strong one will by this means become a most ridiculous Sophisin Yet we are indeed beholden to those that have taken pains to shew that Substance and Nature stand often for accidental Qualities for tho that cannot be applied to the former places yet it helps us with an excellent Answer to many of those Passages with which they triumph not a little Having so far considered these Four Fathers we shall only add to them the Definition of the Seventh General Council at Constantinople Ann. 754. Christ appointed us to offer the Image of his Body to wit the substance of the Bread The Council is indeed of no Authority with these we deal with But we do not bring it as a Decree of a Council but as a Testimony that so great a number of Bishops did in the Eighth Century believe That the substance of the Bread did remain in the Eucharist and that it was only the Image of Christ's Body and if in this Definition they spake not more consonantly to the Doctrine of the former Ages than their Enemies at Nice did let what has been set down and shall be yet adduced declare And now we advance to the third Branch of our first Assertion that the Fathers believed that the Consecrated Elements did nourish our Bodies and the Proofs of this will also give a further Evidence to our former Position that the substance of the Elements does remain And it is a Demonstration that these Fathers who thought the Sacrament nourished our Bodies could not believe a Transubstantiation of the Bread and Wine into the Body and Blood of Christ. For the proof of this Branch we desire the following Testimonies be considered First Iustin Martyr as was already cited not only calls the Eucharist our Nourishment but formally calls it that Food by which our Flesh and Blood through its transmutation into them are nourished Secondly Irenaeus Lib. 5. adv Heret c. 2. proving the Resurrection of the Body by this Argument That our Bodies are fed by the Body and Blood of Christ and that therefore they shall rise again he hath these Words He confirmed that Cup which is a Creature to be His Blood by which He encreases our Blood and the Bread which is a Creature to be His Body by which He encreases our Body And when the mixed Cup and the Bread receive the Word of God it becomes the Eucharist of the Body and Blood of Christ by which the substance of our Flesh is encreased and subsists How then do they deny the Flesh to be capable of the gift of God which is Eternal Life
that is nourished by the Body and Blood of Christ and is made His Member We hope it will be observed that as these Words are express and formal so the Design on which He uses them will admit of none of those Distinctions they commonly rely on Tertullian says Lib. de Resur c. 8. the Flesh is fed with the Body and Blood of Christ. St. Austin Serm. 9. de Divers after he had called the Eucharist our daily Bread he exhorts us so to receive it that not only our Bellies but our Minds might be refreshed by it Isidore of Sevil says The substance of the visible Bread nourishes the outward Man or as Bertram cites his Words all that we receive externally in the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ is proper to refresh the Body Next let us see what the 16th Council of Toledo says in Anno 633. condemning those that did not offer in the Eucharist entire Loaves but only round Crusts they did appoint one entire Loaf carefully prepared to be set on the Altar that it might be sanctified by the Priestly Benediction and order that what remained after Communion should be either put in some Bag or if it was needful to eat it up that it might not oppress the Belly of him that took it with the burden of an heavy surcharge and that it might not go to the Digestion but that it might feed his Soul with spiritual Nourishment From which Words one of two Consequences will necessarily follow either that the Consecrated Elements do really nourish the Body which we intend to prove from them or that the Body of Christ is not in the Elements but as they are Sacramentally used which we acknowledg many of the Fathers believed But the last Words we cited of the Spiritual Nourishment shew those Fathers did not think so and if they did we suppose those we deal with will see that to believe Christ's Body is only in the Elements when used will clearly leave the Charge of Idolatry on that Church in their Processions and other Adorations of the Host. But none is so express as Origen Comment in Mat. c. 15. who on these words 'T is not that which enters within a Man which defiles a Man says If every thing that enters by the Mouth goes into the Belly and is cast into the Draught then the Food that is sanctified by the Word of God and by Prayer goes also to the Belly as to what is material in it and from thence to the Draught but by the Prayer that was made over it it is useful in proportion to our Faith and is the mean that the Understanding is clear-sighted and attentive to that which is profitable and it is not the matter of Bread but the Word pronounced over it which profits him that does not eat in a way unworthy of our Lord. This Doctrine of the Sacraments being so digested that some parts of it turned to Excrement was likewise taught by divers Latin Writers in the 9th Age as Rabanus Maurus Arch-bishop of Mentz and Heribald Bishop of Auxerre Divers of the Greek Writers did also hold it whom for a Reproach their Adversaries called Stercoranists It is true other Greek Fathers were not of Origen's Opinion but believed that the Eucharist did entirely turn into the Substance of our Bodies So Cyril of Ierusalem says Mystic Catech. 5. that the Bread of the Eucharist does not go into the Belly nor is cast into the Draught but is distributed thorough the whole Substance of the Communicant for the good of Body and Soul The Homily of the Eucharist in a Dedication that is in St. Chrysostom's Works Tom. 5. says Do not think that this is Bread and that this is Wine for they pass not to the Draught as other Victuals do And comparing it to Wax put to the Fire of which no Ashes remain he adds So think that the Mâ—teries are consumed with the Substance of our Bodies Iohn Damascene is of the same mind who says Lib. 4. de Orthod fide c. 14. That the Body and the Blood of Christ passes into the Consistence of our Souls and Bodies without being consumed corrupted or passing into the Draught God forbid but passing into our Substance for our Conservation Thus it will appear that tho those last-cited Fathers did not believe as Origen did that any part of the Eucharist went to the Draught yet they thought it was turned into the Substance of our Bodies from which we may well conclude they thought the Substance of Bread and Wine remained in the Eucharist after the Consecration and that it nourished our Bodies And thus we hope we have sufficiently proved our first Proposition in all its three Branches So leaving it we go on to the second Proposition which is That the Fathers call the consecrated Elements the Figures the Signs the Symbols the Types and Antitypes the Commemoration Representation the Mysteries and the Sacraments of the Body and Blood of Christ. Tertullian proving against Marcion Lib. 4 cont Marc. c. 40. that Christ had a real Body he brings some Figures that were fulfilled in Christ and says He made the Bread which he took and gave his Disciples to be his Body saying This is my Body that is the Figure of my Body but it had not been a Figure of his Body had it not been true for an empty thing such as a Phantasm cannot have a Figure Now had Tertullian and the Church in his time believed Transubstantiation it had been much more pertinent for him to have argued Here is corporally present Christ's Body therefore he had a true Body than to say Here is a Figure of his Body therefore he had a true Body such an escape as this is not incident to a Man of common Sense if he had believed Transubstantiation And the same Father in two other places before cited says Christ gave the Figure of his Body to the Bread and that he represented his own Body by the Bread St. Austin says Com. in Psal. 3 He commended and gave to his Disciples the Figure of his Body and Blood The same Expressions are also in Bede Alcuine and Druthmar that lived in the Eighth and Ninth Centuries But what St. Austin says elsewhere Lib. 3. de Doct. Chr. c. 16. is very full in this matter where treating of the Rules by which we are to judg what Expressions in Scripture are figurative and what not he gives this for one Rule If any place seem to command a Crime or horrid Action it is figurative and to instance it cites these words Except ye eat the Flesh and drink the Blood of the Son of Man you have no Life in you which says he seems to command some Crime or horrid Action therefore it is a Figure commanding us to communicate in the Passion of our Lord and sweetly and profitably to lay up in our Memory that his Flesh was crucified and wounded for us Which words are so express and full that whatever
those we deal with may think of them we are sure we cannot devise how any one could have delivered our Doctrine more formally Parallel to these are Origen's words Homil. 7. in Lev. who calls the understanding the Words of our Saviour of eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood according to the Letter a Letter that kills The same St. Austin calls the Eucharist a Sign of Christ's Body in his Book against Adimantus Lib. cont Adimant manich c. 12. who studied to prove that the Author of the Old and New Testament was not the same God and among other Arguments he uses this That Blood in the Old Testament is called the Life or Soul contrary to the New Testament To which St. Austin answers That it was so called not that it was truly the Soul or Life but the Sign of it and to shew that the Sign does sometimes bear the Name of that whereof it is a Sign he says Our Lord did not doubt to say This is my Body when he was giving the Sign of his Body Where if he had not believed the Eucharist was substantially different from his Body it had been the most impertinent Illustration that ever was and had proved just against him that the Sign must be one and the same with that which is signified by it For the Sacrament being called the Type the Antitype the Symbol and Mystery of Christ's Body and Blood The ancient Liturgies and Greek Fathers use these Phrases so frequently that since it is not so much as denied we judg we need not laboriously prove it Therefore we pass over this believing it will be granted for if it be denied we undertake to prove them to have been used not only on some occasions but to have been the constant Style of the Church Now that Types Antitypes Symbols and Mysteries are distinct from that which they shadow forth and mystically hold out we believe can be as little disputed In this Sense all the Figures of the Law are called Types of Christ by the Fathers and both the Baptismal Water and the Chrism are called Symbols and Mysteries And tho there was not that occasion for the Fathers to discourse on Baptism so oft which every body received but once and was administred ordinarily but on a few days of the Year as they had to speak of the Eucharist which was daily consecrated so that it cannot be imagined there should be near such a number of places about the one as about the other yet we fear not to undertake to prove there be many places among the Ancients that do as fully express a change of the Baptismal Water as of the Eucharistical Elements From whence it may appear that their great Zeal to prepare Persons to a due value of these holy Actions and that they might not look on them as a vulgar Ablution or an ordinary Repast carried them to many large and high Expressions which cannot bear a literal meaning And since they with whom we deal are fain to fly to Metaphors and Allegories for clearing of what the Fathers say of Baptism it is a most unreasonable thing to complain of us for using such Expositions of what they say about the Eucharist But that we may not leave this without some Proof we shall set down the words of Facundus Desens Conc. Chalced. lib. 9. who says The Sacrament of Adoption that is Baptism may be called Adoption as the Sacrament of his Body and Blood which is in the consecrated Bread and Cup is called his Body and Blood not that the Bread is properly his Body or the Cup properly his Blood but because they contain in them the Mystery of his Body and Blood and hence it was that our Lord called the Bread that was blessed and the Cup which he gave his Disciples his Body and Blood Therefore as the Believers in Christ when they receive the Sacrament of his Body and Blood are rightly said to have received his Body and Blood so Christ when he received the Sacrament of the Adoption of Sons may be rightly said to have received the Adoption of Sons And we leave every one to gather from these words if the cited Father could believe Transubstantiation and if he did not think that Baptism was as truly the Adoption of the Sons of God as the Eucharist was his Body and Blood which these of Rome acknowledg is only to be meant in a moral Sense That the Fathers called this Sacrament the Memorial and Representation of the Death of Christ and of his Body that was broken and his Blood that was shed we suppose will be as little denied for no Man that ever looked into any of their Treatises of the Eucharist can doubt of it St. Austin says Epist. 23. ad Bonifac. That Sacraments must have some Similitude of these things of which they be the Sacraments otherwise they could not be Sacraments So he says the Sacrament of the Body of Christ is after some manner his Blood So the Sacrament of Faith that is Baptism is Faith But more expresly speaking of the Eucharist as a Sacrifice of Praise he says Lib. 20. cont Faust. Manich. c. 21. The Flesh and Blood of this Sacrifice was promised before the coming of Christ by the Sacrifices of the Types of it In the Passion of Christ it was done in the Truth it self And after his Ascent is celebrated by the Sacrament of the remembrance of it But he explains this more fully on the 98th Psalm where he having read ver 5. Worship his Footstool and seeking for its true meaning expounds it of Christ's Body who was Flesh of this Earth and gives his Flesh to be eaten by us for our Salvation which since none eats except he have first adored it He makes this the Footstool which we worship without any Sin and do sin if we do not worship it So far the Church of Rome triumphs with this place But let us see what follows where we shall find that which will certainly abate their Joy He goes on and tells us not to dwell on the Flesh lest we be not quickened by the Spirit and shews how they that heard our Lord's words were scandalized at them as hard words for they understood them says he foolishly and carnally and thought he was to have cut off some parcels of his Body to be given them But they were hard not our Lord 's saying for had they been meek and not hard they should have said within themselves He says not this without a cause but because there is some Sacrament hid there for had they come to him with his Disciples and asked him he had instructed them For he said it is the Spirit that quickens the Flesh profiteth nothing the words that I have spoken to you are Spirit and Life And adds understand spiritually that which I have said for it is not this Body which you see that you are not to eat or to drink this Blood which they are to shed who shall crucify
in the Sacrament is Faith from these words Whoso eats my Flesh and drinks my Blood hath eternal Life If these words have relation to the Sacrament which the Roman Church declares is the true meaning of them there cannot be a clearer Demonstration in the World And indeed they are necessitated to stand to that Exposition for if they will have the words This is my Body to be understood literally much more must they assert the Phrases of èating his Flesh and drinking his Blood must be literal for if we can drive them to allow a figurative and spiritual meaning of these words it is a shameless thing for them to deny such a meaning of the words This is my Body they then expounding these words of St. Iohn of the Sacrament there cannot be imagined a closer Contexture than this which follows The eating Christ's Flesh and drinking his Blood is the receiving him in the Sacrament therefore every one that receives him in the Sacrament must have eternal Life Now all that is done in the Sacrament is either the external receiving the Elements Symbols or as they phrase it the Accidents of Bread and Wine and under these the Body of Christ or the internal and spiritual communicating by Faith If then Christ received in the Sacrament gives eternal Life it must be in one of these ways either as he is received externally or as he is received internally or both for there is not a fourth Therefore if it be not the one at all it must be the other only Now it is undeniable that it is not the external eating that gives eternal Life For St. Paul tells us of some that eat and drink unworthily that are guilty of the Body and Blood of the Lord and eat and drink Iudgment against themselves Therefore it is only the internal receiving of Christ by Faith that gives eternal Life from which another necessary Inference directs us also to conclude that since all that eat his Flesh and drink his Blood have eternal Life and since it is only by the internal communicating that we have eternal Life therefore these words of eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood can only be understood of internal communicating therefore they must be spiritually understood But all this while the Reader may be justly weary of so much Time and Pains spent to prove a thing which carries its own Evidence so with it that it seems one of the first Principles and Foundations of all Reasoning for no Proposition can appear to us to be true but we must also assent to every other Deduction that is drawn out of it by a certain Inference If then we can certainly know the true meaning of any place of Scripture we may and ought to draw all such Conclusions as follow it with a clear and just Consequence and if we clearly apprehend the Consequence of any Proposition we can no more doubt the Truth of the Consequence than of the Proposition from which it sprung For if I see the Air full of a clear Day-light I must certainly conclude the Sun is risen and I have the same assurance about the one that I have about the other There is more than enough said already for discovering the vanity and groundlesness of this Method of arguing But to set the thing beyond all dispute let us consider the use which we find our Saviour and the Apostles making of the Old Testament and see how far it favours us and condemns this Appeal to the formal and express words of Scriptures But before we advance further we must remove a Prejudice against any thing may be drawn from such Presidents these being Persons so filled with God and Divine Knowledg as appeared by their Miracles and other wonderful Gifts that gave so full an Authority to all they said and of their being Infallible both in their Expositions and Reasonings that we whose Understandings are darkened and disordered ought not to pretend to argue as they did But for clearing this it is to be observed that when any Person divinely assisted having sufficiently proved his Inspiration declares any thing in the Name of God we are bound to submit to it or if such a Person by the same Authority offers any Exposition of Scripture he is to be believed without farther dispute But when an inspired Person argues with any that does not acknowledg his Inspiration but is enquiring into it not being yet satisfied about it then he speaks no more as an inspired Person In which case the Argument offered is to be examined by the Force that is in it and not by the Authority of him that uses it For his Authority being the thing questioned if he offers an Argument from any thing already agreed to and if the Argument be not good it is so far from being the better by the Authority of him that useth it that it rather gives just ground to lessen or suspect his Authority that understands a Consequence so ill as to use a bad Argument to use it by This being premised When our Saviour was to prove against the Sadducees the Truth of the Resurrection from the Scriptures he cites out of the Law that God was the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob since then God is not the God of the Dead but of the Living Therefore Abraham Isaac and Jacob did live unto God From which he proved the Souls having a Being distinct from the Body and living after its Separation from the Body which was the principal Point in Controversy Now if these new Maxims be of any force so that we must only submit to the express words of Scripture without proving any thing by Consequence then certainly our Saviour performed nothing in that Argument For the Sadducees might have told him they appealed to the express words of Scripture But alas they understood not these new-found Arts but submitting to the evident force of that Consequence were put to silence and the Multitudes were astonished at his Doctrine Now it is unreasonable to imagine that the great Authority of our Saviour and his many Miracles made them silent for they coming to try him and to take advantage from every thing he said if it were possible to lessen his Esteem and Authority would never have acquiesced in any Argument because he used it if it had not Strength in it self for an ill Argument is an ill Argument use it whoso will For instance If I see a Man pretending that he sits in an Infallible Chair and proving what he delievers by the most impertinent Allegations of Scripture possible as if he attempt to prove the Pope must be the Head of all Powers Civil and Spiritual from the first words of Genesis where it being said In the Beginning and not in the Beginnings in the plural from which he concludes there must be but one Beginning and Head of all Power to wit the Pope I am so far from being put to silence with this that I am only astonished
it was condemned Can there be therefore any thing more plain than that there was a change made and that what in the one Age was taught by a great number of writers without any censure upon it was in another Age anathematized Is there not then here a clear change And what has been done was certainly possible from whence we conclude with all the justice and reason in the world that a change was not only possible but was indeed made And yet the many repeated condemnations of Berengarius shew his Doctrine was too deeply rooted in the minds of that Age to be very easily suppressed for to the end of the 11th Century the Popes continued to condemn his Opinions even after his death In the beginning of the 12th Century Honorius of Autun who was a considerable man in that Age did clearly assert the Doctrine of the Sacraments nourishing our Bodies and is acknowledge by Thomas Waldensis to have been a follower of Berengarius his Heresie And about the 18th year of that Age that Doctrine was embraced by great numbers in the South of France who were from ther several Teachers called Petrobrusrans Henricians Waldenses and from the Countrey where their number were greatest Albigenses whose Confession dated the year 1120 bears That the eating of the Sacramental Bread was the eating of Iesus Christ in a figure Iesus Christ having said as oft as ye do this do it in remembrance of me It were needless to engage in any long account of these people the Writers of those times have studied to represent them in as hateful and odious Characters as it was possible for them to devise and we have very little remaining that they wrote Yet as the false Witnesses that were suborned to lay heavy things to our Blessed Saviour Charge could not agree among themselves so for all the spite with which these Writers prosecute those poor Innocents there are such noble Characters given even by these enemies of their piety their simplicity their patience constancy and other virtues that as the Apologists for Christianity do justly glory in the testimonies Pliny Lucian Tacitus Iosephus and other declared Enemies give so any that would study to redeem the memory of those multitudes from the black aspersions of their foul-mouthed Enemies would find many passages among them to glory much in on their behalf which are much more to be considered than those virulent Calumnies with which they labour to blot their Memories But neither the death of Peter de Bruis who was burnt nor all the following Cruelties that were as terrible as could be invented by all the fury of the Court of Rome managed by the Inquisitions of the Dominicans whose Souls were then as black as their Garments could bear down or extinguish that light of the Truth in which what was wanting in Learning Wit or Order was fully made up in the simplicity of their Manners and the constancy of their Sufferings And it were easie to shew that the two great things they were most persecuted for were their refusing subjection to the See of Rome and their not believing the Doctrine of the Corporal Presence nor were they confined to one corner of France only but spred almost all Europe over In that Age Steven Bishop in Eduen is the first I ever find cited to have used the word Transubstantiation who expresly says De Sacram. Altar c. 13. That the Oblation of Bread and Wine is Transubstantiated into the Body and Blood of Christ Some place him in the beginning some in the middle of that Age for there were two Bishops of that See both of the same Name the one Anno 1112. the other 1160. And which of the two it was is not certain but the Master of the Sentences was not so positive and would not determine Lib. 4. dist 11. whether Christ was present formally substantially or some other way But in the beginning of the 13th Century one Amalric or Almaric who was in great esteem for Learning did deny Transubstantiation saying That the Body of Christ was no more in the Consecrated Bread than in any other Bread or any other thing Anno 1215. c. 1. for which he was condemned in the 4th Council of Lateran and his Body which was buried in Paris was taken up and burnt and then was it decreed That the Body and Blood of Christ were truly contained under the kinds or Species of Bread and Wine the Bread being transubstantiated into the Body and the Wine into the Blood All the while this Doctrine was carried on it was managed with all the ways possible that might justly create a prejudice against them who set it forward for besides many ridiculous lying wonders that were forged to make it more easily believed by a credulous and superstitious multitude the Church of Rome did discover a cruelty and blood-thirstiness which no Pen is able to set out to the full What Burnings and Tortures and what Croissades as against Infidels and Mabumetans did they set on against those poor innocent Companies whom they with an enraged wolvish and barbarous bloodiness studied to destroy This was clearly contrary to the Laws of Humanity the Rules of the Gospel and the Gentleness of Christ How then could such companies of Wolves pretend to be the followers of the Lamb In the Primitive Church the Bishops that had prosecuted the Priscillanists before the Emperor Maximus to the taking away their lives were cast out of the Communion of the Church but now did these that still pretended to be Christ's Vicars shew themselves in Antichrist's Colours dipt in blood If then any of that Church that live among us plead for pity and the not executing the Laws and if they blame the severity of the Statutes against themselves let them do as becomes honest men and without disguise disown and condemn those Barbarities and them that were the promoters and pursuers of them for those practices have justly filled the world with fears and jealousies of them that how meekly soever they may now whine under the pretended oppression of the Laws they would no sooner get into power but that old Leaven not being yet purged out of their hearts they would again betake themselves to fire and faggot as the unanswerable Arguments of their Church and so they are only against persecution because they are not able to persecute but were they the men that had the power it would be again a Catholick Doctrine and Practice But when they frankly and candidly condemn those Practices and Principles they will have somewhat to plead which will in reason prevail more than all their little Arts can do to procure them favour It was this same Council of Lateran that established both Cruelty Persecution and Rebellion into a Law appointing that all Princes should exterminate all Hereticks this is the mercy of that Church which all may look for if ever their power be equal to their malice and did decree Cap. 3. That if any Temporal Lord being