wine there whereas the whole substance as this fellow beareth vs in hand that is both matter and forme of bread passeth into Christs body here 9. To say that one substance passeth into another substance preexisting is to say that that is made that already is or that is produced and hath beeing giuen it that is in beeing already when as a thing cannot be in making and beeing at once nor can beeing be giuen to that that already is or to say that a creature is now made that was fully made before or that a creature that was before is new made of that that before was not it Yea to speake more plainely it is all one to as say that a man is killed when hee was dead before or is quickened when hee was aliue before or is now stript when hee was starke naked before or is now bred or begotten when he was borne before Lastly to say that Christs body long before preexisting is now made of bread that some two or three dayes past had no existence it selfe is all one as to say that wine of a twelue-month old is made of grapes that were but yesterday gathered and pressed and were yet growing the day before or that an Oke hauing stood vpward of an hundred yeeres and yet standing in the Forrest is sprung vp this yeere of an acorne of the last yeares growth And consider wee now how well these things agree together The body of Christ is contained in the bread and yet there is no bread at all in the Eucharist The body of Christ succeedeth onely in the roome of bread and yet the substance of the bread passeth into the substance of Christs body The whole substance of bread is so abolished that nothing remaineth of it and yet the whole substance of the same bread passeth into the substance of Christs body Christs body was in beeing before and yet it is now made of another substance that before it was not yea Christs body that was bread and borne aboue a thousand yeeres since is now made of a wafer-cake of yesterdayes baking The whole essence of that wafer cake passeth into Christs body and yet wee cannot say of Christs body that euer it was that wafer-cake But like ropes of sand as wee are wont to say doe these things hang together and to spend much time in refuting them may be deemed I feare as ridiculous to vse their Dennis his tearmes as to stand seriously and curiously pulling downe by piece-meale such castles as little children haue in sport built vp of sand NEither is it a good or Christian kinde of Argument which my Adversary in the end of the same 12. page to this purpose maketh Other substantiall conversions are sensible and easily discerned albeit miraculous as when Aarons rod was made a Serpent c. Wheras in the Sacrament we see wholly the contrary therefore we are not to beleeue therein any such conversion citing thus for proofe thereof a place of S. Augustine in his margent which directly if hee had marked it overthroweth his owne doctrine and purpose of citing it That which you see saith this Father is bread and a Cup but that which your faith requireth you to be enformed of is that the bread is Christs body and the Cup his blood Could hee affirme any thing more plainly against this Ministers sensuall and absurd Argument which were it good would lead vs to beleeue nothing faith being onely of things which appeare not to our vnderstanding or senses How farre is this carnall poore vnlearned man from the holy Fathers spirit and doctrine as I haue formerly cited their assertions wherein they teach vs to renounce the naturall iudgement of our vnderstanding and senses and with the Apostle to captivate our vnderstandings to the obedience of faith in this and many other mysteries of faith humbly to bee vpon the warrant of Gods word assented vnto and not ouer-curiously searched after by vs. We are saith S. Hillarie that great Doctor of Christs Church and victorious Champion of his deity not to dispute as my Adversarie doth in a secular and sensuall manner of diuine things For of this naturall veritie of Christ in vs speaking of the Sacrament vnlesse we learne of Christ himself we speake foolishly and impiously Wherefore sithence hee saith My flesh is truely food and my blood is truely drinke Hee that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood remaineth in mee and I in him there is no place of doubting left cōcerning the verity of Christs body and blood For now by the profession of our Lord and faithfull beleefe which we haue thereof it is his true flesh and blood and these being receiued by vs do make vs to be in Christ and Christ in vs. Is not this truth Surely it is but to those that deny Iesus Christ to be true God c. With a cloud of such ancient and vncontrollable Testimonies of the holy Fathers formerly touched could I confound my sensuall Adversary and teach him a new manner of disputing of these heauenly and diuine Mysteries instituted by the Sonne of God with equall wisedome power and goodnesse for vs wherein the omnipotency of him that chiefly doth them is to be assigned for a sufficient reason of them § 4. NOw further whereas I alleadge among other things that in euery miraculous conversion of bodies there is a sensible change whereas no such thing at all is found in the Sacrament Our eyes saith Augustine informe vs that it is bread that is there He telleth me this is no good nor Christian but an absurd secular and senslesse arguing and such as would leade vs to beleeue nothing but what we see and that Augustine if I had marked him whom I cite in the margent as if his very wordes were not in the text vtterly ouerthroweth it as also Hillarie and other Fathers when they teach vs in diuine mysteries to renounce the naturall iudgement of our vnderstanding and senses which this poore carnall vnlearned man his Adversarie is so farre from c. And withall as commiserating and bewailing my simplicity Oh how farre is this poore c. He telleth his Reader that he could with a cloud of such ancient and vncontrolleable testimonies of the holy Fathers confound this his sensuall Adversarie and teach him a new manner of disputing of these heauenly and divine mysteries Wel when he doth this you may beleeue that he can doe it and his poore puny Adversary shall be eternally obliged to him for it But meane while let vs see what Pyrgopolinices here saith 1. Augustine telleth vs that something is seene in the Sacrament and something else is to bee belieued But doth Augustine tell vs that wee must not beleeue that there is bread there though our eyes informe vs that there is No He telleth vs expressely that there is bread there as our eyes doe informe vs. And what can be more euidently or plainely spoken Yea
yet really handled and receiued as Angels in assumpted bodies are said to bee seene and felt and as S. Iohn Baptist likewise Ioh. 1. said he saw the holy Ghost when hee onely saw a Doue the signe of his presence c. which manner of speech is not vâ—usuall with the holy Fathers Thou seest him saith S. Chrysostome speaking of Christ in the Sacrament Thou touchest him Thou eatest him c. Which is the same in sense which Pope Nicholas affirmeth onely hee explicateth somewhat more particularly the diuision and fraction of the sacramentall formes containing the very bodie and blood of Christ vnder them all and each particle of them entirely and vndeuidedly remaining Insomuch as Iohn Husie falsely wont by our Aduersaries to be claimed for Patron and faithfull witnesse of their doctrine singeth thus in certaine verses of Christs presence and manner of being receiued in the Sacrament which hee with vs to his dying day constantly beleeued as now also his disciples doe after him Non est panissed est Deus Qui in cruce pependisti Non augetur consecratus Nec diuisus in fractura Homo liberator meus Et in carne defecisti Nec coÌ„sumptus fit mutatê° Plenus Dâ—us iu statura It is not bread but God and Man my Redeemer who hanged on a Crosse and died in flesh for me Hee is not encreased on multiplied by Consecration nor diuided in breaking of the Host but God full in stature So likewise S. Andrew in his passion authentically as Bellarmine proueth written by the Clergie of Achaia present thereat told the Procounsul Egeus I dayly offer to God who is one and omnipotent not the flesh of Buls blood of Goats but the immaculate Lambe vpon the Altar whose flesh when all the multitude of faithfull people hath receiued the Lambe sacrificed integer perseuer at ac viuus doth liue and remaine entire c. So as Pope Nicholas doctrine vnderstood of Christs flesh being eaten in the Sacrament needeth not Gratians Glosse to saue it from hereticall blaspemy and the danger of a worse opinion then Berengarius renounced vnlesse hee had taught Christs flesh in it selfe to haue beene torne with teeth and bloodily eaten as the Capharnites imagined and the Gentile persecutors were went to obiect against poore Christians that they did eate the flesh of a certaine man in their synaxes and meetings calling them men eaters c. to wit because they did eate bread and drinke wine consecrated by the miraculous force of Christs wordes into his naturall flesh and blood as Saint Iustine that holy Martyr and great Christian Philosopher told Aurelius the Emperor in his second Apologie for Christians where hee describeth as much as it was fit for him to open the heauenly mysteries of our faith to the Gentiles the whole order of the Sacrifice and distribution of the Sacrament as it is now celebrated by vs this being the new Oblation of the New Testament as S. Irenaeus tearmeth it instituted by Christ in his last Supper and that cleane Sacrifice which Malachie foretold should succeed in place of the Iewish Sacrifices and be offered by the Gentiles in all places IN the next place I proceede to discusse the wordes of our Sauiour concerning the eating his flesh and drinking his blood Iohn 6. Where first I quarell he saith at P. Nicholas his maner of speech deuised purposely as this mine Aduersary here informeth vs in a CouÌ„cell of learned Bishops to make a slippery shifting heretike make a direct and plain confession of his faith concerning the reall presence His words are as I haue related theÌ„ that the very body of Christ in the Eucharist is broken with the Priests hands and torn in pieces with mens teeth not sacrameÌ„tally only but sensually Which palpable absurdities and carnall and Capernaiticall assertions this Defendant would faine salue if hee could but he sheweth himselfe therein but a sorry Quackesaluer 1. By citing besides some of his owne counterfaits of which more anone a saying of S. Chrysostome affirming that the faithfull see and touch and eate Christ in the Eucharist which neither they nor we deny nor is it ought to the purpose vnlesse Chrysostome should also say that hee is eaten in such sort as Pope Nicholas averreth not sacramentally onely or spiritually but euen sensually so hee saith For so the Galathians also saw him crucified as the Apostle telleth them in their sight and some of the Ancients say that euen at this day he is crucified 2. By telling vs that Christs glorified bodie is incapable of renting which if it be so how saith Pope Nicholas that it is torne in pieces This is a strange manner of saluing him to tell vs that that cannot be done which he in precise tearmes saith is vsually done And marke here I pray you how these men play fast and loose with vs. They tell vs when wee presse them with the indignitie of the thing that Christs bodie cannot bee bruised now or broken and this is it seemeth when they speake mystically or shiftingly as hee speaketh But when they make a plaine and direct confession for so hee saith Pope Nicholas did when hee thus spake and no formes are more exact saith Bellarmine then those formes of abiuration are then they acknowledge that according to their saith and beliefe if they beleeue at least as they speake and doe not dally with vs and delude vs Christs very bodie is sensually rent and torne in pieces in the Sacrament 3. By granting that if he had taught that Christs flesh in it selfe were torne with teeth c. it were indeed hereticall blasphemie And what other thing I pray you doth Pope Nicholas affirme when he saith that Christs very bodie not in the Sacrament onely but in very truth and sensually is torne in pieces with mens teeth This is not to excuse him but to accuse and condemne him both of heresie and blasphemy 4. By affirming that the Popes wordes need not Gratians Glosse to saue them from any such imputation Yet Gabriel Biel a great Schooleman whom wee rather beleeue freely confesseth that Pope Nicholas in so saying exceeded the truth as another Glosse on Gratian also else-where acknowledgeth and while he sought to shun one error ranne into another wherein others also of their owne writers dare not defend him So that the Pops sitting in his Chaire yea and in Councell too with all his learned Bishops like himselfe round about him consistorially to censure and to determine truth in matter of faith may yet erre for all his infallibility so much so oft bâ—agged of And it was not vnwisely done of Bellarmine to let this passe where he relateth and refuteth as well as he may the seuerall errors and heresies that their Popes are charged with § 2. Heere by the way though little to the present purpose to wit the cleering of Pope Nicholas that hee may fill vp his Discourse
is a deale of durt indeede and mud raised to trouble Augustines cleere water The Question is whether our Sauiours words be to be vnderstood properly or figuratiuely They say properly and not figuratiuely Augustine saith figuratiuely and so consequently not properly which is as much as is here required Christs body saith Bellar mine is with the body properly eaten in the Eucharist But it is no proper but a figuratiue eating saith Augustine that Christ speaketh of Iohn 6. It is no such eating of Christs body therefore as they imagine to be in the Eucharist Yea so contrary to them and so pregnant for vs is that passage of Augustine that in Fulbertus his workes where those words of his are related they haue with a foule insertion branded them for hereticall Yea but saith mine Aduersarie there are many plaine places in Augustine cited by Bellarmine for the reall receiuing of Christ which my superficiall Aduersarie taketh no notice of Bellarmine is still much in this mans mouth and the superficialnesse of his silly and vnlearned Aduersarie But this I am sure is a very vnlearned slender and superficiall proofe of points questioned to turne his Reader ouer still for satisfaction to some other Yet I will doe him the couttesie since he telleth vs of other plaine places in Augustine to present him with one of them though such an one it may be as will not easily goe downe with him Augustine speaking of this place in Iohn on Psal. 98. saith that Christ hauing vsed those words Vnlesse you eate the flesh of the Sonne of man and drinke his blood you haue no life in you When some vnderstood them foolishly and carnally he taught them to vnderstand them spiritually saying It is the Spirit that quickneth the flesh profiteth nothing the words that I speake are Spirit and life As if he should haue said vnderstand you spiritually what I haue spoken You are not to eate that body which you see and to drinke that blood which they will shed that shall crucifie me I haue commended a kinde of Sacrament vnto you which being spiritually vnderstood will quicken you Though it must be visibly colebrated yet is it inuisibly to be vnderstood Thus Augustine in plaine tearmes and yet if we beleeue these men the very same body of Christ that was then seene and that very same blood that was shed on the Crosse is orally eaten and drunke in the Eucharist ANd surely if the Authoritie of holy Fathers might preuaile with the Minister further then himselfe listeth he cannot be so ignorant as not to know that all the auncient Doctors expounding or treating of Christs words Ioh. 6. haue literally vnderstood them of the Sacrament as learned Tolet Saunders Bellarmine and other of our diuines haue particularly prooued collecting from them inuincible Testimonies also to prooue the verity of our Sauiours body and blood really in the Sacrament conteined and receiued Insomuch as S. Austin affirmeth S. Iohn purposely to haue emitted all mention of the Sacrament in our Sauiours last Supper because he had in the 6. Chap. of his Gospell so particularly expressed the promised excellency and heauenly fruits thereof and many euident and vnanswerable Arguments are by Catholike expositors of that Chapter made to prooue the same which with silence my Aduersarie ouerpasseth First for example our Sauiour from the 31. to the 60. verse of that Chapter maketh a difference betwixt the gift which his Father had giuen to the Iewes louing the world so as to giue his onely begotten Sonne for it and the gift which himselfe meant to giue to them speaking of the one as a gift already past but of the other as of a gift afterwards to bee giuen vnto them Secondly He compareth the eating of his flesh to the Israelites eating of Manna in the desert which was a corporall food really eaten by them Thirdly If by eating his flesh and drinking his blood our Sauiour meant no other thing then that they should beleeue in him it had beene a strange course in him who so thirsted after the saluation of soules by an obscure manner of speaking to driue away so many such persons especially as had formerly followed him without any word added which might open this obscure doctrine vnto them as Card. Tollet excellently relateth there the whole processe of our Sauiours doctrine § 5. MY second Proposition is that Christ in that whole Discourse Iohn 6 doth not speake of the Eucharist That Augustine and diuers others of the ancient Fathers doe expound it of feeding on Christ yet not corporally but spiritually in the Sacrament for so Bishop Iansenius also ingenuously confesseth that Augustine holdeth it to be vnderstood of seeding on Christ spiritually not corporally yea and so Pope Innocent himselfe witnesse Durand and Biel and Peter Lombard also witnesse Bonâ—uenture expound it I deny not nor doth it at all impeach our cause in the maine point here in question of Christs corporall presence Yet the rather herein wee are inforced together with diuerse Popish writers to depart from them in that their exposition so farre forth as they vnderstand the same as directly speaking of the Eucharist as for the one moitie of that discourse also euen Bellarmine himself doth in regard of some erronious consequences that they were by that meanes enforced vnto which euen the Papists themselues now condemne and for other weighty reasons as in my first writing I shew Yea but Catholique Expositors saith this Answerer by many euident and vnanswerable Arguments haue prooued that it is so to be vnderstood which his Aduersarie also saith hee euerpasseth with silence And say I A Catholique Expositor in their language to wit Corn. Iansenius no Iesuite now for so this Answerer hath informed me and yet a Bishop of Flanders in a worke of his by common consent of the learned among them well approoued of they are the Popes owne Censurers wordes of it hath by euident and vnanswerable Arguments prooued that it cannot so bee vnderstood which this mine aduersarie also ouerpasseth with silence And the like also doth Frier Ferus and Gabriel Biel at large in the place aboue recited But hee will at length I hope say somewhat himselfe 1. Our Sauiour saith he maketh a difference there betweene the gift which his Father had â—iuen the Iewes and the gift that himselfe ment to giue speaking of the one as past of the other as to come This out of Bellarmine I maruell where this man learned his Logicke He neuer is luckie in the framing of his Consequences There is a difference betweene the gift that God the Father had giuen and the gift that Christ would giue Ergò Christs wordes must needs be vnderstood of his corporall presence in the Eucharist How hang these things together or by what necâ—ssity of consequence doth the one follow from the other For first Are they diuerse gifts that God
dead and lastly in the institution of this Sacrament And in like manner hee is not wont to blesse insensible things but when he was to worke some admirable thing with them For he is neuer read so to haue done but when hee blessed the bread to be multiplied and in the Encharist As on the contrary when hee cursed the figtree for it withered away instantly For Gods blessing is a well-doing not a praying as ours but an effecting as appeareth when hee blessed the beasts for by that blessing hee bestowed fruitfulnesse vpon them Nor do we reade that Christ euer blessed the water in Baptisme And what of all this Therefore forsooth it must needs follow that Christ by that blessing turned the bread into his owne naturall body Where to omit that it is not true that Christ is neuer read to haue giuen thankes oftner then is here said for at other times also hee is reported to haue giuen thankes and that when hee was not about to worke any miracle neither Nor is it truely said that Christs blessing was not a prayer which that it was not Iansenius onely but Maldonat the Iesuite from some of the Ancients also confesseth being conceiued by him as man but effected by him as God and beside that it is absurd to reason à non scripto ad non factum hee is not read oftâ—er to haue blessed or given thankes therefore hee neuer oftner did either yea it is impious to imagine that Christ who for our sakes made himselfe subiect to the Law did not ordinarily blesse and sanctifie the food that he tooke commonly by thankes-giuing and prayer who denyeth but that Christ went about a marueilous worke when hee was to institute this Sacrament or who doubteth but that Christs benediction was a most effectuall benediction and as effectuall as that of Gods was in the Creation whereby he blessed the creatures by vertue whereof yet the creatures so blessed were not transformed into new shapes but had a naturall facultie only conferred vpon them which before they had not nor of theÌ„selues could haue and so haue the elements a spirituall and supernaturall by our acknowledgement in the Sacrament But who seeth not what a silly and senselesse consequence this is Bellarmine could not be so silly and sottish as not to see it himselfe Christ gaue thankes and blessed the bread ere hee gaue it therefore hee wrought such a miracle on it as wee would haue or therefore if you will he turned it into the very substance of his body It may as well bee said that Samuel wrought some miracle by blessing the sacrifice as our Sauiour here by blessing the bread For the water in Baptisme it is easie to answer though it be little to the purpose It is not to bee maruelled if hee be not read to haue blessed it for we are told expresly that he neuer baptised saue as he doth spiritually baptise to this day But dare any say that his Disciples were so prophane as to baptise without blessing or must a bald yea a Baals Priests blessing of bread at this day be needes more effectuall then their blessing of water then was Or doe not the ancient Fathers compare the blessing of the water and the effect thereof in Baptisme with the blessing of the waters and the moouing of the Spirit vpon them in the Creation And why must the blessing then of necessity import such a change more in the one Sacrament then in the other Diuision 8. AS for the names of bread and wine after giuen by Saint Paul and the holy Fathers to the consecrated parts of the Sacrament which with this Minister is a great argument tediously vrged page 10. hee cannot be ignorant I suppose as not to conceiue the little sorce of the Argument For if Aarons red after it was conuerted into a Serpent and retained not the essence or figure of a rod bee notwithstanding called so with much more reason may the Accidents of bread and wine still remaining and containing in them Christs body and blood retaine their old names especially with articles superadded importing the singular and diuine excellency of them still vsed by Saint Paul 1 Cor. 10 11. as this bread this Chalice the bread which wee breake c. willing them to prooue themselues c. before they come to eate of this bread least eating it vnworthily they eate their owne damnation not discerning the body of Christ or which is all one not distinguishing it from other common bread it being indeed bread blessed and conuerted into the very body of Christ and therefore not irreuerently and vnworthily to be receiued by any Christian vnder paine of damnation as the ancient Doctor and holy Mariyr of Christs Church S. Cyprian affirmeth S. Basil also S. Chrysostome S. Ierome Origen and S. Augustine with other Fathers expressâ—ly teach the sinne of such as come vnworthily to the Sacrament to be haynous and equall even to the sinne of such as betrayed and killed Christ because they presume vnworthily to eate that bread wherein the Son of God himselfe is contained MY second Argument was taken from the expresse words of Scripture wherein after Consecration there is said to be bread and wine in the Sacrament 1. The little force of this Argument hee saith I cannot be so ignorant as not to conceiue because Aarons rod after it was conuerted into a Serpent and retained not the essence or figure of a rod yet was notwithstanding so called c. And hee cannot bee so ignorant as not to conceiue that this very Obiection is there by me propounded and answered yea and that Bellarmine himselfe reiecteth it as not very sound but such as iust exception may be taken vnto Did hee thinke that any one not voyd of common sense would not soone see this 2. He saith that the accidents of bread and wine remaining retaine still their old names To what purpose For who doubteth but that the accidents that is the colour sauour shape sise c. of the elements remaine still in the Eucharist not without a subiect as they say for how can accidents so do when the very essence of an accident as it is an accident is to be in some subiect but in the selfe same subiect wherein formerly they were And what should hinder but that remaining so they should retaine still their old names But neither are the accidents of bread and wine bread and wine and it is absurd to say either that the Apostle by bread meant the accidents of bread onely when he said The bread which wee breake c. and Let a man eate of that bread c. Or that by the fruit of the vine our Sauiour meant nothing but the acci dents of wine when hee said I will drinke henceforth no more of this fruit of the vine c. So that his
Title of the 33. Psalme wherein these words are written Et ferebatur in manibus suis And-he was carried in his owne hands Who saith he conc 1. is able to conceiue how this can happen in man For who is carried in his owne hands A man may be carried in the hands of an other But in his owne hands he cannot be carried How this may be literally vnderstood in Dauid we finde not But in Christ we doe For Christ was carried in his owne hands when giuing his bodie he said This is my Body For then did he carry that body in his owne hands c. When as Christ himselfe saith S. Cyril affirmeth and saith of the bread This is my Bodie who may presume to make any doubt thereof And when the same Christ confirmeth and saith This is my Blood who can doubt and say it is not his blood Againe Let vs not consider it as meere bread or bare wine For it is the bodie and blood of Christ. For although the sense teacheth thee that it is bread and wine yet let thy faith confirme thee that thou iudge not the thing it selfe by thy taste And a little after This knowing for most certaine that the bread which we see is not bread although thy taste thinketh it to be bread but that it is the bodie of Christ and the wine which we behold although to the sense of tasting it seemeth to be wine yet that it is not wine indeede but the blood of our Sauiour c. Let vs beleeue God saith S. Chrysostome in euery thing not gain-saying him though what he saith may seeme absurd to our sense and cogitation I beseech thee therefore that his speech may ouercome our sense and reason Which point we are to obserue in all things but especially in holy mysteries not onely beholding those things which lie before vs but also laying hold of his words for his words cannot deceiue vs but our sense may easily be deceiued And elsewhere lib. 3. de Sacerd. O miracle saith he O the bountie of God! he that sitteth aboue with his Father euen in the same instant of time is handled with the hands of all and deliuereth himselfe to such as are willing to entertaine and imbrace him Againe Elias did leaue his garment to his disciple But the Sonne of God ascending to heauen did leaue his flesh But Elias by leauing it was deuested thereof Whereas Christ leauing his flesh to vs yet ascending to heauen there also he hath it AFter that he hath thus spent some part of his railing Rhetorick in traducing vilifying this Protestantical Diuine his Aduersary asignorant vnacquainted with the Authors he citeth a petty writer a meere collector a filcher a falsifier c. and disgraced his Discourse as consisting of proofes tedious and superficiall and allegations impertinent maimedly and corruptly produced and that nothing may escape him without some nip written with a very bad hand which he taketh to be his owne and the partie therefore one it may be not so fit to write for Ladies as himselfe being both a man of worth as before he intimated himselfe to be and writing a faire hand too though not very Scholerlike as the worke it selfe sheweth Hee commeth now to deale with the matter and substance of the Discourse Where the first Proposition that he vndertaketh to oppugne as I propound it is this These words in the Gospel This is my Body may well be taken figuratiuely Which how it may be I shew by some instances to wit these other in Scripture The seuen kine are seauen yeeres The ten hornes are ten Kings The Rocke was Christ or as those other in ordinary speech This is Caesar That is Cicero c. Nor is there any thing in the Gospel that may enforce the contrarie Now this worthy man that taxeth me for a meere Collector and a filcher out of Bellarmine hath nothing here to answere but what he fetcheth from Bellarmine whom he saith I filch all from But let vs see how well he vrgeth and maketh good Bellarmines answeres 1. The words are simply and without any other explication simply and vniformally for so in his scholerlike manner he speaketh recounted by three Euangelists and Saint Paul And therefore they cannot be taken figuratiuely For that must follow or else he speaketh nothing to the purpose We shall not neede to goe farre to discouer the weakenesse of this consequence The three Euangelists and S. Paul speaking of the other part of this Sacrament doe all simply and without another explication vniformally to retaine his owne precise tearmes say This Cup is c. therefore the Cup cannot be taken figuratiuely there which if it be not they must inuent a new Transsubstantiation of some other matter or mettall then the fruite of the Vine either into the New Testament or into Christs blood § 2. When the Lambe is called the Passeouer and the Rocke said to be Christ something is added in the Text to explaine the literall true meaning of them The Lambe for example in the same place is called the Sacrifice of the Passeouer Christ is said to be a spirituall Rocke c. 1. It is not true that he saith that in the same place where the Lambe is called the Passeouer the same Lambe is called the Sacrifice of the Passeouer There is no more said Exod. 12. 11. but this Ye shall eate it in hast it is the Lords Passeouer there being nothing by way of explication there added But after indeede verse 27. not the Lambe precisely but the whole Seruice is said to be the Sacrifice of the Lords Passeouer When your Children shal aske you What seruice is this that you obserue Then shall you say It is the Sacrifice of the Lords Passeouer Neither is Christ said to be a spirituall Rocke 1. Cor. 10. 4. But the reall Rocke is called a spirituall Rocke as the Manna and the water that issued from it are called spirituall meate and drinke And that Rocke for matter corporall for vse spirituall is said as Augustine well obserueth not to signifie but to be Christ Nothing being added more to intimate a figuratiue sense there then heere in the wordes This is my Body which two speeches both Augustine and Caietan compare the one with the other 2. It is senselesse thus to reason In some places where figuratiue speeches are vsed something is added to explicate them therefore wheresoeuer nothing is added to explicate the figure the words are not or cannot be figuratiuely taken 3. In many of the instances giuen no such explication is added as these The ten Hornes are ten Kings The seven Kine are seuen yeeres This is Caesar This Cicero c. 4. In the very Context there is added that which sheweth the sense to bee figuratiue For that which is called Christs blood by the Euangelist in the one verse is expresly said to be the
Theodorets owne words By Sacramentall Signes saith he Theodoret meaneth not the Substance of Bread and Wine 1. He vnderstandeth by the mysticall Signes that that is offered to God by Gods Priests And doth the Priest then offer nothing to God but accidents onely Indeed they tell vs that Melchisedech offred bread and wine and that their Priests are Priests after the order of Melchisedech and so offer such offerings as he did And the auncient Fathers alluding to that story by them allegorised say that Bread and Wine are offred to God in the Eucaarist But in the Popish Masse according to their opinion of it no such thing can be offred because no such thing is there present 2. More particularly explaining himselfe he saith that by the one signe he meaneth the food that of certaine graine is made and by the other the fruite of the Vine And is there any such foode or fruit at all that is no physicall substance or that consisteth of meere accidents He deserueth to be fed till he starue with such food that would feede or infect rather mens soules with such draffy stuffe as this is Yea in precise tearmes he saith that Christ called Bread not the accidents of bread his Body as he called his Body else-where bread 3. The very maine drift and scope euidently manifesteth his meaning which is to shew that the Lords Body though it be not a common body but hath glorious endowments yet remaineth a true body still as the Sacramentall bread though it be not common bread yet retaineth still it former nature and substance and is true bread still 4. If wee aske Theodoret himselfe what hee meaneth here by Substance and whether hee take the word in such sense as it is vsually taken hee telleth vs himselfe a little before he entreth into this discourse that by Substance he vnderstandeth a body and by Accidents which hee opposeth to Substance such things as betide bodies and yet may depart from them And they may as well say that by Substance Theodoret meant Accidents when hee saith that Christs body retaineth still the same bodily substance as they may say hee so meaneth when of the bread which hee compareth therewith hee saith the very same But what take I so much paines to set vp a light when the Sun shines the proofe is so plaine and his meaning so perspicuous that it may seem written as Tertullian speaketh with a beame of the Sunne saue to lay open a little this mans shamelesse carriage and senslesse shifts who yet with a confident face telleth his Reader that his Aduersarie both heere and else-where sheweth how learned and iudicious hee is in the choice of his authorities as if this allegation made wholly for them and against vs were it read all out or were nothing pertinent at least to the purpose § 5. In conclusion for Gratians Glosse acknowledging the truth by vs maintained that our Sauiours wordes are figuratiuely to bee vnderstood and Cardinall Caietan confessing that they may well beare that sense hauing nothing and that is maruell for he dare say any thing to except against either hee excuseth himselfe that hee hath not the bookes by him as if they were not commonly in Pauls Church-yard to be had if hee had listed to looke after them A bad excuse as we say is better then none at all with him Onely hee addeth that they are both of small account with them Caietan especially In regard whereof hee wondereth that I should so much magnifie him as if he were the Oracle of their Church c. For the former none can be ignorant what Authority among their Canonists the Glosses haue and in the place cited the rather because hee buildeth vpon Augustines owne wordes For the latter I cite him onely by the name of Cardinall Caietan nor had they many Cardinals in his time for learning his equals one of our Aduersaries that is all my magnifying of him But mine Adversaries lips must need ouer-runne Yet of what repute and esteeme Caietan was for both kinds of learning as well Philosophy as Diuinity to omit the titles commonly giuen him in the Inscriptions of his workes by those that set out some of them stiling him the most eminent Doctour and professor of diuinity his Commentaries on Thomas whence this testimony is taken most luculent and euen diuine Commentaries his smaller Treatises golden workes I may referre you to the workes themselues so many so learned so elaborate and to the storie of his life written by Antonius Fonseca and set out with some of them It is apparent and it is enough that a prime Cardinall of the Sea of Rome confesseth ingenuously that the wordes of our Sauiour This is my body may be siguratiuely taken for ought in the text were it not that their Church that is the Pope will haue them otherwise expounded Diuision 5. HE concludeth his first Discourse thus page 5. Thus they and thus we and yet neither doe they nor wee therefore make the Sacrament of Christs body and blood ANY thing but bare bread and wine Which Corollarium of his plainely so delivered may make any man see the Protestanticall Communion truely anathomized and plainely shewed to haue nothing holy heauenly and diuinely as the Fathers speake therein contained but bare bread and wine which any man may eate when and where hee pleaseth remembring withall our Sauiours passion Neuer Caietan neuer Bellarmine neuer Gratian neuer Father or other Catholique Diuine of our Church beleeued or taught this grosse and sacrilegious doctrine as my Aduersarie in his wordes They and Wee falsely pretendeth Neither doth Caluine or any other noted Diuine of their Church speake at least whatsoeuer they thinke so poorely and grossely of this Sacrament but they endeauour with Epithets and wordes to couer the bready nakednesse thereof making it seeme mysterious at least if not miraculous Blessed Saint Dennis great Scholler of Saint Paul himselfe I will heere presume to aske thee If the Sacrament of the Altar bee but bare bread and wine why doest thou so absurdly speake and blasphemously praey vnto it in this manner O most diuine and holy Sacrament vouchsafe to open those signifying signes and appeare perspicuously vnto vs and replenish the spirituall eyes of our soule with the singular and cleere splendor of thy light c. Why likewise thou holy Martyr and great Doctor of Christs Church Saint Itaeneus liuing so neere the Apostles times as to know great Polycarpus S. Iohns disciple and deeply seene in the knowledge of heauenly verities doest thou deny this bread after consecration to bee any more accounted common bread but the Eucharist cōsisting of two things heauenly and earthly that being receiued into our bodies they may bee no more corruptible hauing the hope of resurrection If no more then bare bread and wine be in this Communion as my Aduersarie affirmeth why did yee noble Confessors of
the first Nicene Councell will vs in this diuine table not to regard onely bread and wine proposed but to eleuate our minde by faith and behold on this table the Lambe of God taking away the sinnes of the world by Priests vnbloodily sacrificed and receiuing his body and blood to beleeue them to bee symboles and pledges of our resurrection c. O holy Ephrem renowned so for thy great learning and singular sanctitie as Saint Ierome testifieth thy writings to haue beene read in the Church after the holy Scriptures why doest thou will vs not to search after these inscrutable mysteries c. but to receiue with a full assurance of faith the immaculate body of the Lord and the Lambe himselfe entirely adding those wordes which cannot agree to such a communion of bare bread and wine as this Minister teacheth The mysteries of Christ are an immortall fire search them not curiously least in the search thou become burned c. telling vs that this Sacrament doth exceed all admiration and speech which Christ our Sauiour the onely begotten Sonne of God hath instituted for vs. Finally why doe other ancient â—nd chiefe Fathers of the Greeke and Latine Church call the consecrated bread and wine on the Altar dreadfull mysteries the food of life and immortality hidden Manna and infinitely excelling it a heauenly banquet the bread of Angels humbly present while it is offered and deuoutly adoring it c. If there bee no more but bare bread and wine therein receiued in memorie of our Sauiours passion as my Aduersarie affirmeth of his Protestanticall Sacrament THe next Diuisiâ—â— hee maketh entrance into with a grosse and shamelesse deprauation and thereupon prosecuteth it to the end with an impertinent digression Hauing cited the forenamed Testimenies of Theodoret and Gelasius in mine Answer to that Obiection brought commonly against vs as if by a deniall of such a reall presence as Papists maintaine wee should make the Sacrament to be nothing but bare bread I conclude both mine Answer and the Allegation of those two Authors in these wordes Thus they to wit Gelasius and Theodoret and thus we and yet neither doe they nor we therefore make the Sacraments of Christs body and blood NOthing but bare bread and wine Now this shamelesse wretch wanting matter to be dealing with turneth me NOthing into ANY thing a man able indeed with his shamelesse senselesse shifts to picke any thing out of nothing and relateth my wordes in this manner to a cleane contrary sense Thus they and thus we and yet neither doe they nor wee therefore make the Sacraments of Christs body and blood ANY thing but bare bread and wine Had either I or my Transcriber for the truth is it was not mine owne hand-writing that hee had I write a worse hand I confesse then he is aware of that accounteth that so bad an one If either I or hee I say had slipt heere with the pen as I suspected hee might haue done till I saw the copie againe that this Answerer had yet the whole tenour of my speech wherein I shew that the bread and wine in the Eucharist are no more bare bread or bare wine then the water vsed in the Sacrament of Baptisme is bare water would sufficiently haue shewed my meaning But when the copie that was deliuered him remaining in the custodie of that Noble Personage for whom at first it was written is found apparantly to haue the wordes in the very same manner as I haue before cited them I cannot deuise what colour this audacious wretch can bring to salue his owne credite with and excuse his corrupt carriage It argueth not a bad but a desperate cause that without such senselesse and shamelesse shifts cannot bee vpheld And I beseech your Ladiship well to consider what credite is to be giuen to these men alleadging Authors Fathers Councels c. which they know you cannot your selfe peruse and examine when they dare thus palpably falsifie a writing that you haue in your owne hands and may haue recourse to when you will § 2. Now hauing thus laid a lewd and loud vntruth for the ground of his ensuing Discourse 1. Hee falleth into an Inuectiue against our Protestanticall Communion as acknowledged by me to haue nothing holy heauenly and diuinely for so it pleaseth him to speak therein contained but bare bread and wine c. adding withall that neuer Câ—ietan neuer Bellarmine neuer Gratian neuer Father or other Catholique Diuine beleeued or taught this sacrilegious doctrine a lye he meaneth of his owne forging as my Aduersarie in these wordes They and wee falsly pretendeth In which wordes first for hee cannot forbeare fâ—lsifying for his life no not then and there where he chargeth others with falshood he intimateth that in those words Thus they I should haue reference to Caietan Bellarmine and Gratian whereas my wordes euidently point at Gelasius and Theodoret whose owne wordes in precise tearmes I had next before cited 2. He chargeth me falsely to say that of the Eucharish that neither I nor any of our Diuines euer said yea which being by way of Obiection before produced I not onely disauow and disprooue approouing freely and at large proouing the contrary but in this place in plaine tearmes conclude the direct contrary vnto in the very wordes by him fowly falfified 3. Hee runneth out to giue vs some taste of his rowling Rhetoricke as well as his loose Logicke into a solemn inuocation of his forged S. Dionyse together with some of the Ancients as if hee were raising of Spirits with some magicall inchantment to fight with a shadow and to skirmish with a man of straw of his owne making to testifie in that against vs that hee would faine put vpon vs but none of vs by his owne confession euer said or doe say Thus hee hath nibled here and there cauilled at by-matters coined lies forged and faced but giuen no direct Answer to the Argument whereunto hee should haue answered and whereby it was prooued that these wordes of our Sauiour This my body may well beare a figuratiue sense so expounded by the Ancient Fathers and confessed by their owne writers not so much as attempted to prooue the contrary thereunto § 3. Now howsoeuer I might very well let passe as impertinent those citations and sayings of the Authors here summoned to giue in either testimony or sentence against that that none of vs auoweth and which therfore though all that either they doe say or hee would haue them say were true did no way crosse vs or once touch vs in ought that is heerein affirmed of vs and I had sometime therefore determined wholy to passe by them for feare of ouercharging this Discourse yet considering that some weake ones peraduenture may stumble at some passages in them especially as they are vnfaithfully by this alleadger of them here translated I haue thought good now ere wee part with them to examinine what they say that
it pleaseth Bellarmine to cite him as if hee had said The high Priest that he sacrificeth the sauing Host that is aboue him excuseth himselfe to him or to it crying out Thou hast said Doe this c. But let Dennis speake in his owne language or but as their owne writers translate him and both Bellarmines mis-alleadging of him will soone be discouered and the force of his reason drawne from thence vtterly dissolued That which he saith is word for word thus The diuine Hierarch standing at the diuine Altar celebrateth that is praiseth and extolleth Christs holy diuine workes out of his most diuine care of vs for our saluation by the goodwill of his Father in the Holy Ghost by him consummated Which hauing celebrated and by contemplation with intellectuall eyes taken a venerable and spirituall view of them he passeth vnto the symbolicall celebration or holy administration of them and that according to diuine Tradition Wherefore religiously and hierarchically that is as becommeth an Hierarch or a Bishop after the holy celebration or solemne praise of those diuine workes he maketh an Apologie for himselfe in regard of that boly seruice or sacrifice as they translate it though the word be more generall that is to worthy for him to deale with crying out to him to whom but to Christ Iesus before mentioned Thou hast said Doe this in remembrance of me And then hauing requested that he may be vouchsafed the grace of performing this holy and diuine seruice in holy manner and that those that are to communicate may religiously partake in it hee performeth the most diuine seruice c. For vncouering the bread that was hitherto couered and vndiuided and diuiding it into many pieces and distributing to them all the one onely Cup be doth symbolically further their vnitie thereby performing his most holy seruice Now where is there here any mention of an Host or affirming that Host to be aboue him or better then himselfe or making any speech at all to it And yet if it were Christ to whom should he direct his speech more fitly then to it what should he speake to him as sited else-where when hee hath him corporally there present The rather if as they tell vs he seeth there what we doe and heareth what we say though he say nothing himselfe because he would not be discouered Yea but he acknowledgeth the holy seruice then and there to be performed to be too worthy for him to deale with And doth not the Apostle say as much of the ministery of the word that no man is sufficient or worthy enough for such a worke Or may not the same truly be said of the Sacrament of Baptisme and the administration of it There is nothing here then in either allegation that may at all helpe to establish the Popish Transubstantiation And yet this is all that out of this Dennis Bellarmine is able to produce Who though indeede otherwise not free from sundry fantasticall conceipts yet is so farre from enclining to that prodigious fancy that the whole tenure of his discourse concerning that Sacrament as the auncient Scholiast also hath well obserued on him runneth cleane another way He calleth the Eucharist as you haue heard a symbolicall seruice and a distribution of bread and a Cup and the bread and the Cup vsed in it symboles or signes and images or pictures and paternes resembling the truth of their principals to which he doth also there oppose thē And not we but the Monke Maximus aunciently expounding him Marke you saith he how still he calleth this diuine seruice a Symbolicall seruice that is a seruice saith he consisting of Symboles or Signes and the holy gifts themselues signes or symboles of the true things aboue And againe He calleth them pictures and images of true things vnseene And if we aske him what that word Symbole or Signe signifieth A Symbole or Signe saith he is a thing sensible taken for something intelligible as bread and wine for the spirituall and diuine foode and refection and the like Yea hereupon he inferreth that because these things are Symboles and Signes they are not therefore the truth it selfe For the image saith he else-where and that from Dennis himselfe too albeit it haue neuer so neere a resemblance yet in substance differeth from that whereof it is a resemblance The thing indeede it selfe saith this Dennis that by an exact image or picture is represented is if we may so say thereby doubled while the truth is shewed in the type and the precedent or principall in the picture or patterne but yet there is for all that a diuersitie of substance in either From this Dennis his owne grounds therefore we may wel reason and conclude thus against the Popish doctrine which they would haue him to vphold No picture is the same in substance with that whose picture it is But the bread and wine in the Eucharist are pictures and images so he tearmeth them of the spirituall foode to wit the body and blood of Christ. They are not therefore the same in substance with it Or as Maximus directeth vs No type is the Truth for it were then no type But these are Types and consequently other then the Truth The second allegation is out of Irenaeus 1. Irenaeus saith he denieth the bread after consecration to be any more accounted common bread but 2. The Eucharist consisting of two things heauenly and earthly that being receiued into our bodies they may be no more corruptible hauing the hope of resurrection These words indeede are found the most of them in Irenaeus but are foulely disioynted and related in other manner then they lye in Irenaeus his context As the bread saith he that is from the earth after diuine inuocation is no more common bread but the Eucharist consisting of two things the one earthly the other heauenly So our bodies receiue the Eucharist are not now corruptible hauing the hope of resurrection 3. Where first He denieth the bread after consecration to be any more common bread as before him Iustin Martyr that they receiued those creatures not as common bread or common drinke And doth not their Cyril as before you heard deny the oyle also after it is consecrate to be any more common oyle Or may we not say truly as the Auncients also oft doe yea dare any Christian man say otherwise but that the water in Baptisme being once consecrated is no more common Water There is nothing then hitherto said by Irenaeus of the bread but what may truly be said of any other consecrated creature since that holy and common in this sense oppose and expell either other Secondly he saith that the Encharist consisteth of two things the one earthly the other heauenly And doe not all Sacraments the
with some shew of allegations 1. Hee telleth vs that Iohn Husse was of their iudgement concerning the Sacrament and alledgeth a sorry Rome to prooue it which whence hee hath I know not nor am able to say what Husse sometime held But sure I am that in the Councell of Constance one of the Articles wherewith he was charged and for which condemned and contrary to the Emperours safeconduct granted him perfidiousâ—â— burnt was the deniall of Transubstantiation as a deuice inuented to delude simple people with and the teaching and maintaining as well publikely as priuately that the substance of bread and materiall bread remained after Consecration in the Sacrament deposed by many that had heard him and that had argued about it with him 2. He citeth a few Fathers some forged as the Author of the Passion of S. Andrew some falsified as that of Iustine Martyr which shall by and by be examined some saying nothing but what wee will willingly yeeld him as both Irenaeus and that also out of the apocryphall Story of S. Andrew which howsoeuer he saith that Bellarmine which is his wonted manner of proofe hath proued to be authenticall Yet neither are his proofes pregnant no iust antiquitie being produced for it and by others of their owne as we shewed before it is confessed to be apocryphall and if we may beleeue Bellarmine himselfe there is some grosse vntruth in it For this vncertaine Author affirmeth that S. Andrew was not nailed with nailes but with cords eyed to the crosse as their counterfeit Abdie also saith that he might liue the longer in paine as he did preaching two daies together as he hung there aliue Whereas if Bellarmine may be beleeued it was not so but he was with nailes fastned as Christ was to the Crosse. But to leaue that as saying nothing that we neede sticke at no more then we doe at ought that out of Irenaeus is alleadged I may not let passe his falsifying of Iustine Martyr whom hauing so little occasion to alledge here he may well seeme for no other end to haue alleadged but to falsifie what he saith of this Sacrament in which kinde he hath the best gift one of them that euer I knew any Iustine Martyr saith he in his 2. Apologie where as far as was fit c. he describeth the whole order of the Sacrifice and distribution of the Sacrament as it is now celebrated by vs telleth Antoninus the Emperour that they did therein eate bread and drinke wine conuerted by the miraculous force of Christs words into his naturall flesh and blood Now heare Justines owne words Hauing spoken before of Baptisme After this saith he is there bread and a cup of water and wine presented to the Prelate of the brethren Who receiuing the same sendeth vp praise and glory to the Father of all by the name of the Sonne and the holy Ghost and at large giueth thankes to him for being vouchsafed to be by him reputed worthy of these things And when he hath ended his prayers and thankes-giuing all the people answer Amen Now when the Prelate hath giuen thankes and all the people haue answered those that we call Deacons giue to each one of those that be present to partake of the blessed Bread and wine and water and they carry of it to those that be not present And this foode is with vs called the Eucharist which none may partake of but those that beleeue haue beene baptised and liue as Christ taught For we receiue not these things as common Bread and Wine but in like maner as Christ our Sauiour being by the word of God incarnate had flesh and blood so haue wee beene taught that the foode blessed by the word of prayer that is from him whereby our blood and flesh by a change are nourished is the flesh and blood of that Iesus Christ incarnate For so in the Gospels haue the Apostles deliuered that Iesus enioyned them hauing taken the bread and giuen thankes to say Doe this in remembrance of me This is my Body And taking the Cup likewise and hauing giuen thankes to say This is my blood and to giue it to such onely Now first tell me I pray you where there is any mention of a Sacrifice in Iustine distinct especially from the Sacrament that this corrupter of all almost that he dealeth with should say Iustine describeth the whole order of the Sacrifice and distribution of the Sacrament True it is that the Fathers tearme the Lords Supper oft a Sacrifice as we also in our Liturgie partly in regard of the spirituall Sacrifice of praise therein offred and partly because it is a liuely representation and commemoration of Christs Sacrifice once offred on the Crosse as their Master of the Sentences himselfe explaineth it and partly also because it succeedeth in the roome of the Passeouer and those other Sacrifices that in the old Testament were offred But that they euer dreamed of any other Sacrifice distinct and diuers from the Sacrament no Papist shall euer be able to prooue Nor either out of our Sauiours words or Iustines report can be gathered 2. Obserue how iustly Iustine describeth the whole order of this Sacrifice and distribution of the Sacrament as it is celebrated by them Yea marke and iudge I pray you whether his description of it come neerer vnto ours or vnto theirs 1. Where are all those crossings and bendings and â—ringes and turnings and eleuations and adorations and mimicke gestures and apish sooleries that their Masse-bookes enioyne 2. As well the cup as the bread is giuen to all present which Iustine also saith that Christ enioyned them to giue and which Pope Gelasius saith cannot be seuered from the Bread without great Sacriledge Whereas with them the people may not meddle at all with it How many toyes are there in theirs that are not touched at all in Iustine And againe what is there in Iustines relation that is not found in our Protestanticall as he tearmeth it communion that sending of it home ordinarily onely excepted which neither they themselues vse ordinarily when they celebrate and the danger of repaire hindring accesse it seemeth then occasioned 3. Where doth Iustine say as this corrupt corrupter reporteth him that they eate bread and drinke wine conuerted by the miraculous force of Christs words into his naturall flesh and blood No one word in him of a miraculous conuersion nor of their being the naturall flesh and blood of Christ. There is mention indeede of a change and that a naturall change not of the creatures into Christs naturall flesh and blood but of the blessed foode Or the foode made the Eucharist as Bellarmine translateth it into our flesh Which words though Bellarmine would faine wrest awry because they wring him yet no Grammer will admit any other sense of them From whence it is apparent that the blessed foode that Iustine speaketh of is not really but
symbolically and figuratiuely Christs body For there can nothing be deuised more absurd saith Bellarmine then that the Substance of our bodies should be nourished with Christs flesh But our flesh and blood and that I hope is the substance of our Bodies as Irenaeus also expressely speaketh are nourished saith Iustine by the blessed foode or by the Bread and Wine made the Eucharist and that by a change of the things receiued The blessed foode therefore that Iustine speaketh of is not really Christs naturall Body as this mis-reporter and mis-expounder of him affirmeth NEither can euer the Minister prooue his ensuing Assertion that Christs corporall presence in the thing eaten must necessarily inferre and enforce a corporall and carnall manner of eating him vnlesse his bodie had therein a corporall extensiue and sensible manner of existing which is by no Catholike Author affirmed and so no hainous and vnseemely thing is in such a manner of receiuing Christs body committed For auoiding whereof we should be enforced to runne to a figuratiue interpretation of our Sauiours speeches Ioh. 6. So as to exclude the reall receiuing of our Sauiours flesh and blood in the Sacrament as out of an obscure place of S. Austin cited by him page 7. and fully answered by Cardinall Bellarmine hee falsely gathereth the place proouing no more but that our Sauiours speech concerning the eating of his flesh and drinking of his blood is figuratiue so farre forth as that his flesh was not carnally to be eaten but after a Sacramentall and inuisible manner as the signes of bread and wine doe containe them the chiefe end of his being so receiued by vs being indeed to communicate with Christs passion and profitably to lay vp in our memories that his flesh was wounded for vs as S. Austin in that place affirmeth Whose plaine places for the reall receiuing of our Sauiours body and blood in the Sacrament my superficiall Aduersarie taketh no notice of but as Eeles loue rather to hide themselues in durt then to swim in cleere waters so are hee and his companions glad to hide themselues and their hereticall nouelties in darke and obscure places of the holy Fathers not regarding their pregnant and plaine testimonies for vs and against them vnanswerably in other places expressed § 3. AT length he pleaseth to recollect himselfe and returne to the matter in hand Christs corporall presence saith he in the thing eaten doth not necessarily inferre and enforce a corporall and carnall manner of eating him vnlesse his body had therein a corporall extensiue and sensible manner of existing To passe by these mysticall and metaphysicall tearmes wherewith he and his Associates are wont to enwrap and inuolue themselues like Eeles in mire and mud as himselfe speaketh that their absurd and senselesse doctrines or dotages rather may not be discerned nor to insist vpon the implication of contradiction when he saith that Christs body is corporally that is bodily present in the Eucharist and yet hath there no corporall that is bodily existence a bodie bodily present and yet not bodily existing like the Marcionites riddles in Tertullian A man no man Flesh no flesh a body no body blood no blood or A body but not as a body with blood but not as blood in a place but not as in a place with qualities but not qualitatiuely with quantitie but not quantitatiuely Such strange fancies and prodigies are these mens braines possest with 1. If the one doe not follow vpon the other Pope Nicholas was much to blame when he inferred thereupon that Christs very body was sensually that is as much if not more then corporally chewed and eaten in the Eucharist 2. If it be true that Bellarmine telleth vs that by the Eucharist Christ remaineth carnally in vs which he citeth also but with a foule hand and some of his owne words foisted in as a saying of S. Hilaries then sure he must needs carnally be eaten of vs. And to see how inconstant error is and how contrary to it selfe one while he saith that there is a corporall eating of Christs body in the Sacrament as their common tenent is and how is he not then corporaelly eaten and that Christ carnally thereby abideth in vs And yet againe another while out of Athanasius that the eating of Christs body is not carnally to be taken nor is in a carnall manner to be vnderstood In a word 1. Either Bread or Christs body must needs be corporally eaten in the Eucharist but not bread if we beleeue them for there is none there and to say that meere accidents onely are chewed and fed vpon is most senselesse and absurd It remaineth therefore that Christs body if that alone be there be corporally eaten there as Pope Nicholas before affirmed 2. Either Christs flesh is eaten there corporally or spiritually onely If corporally why doth this fellow sticke at it and is so loath to acknowledge it If spiritually onely why vrge they those passages of Iohn 6. to prooue 〈…〉 corporall and bodily manducation of Christs body in the Eucharist And so come we to examine that place by them so much and so oft vrged to prooue such a carnall eating of Christ. § 4. Here this profound and learned Doctor telleth vs that his superficiall Aduersarie hath in an vnlearned and slender manner endeauoured to prooue that our Sauiours discourse there is not to be vnderstood of Sacramentall Manducation but of spirituall eating his flesh and blood by beleeuing in him I propound two Propositions to be prooued 1. That the words are not to be vnderstood of any such corporall eating and drinking as they hold 2. That Christ doth not in that whole discourse speake of the Sacrament of the Eucharist which was not as yet instituted but of such spirituall feeding on Christ as is performed not in the Sacrament onely but out of it also The former I prooue by a plaine place of S. Augustine which this Aduersarie referring vs still for an answer to Bellarmine from whom he borroweth the most that he hath saith is an obscure place and is pleased a little after to tearme it no better then durt which wee Protestants like Eeles desire to hide our selues in 1. Were it not an absurd thing for Augustine to speake â—bscurely there where he giueth rules for the opening and right vnderstanding of places obscure where should he speake more plainely and perspicuously then there where his maine aime is to make things cleere 2. This shifters answer borrowed from Bellarmine is but a bare shift to wit that the place prooueth no more but that our Sauiours speech concerning the eating of his flesh and drinking of his blood is figuratiue so far forth as that his flesh was not carnally to be eaten and in a bloody manner as flesh sold in the shambles is wont to be eaten c. As if flesh bought in the shambles vsed to be eaten raw and in bloody manner Here
sticke to contemne them Had he any wit in his adle braine he would neuer haue asked this idle Question It is as if in a Law-suite because a man taketh hold as he may well doe of somewhat that falleth from his Aduersaries or is granted him and confessed by them because it furthereth his owne cause he were therefore bound to beleeue or admit all that euer they say to the preiudice of his right The greater differences are betweene them and vs yea in the present controuersie concerning the manner of Christs presence in the Sacrament the lesse cause there is to suspect that they should speake partially for vs and the greater cause to suppose they were by euidence of truth enforced to confesse that that should take away some of those grounds whereby the cause that themselues stiffely maintained is ordinarily vpheld 3. He addeth in the end These men herein without hereticall intention or obstinâ—cie of iudgement differed from vs. Whom he meaneth by that Vs I leaue to himselfe to explaine And the lesse hereticall their intention was as he vnderstandeth hereticall the lesse suspition there is of collusion or any purpose therein to gratifie vs and so much the stronger therefore is their testimonie for vs. The testimonie of a meere stranger or no well-willer to the cause maketh it to be of more moment But when he speaketh of obstinacie of iudgement he glaunceth at a secret in their Church which I shall in a word or two take occasion hereby to discouer It is no matter what a man hold or maintaine among them so long as he acknowledgeth the Popes Supremacie the maine pillar of their faith and submit himselfe and his workes wholly to his censure and so be ready to vnsay what he saith when he will haue him so to doe For his censure indeede alone is that which they call commonly the censure of the Church And to this purpose they confesse that many of their writers haue held the very same points for which they condemne vs now as Heretikes of whom yet they say that they were not Heretikes because they submitted themselues to this Censure I will adde an instance or two hereof out of Bellarmine 1. In this very particular he confesseth that many of the Authors before mentioned expound that 6. Chap. of Iohn as the Heretikes doe but they submit themselues saith he and their writings to the Censure of the Councels and Popes which the Heretikes doe not 2. In the present controuersie Durandus held not a Transubstantiation but a transformation in the Sacrament which opinion saith he is hereticall and yet was hee no Heretike because he was ready to yeeld to the iudgement of the Church 3. Ambrose Catharines opinion of the Ministers intention in the Sacrament differeth not saith he for ought I see from the opinion of Chemnicius and other Heretikes saue that he in the end of his booke submitteth himselfe to the Apostolike Sea and Councel 4. Durandus in the point concerning merite of workes held as we now doe that no reward was due to them but out of Gods meere liberalitie and that it were temerarious and blasphemous to say that God were vniust if he should not so reward them And yet was he also no Heretike for the cause before-mentioned And thus are we at length arriued after much winding to and fro while wee follow a shifting wind at the end of the former part of my Discourse wherein hath beene shewed beside other Arguments confirming the same by the confession of their owne Authors that those places of Scripture doe not enforce any such corporall presence of Christ in the Sacrament as Papists maintaine which they commonly produce to prooue it Diuision 7. PAg. 9. My Aduersarie becommeth a more formall Disputant then before and against our Doctrines of Transubstantiation and reall presence of our Sauiour in the Sacrament ignorantly by him in many places confounded he frameth this wise Argument Looke what our Sauiour tooke that he blessed what he blessed that he brake what he brake that he deliuered to his Disciples what he deliuered of that he said This is my Body But it was bread that he tooke And bread therefore that he blessed bread that hee brake and bread that he deliuered and bread consequently of which he said This is my Body Which is a formelâ—sse and fallacious kinde of arguing wholly forcelesse if we suppose the former doctrine of the holy Fathers to be true that Christs words haue force now as then they had when himselfe vttred them to change the substance of Bread and Wine into his Body and Blood As if after the like manner of the water conuerted by Christ into wine I should make this deduction The Ministers drew water out of the well carried what they drew therefore that which they drew and carried was water If the Minister shall tell me that they drew water but carried it made wine by our Sauiours omnipotent operation so I will tell him that Christ tooke bread and wine and conuerted them by his miraculous and omnipotent benediction into his owne bodie and blood before he distributed them as he by his plaine words pronounced of them saying This is my Body c. HItherto if you will beleeue this worthy Doctor his Aduersarie hath disputed without forme or figure that you may not maruaile why his Answer is so diffused deformed and mis-figured for the fault it seemeth was in his Aduersaries mishapen Syllogismes which made him also so loath to meddle with any of them Here he confesseth he becommeth a more formall Dissutant and I hope therefore we shall finde him a more formall Defendant Yet ere he come to my first Argument he must needs haue a fling at me for confounding their doctrine of Transsubstantiation and the reall presence corporall hee should haue said for more perspicuitie for so I speake ignorantly the one with the other I perceiue well what his drift herein is to make some beleeue that howsoeuer Transubstantiation was not generally held till of late times yet a reall that is a corporall presence was euer acknowledged But if we will beleeue Bellarmine Aquinas and the Councel of Trent the one of them is euery iot as ancient as the other yea the one cannot possibly bee without the other This the Councel of Trent telleth vs was alwaies the faith of the Church that by the consecration of Bread and Wine the whole Substance of the Bread was turned into the Substance of Christs body and the whole Substance of wine into his Blood And A body saith Aquinas cannot be where it was not before but either by locall motion or by the conuersion of some other thing into it But it is manifest that Christs bodie beginneth not to bee in the Sacrament by any locall motion And therefore it must needs come there by the conuersion of the bread into it Yea by locall motion it cannot be there nor by any meanes but
by this And Bellarm. cleane contrary to himselfe else-where It cannot be that the words of Christ should be true but by such a conversion and transmutation as the Catholike Church calleth Transubstantiation It is no matter of ignorance therefore in this Controversie to confound those things which those we deale with conioyne yea which they tell vs cannot be dis-ioyned To ouerthrow this their opinion then of Transubstantiation and Christs corporall presence in the Eucharist I first reason from the Context Christ tooke bread and blessed it and gaue it and said This is my body Whence I thus argued What Christ tooke hee blessed what he blessed he brake what he brake he deliuered what he deliuered of that he said This is my body But it was bread that hee tooke blessed brake and deliuered It is bread saith Durant a Popish writer that all those verbes are referred to It was bread therefore of which he said This is my body Now this saith mine Adversarie forgetting it seemeth what he had said but euen now that heere I began to dispute formally is a formlesse fallacious and wholly forcelesse kinde of arguing if we suppose with the holy Fathers who belike held Transubstantiation then as well as a reall and corporall presence if this worthy man vpon his bare word may bee beleeued that the substances of bread and wine were by the force of Christs wordes turned into Christs body and blood That is as if hee should say this Argument is of no force at all if the point in Question be granted or if that be yeelded that is not at all in the Text. Yea but this is as if a man should make the like deduction of the water that Christ turned into wine The Ministers drew water out of the well carried what they drew Therefore that which they drew and carried was water How formall a Disputant soeuer this mans Adversary is sure I am hee disputeth neither in forme nor figure But let vs helpe him a little to bring his Argument into forme and then hee shall haue an Answer Thus it seemeth he would argue if he could hit on it What the Ministers drew out of the well they caried But they drew water Therefore they carried water And now I deny his Proposition The Ministers carried not that that they drew They drew water they carried not water but wine And for his addition hereunto that Christ after hee tooke the bread and wine and before hee distributed them by his miraculous and omnipotent benediction converted them into his owne body and blood as hee sheweth by his wordes plainely pronounced of them This is my body Though it be nothing to the Argument and a meere begging of the point in Question yet let vs consider a little of it where in the Text hee findeth that Christ thus converted them for the wordes This is my body as was formerly shewed doe not euince it But he findeth it it seemeth in the benediction or the blessing of the bread which is yet against the common conceite of his Associates that say there was no conversion at all till Christ vttered those words This is my body Heare we Bellarmine a little arguing this point against Luther Hauing acknowledged as was said formerly that Christs words This is my body may beare either the sence that wee giue them or the sense that they giue them but not that sense that the Lutherans giue For saith hee the Lord tooke bread and blessed it and gaue it his Disciples saying This is my body Bread therefore he tooke bread hee blessed and of bread of he said This is my body Either therefore Christ by blessing changed the bread into his body truely and properly or he changed it improperly and figuratiuely by adding signification or as Theodoret rather by adding to nature that grace which before it had not If hee changed it truely and properly then gaue he bread changed and of that bread so changed he truely said This is my body that is that which is contained vnder the shape of bread is no more bread but my body and this we say If it be said that he changed the bread figuratiuely then shall there be that bread given the Apostles that is siguratiuely Christs body and those words This is my body haue this sense This is the figure of my body and so the Protestants hold Yea so indeede as you haue heard before did Augustine in precise tearmes after Tertullian expound them who belike then by Bellarmines ground was in this point a Protestant Now let either Bellarmine or this Answerer prooue that our Sauiour by his blessing wrought any other conuersion and wee will yeeld vnto them But they will as soone proue that Christ turned the children that hee blessed into bread as that he turned the bread by blessing it into his naturall bodie Yea runne ouer all the whole Chapter in Bellarmine wherein hee propoundeth to himselfe to proue Transubstantiation out of Gods word in the entrance whereunto hee confesseth that the words of Christ may be taken as well our way as their way but not Luthers way and you shall finde that there is neuer a word in it much lesse any sound proofe either to prooue that Christs wordes are so to be vnderstood as they say or that they are not to bee vnderstood as we say but it is wholly spent in confuting of Luthers opinion to wit that bread remaineth together with Christs body in the Sacrament Which opinion also themselues confesse that Luther admonished by Melancthon renounced before he died Hee beginneth with a first Argument without any second the summe and substance whereof was before related Either his second he saw was vnsound and it seemed best therefore to suppresse and conceale it or else he wanted a second and thought to let the first though without a fellow stand still as first by the rule of the Ciuilians who say That is first that hath none before it though no other come after it or that is first that hath none before it that is last that hath none after it And so is this Bellarmines both first and last Argument there And in Conclusion he is faine to flie to the Councels and pretended Fachers Though there were some ambiguity saith hee in our Sauiour Christs words yet it is taken away by Councels what Councels think we Surely none but such as themselues held within these 300. yeeres as himself afterward sheweth and the consent of Fathers which remaineth yet to be shewed As for the benediction the best nay the sole Argument whereby hee can prooue such 〈…〉 conuersion wrought there is this Christ is not wont to giue thankes but when hee is about to worke some great and maruelous thing For he is read onely to haue given thankes when hee would multiply the fiue loaues and againe when the seuen and when hee was to raise Lazarus from the
reason is â—idiculous The accidents remaining retaine still their old names therefore the substance that is gone retaineth it owne name still or the colour savour shape and sise retaine their old names and that which is in the Eucharist what euer it be is said still to be white round thin well tasted c. and that with good reason since it is so still as it was therefore though it be no more bread now yet is it said to be so still Sure reason and this mans braine were farre asunder when he writ this 3. He addeth that the Apostle when hee calleth it bread for so I suppose he would say and not when he speaketh of the accidents of bread onely speaketh with such articles superadded as may note the singular and divine excellency of it This bread and so This Chalice and The bread which we breake and requireth men to examine themselues before they come there least they sinne in not distinguishing it from other common bread c. And that the ancient Fathers shew what an horrible sinne it is to come vnreuerently to it c. because they presume to eate that bread wherein the Son of God himselfe is contained And is not this a most silly Argument to prooue that that hee should prooue vnlesse you take in withall his ly at the last where he saith that the Sonne of God himselfe is contained in the bread which hee falsely also fathereth vpon those Fathers as would haue appeared had hee cited their wordes and which being the point in Question had it beene propounded as it should haue beene vnlesse you grant him hee sticketh fast still and cannot goe forward For may not a man say as much of Baptisme that the holy Ghost speaks of it with such elogies superadded as may note the singular diuine excellency of it that those therefore that are of yeeres ought with great care to addresse and prepare themselues vnto it when they are to be baptised and that those that distinguish it not from ordinary water or vse it irreuerently commit an hainous sinne euen against Christ himselfe And yet who euer dreamed therefore of any such Transubstantiation in Baptisme yea the very same Authours here produced by him so plentifully though by their bare names onely out of Bellarmine in a point for the generall not at all denied to wit the hainousnesse of their sinne that abuse this Sacrament yet distinguish expressely some of them as in mine allegations I haue noted betweene the bread of the Lord as the Apostle tearmeth it and the Bread the Lord of which our Sauiour in the Gospel betweene the body that was on the Crosse and the bread that is on the bord Which he taketh no notice of 4. And yet neither is it true that so confidently here he affirmeth that all those Fathers in all those places yea or that any one of them in any one of those places that he quoteth nor as I verily beleeue in any place of their writings else-where doe as he saith expressely and purposely teach that the sinne of vnworthy receiuers is equall for the hainousnesse of it with the sinne of those that betraied and killed Christ. Which no sober Diuine will say nor can it be iustified vnlesse the Stoicall paritie of sinnes charged vpon Iouinian by some how truly I know not vpon vs by some of their side falsely I am sure Bellarmine himselfe therein acquitting vs be in Theologie admitted Bellarmine indeede in the Chapter whence he tooke all these quotations as he found them there mustered together hath somewhat out of Oecumenius that may seeme to looke that way He compareth vnworthy communicants saith he with those that killed Christ which this man hauing strained more then an inch further ascribeth vnaduisedly and vntruly to them all Whereas onely Basil if those ascetica at least be his and Chrysostome who is wont to presse farre in reproouing of sinne the one of them willeth vs to repaire holily to Gods bord least we incurre the iudgement of them that killed Christ the other of them in one of the places there quoted saith that as those that defile the princes robe are punished in like manner as those also that rend it so it is u not vnlikely or vnequal that those that with an vnholy heart receiue the Lords body vndergoe the same punishment with those that tore it with nailes that is that the one be damned for so doing as well as the other which may well be albeit their sinnes be not equall The rest of them to wit Origen Hierome and Augustine haue not any one word at all in any of all those places of the sinne of those that killed Christ yea the places well weighed vtterly ouerthrow the ground of that Argument which from the words of the Apostle and their application of it they would frame to prooue a reall and essentiall presence of Christs naturall body and blood in the Eucharist because such vnworthy receiuers are said to be guilty of wronging Christs body and blood and thereby to acquire iudgemenâ— or condemnation to themselues For beside that in the one place Augustine saith nothing but this that the Sacrament of Baptisme as well as that other of the Eucharist is a true Sacrament euen to those that vse it otherwise then they ought which is nothing at all to that for which here it is alleadged In the other place he saith nothing of the Eucharist but what he saith also both of the Word of God or the Law and Baptisme expressely in the same place to wit that euen holy and diuine things hurt those that vse them otherwise then they ought Yea Hierome goeth further in the place alleadged and applieth what he speaketh not to the Sacraments onely of the New Testament but to the Sacrifices also which were Sacraments too of the old For commenting on those words Wherein doe we pollute thee When the Sacraments saith he are violated he is violated whose Sacraments they are And that is all he saith there Now were not the Sacrifices and the Sacraments of the old Testament as the l Paschall Lambe at least Sacraments of Christ yea and of his body and blood too If they were as no doubt can be but they were then by Hieromes Rule was Christ and his body and blood wronged in them when any wrong was done to them albeit it were not essentially or corporally present in them nor doth such wrong therefore or guilt acquired by euill vsage of the Eucharist imply any such corporall presence thereof in it 5. Let me adde onely that this Defendant telleth vs â—hat the Sonne of God is contained in that bread that is eaten â—n the Eucharist and yet by their doctrine there is no bread at all there How is he in bread where no bread is Or how is there no bread there where in bread
the Sonne of God is as he telleth vs conteined What is this but that which Bellarmine condemneth in the Lutherans to forge vs a Christ impanated or enclosed in bread Nor doth their owne doctrine any whit mend the matter For as Bellarmine saith of Rupert us and some others that they make Christ haue a breaden body so may wee as truly say the same of them For what is a body made of bread but a breaden Body But that you see this Doctor here swarueth from and saith that Christs body is but couched in Bread ANd I maruaile not to finde this Minister to corrupt the sayings of the holy Fathers to his hereticall purpose sithence he maketh Bellarmine himselfe page 10. to speake like a Protestant and seeme to say against his owne expresse doctrine that the bread blessed and consecrated on the Altar is not nor cannot be called Christs body Whereas Bellarmine onely disputeth against Luther teaching naturall bread to remaine still in the Sacrament and making the sense of Christs words This is my body to be the same as if he had said This bread is my body saith this and no more that Naturall bread cannot be otherwise then figuratiuely and significantly affirmed to be Christs body Speaking not at all of bread consecrated and by consecration conuerted into the true body of Christ yet still retaining the name of bread for the Accidents of bread still remaining as this false fellow would haue frequently citing Authors which he vnderstandeth not § 2. ANd here againe as one running the wild goose race he windeth backe to a passage in the former Argument and saith he marueileth not to finde me corrupt the sayings of the Fathers he thought sure euery one would beleeue whatsoeuer he said though he neuer assaied to shew it since I make Bellarmine himselfe speake like a Protestant No I make him speake nothing but what hee saith of himselfe and by his owne graunts prooue that either the auncient Fathers spake very absurdly or else they ment as we meane The Argument is this The ancients Fathers say oft that the Bread in the Eucharist is Christs body But this saying saith Bellarmine This bread is my body must either be taken figuratiuely or else it is absurd and impossible The Fathers therfore when they vsed such speeches shewed euidently thereby that they ment as we meane that is they vnderstood Christs words figuratiuely or else by Bellarmines confession they spake very absurdly Nor is it enough to prooue that I corrupt Bellarmine to say that he disputeth in that place against Luther who taught that bread remained still in the Sacrament For what is that to the purpose much lesse to say vntruly that he spake not of bread consecrated when the very Question is there concerning the consecrated bread But I cite Authors he saith that I vnderstand not It is true indeede In this very place I cite some sayings of Bellarmine that neither I nor any such dull-heads as I am I thinke can easily vnderstand as for example where he saith as I here cite him that The Priest maketh Christs body of bread and yet Christs body is not made by the Priest And againe that the body of Christ that was crucified was truly or verily made of Bread And yet confuting Rupertus he saith else-where that it was not a breaden body that was crucified for vs as Tertullian inferred from the doctrine of the Marciâ—nites and as we may well inferre from theirs He waiueth else-where Metaphysicall subtilties in disputing of this Sacrament And taxeth Caluine for his fond and foolish Metaphysicks But these are such transcendent subtilties if not absurdities as any Metaphysicks will afford And this deepe Metaphysicall Doctor that hath no want of wit and vnderstandeth him so well should haue done well to vnfold to vs these mysteries and arreade vs these riddles whereas he very vncharitably passeth them by and onely controlling vs for our ignorance leaueth vs sticking still in the bryers with them not vouchsafing to helpe vs out PAg. 12. He affirmeth it to be most absurd to affirme as we doe that a thing is made of that in the roome whereof it onely succeedeth or is turned into that which succeedeth onely in the roome thereof Whereas in euery substantiall conuersion one substance is destroied and another succeedeth in the place thereof by the same action as where wood is conuerted into fire c. The difference betwixt Transsubstantiation in the Sacrament and other substantiall naturall conuersions chiefely consisting in this that the whole substance of bread passeth into another praeexisting substance Christs body to wit introduced in place thereof so as nothing thereof remaineth whereas in them the same matter albeit receiuing a new forme and so made a distinct substance from what it was before still remaineth which is to the Ministers purpose wholly impertinent vnlesse hee will falsely and foolishly withall affirme that God can destroy no substance intirely leauing the Accidents thereof still remaining to introduce an other substance in place thereof And albeit we cannot say of Christs body that it was bread which is another Argument of the Minister ibidem yet may it be said to haue beene of bread as being by the same miraculous and omnipotent power of Christs words whereby bread looseth naturall being in place thereof Sacramentally produced and made present And this is without any difficultie affirmed by vs who know the same in a propertionable manner to be found in all other substantiall and accident all conuersions howsoeuer his poore Iudgement will not serue to consider it heate for example was neuer cold albeit in place thereof produced fire was neuer wood but as a substance as naturall vnderstanding might teach him essentially different and produced by the others destruction § 3. AFter he hath thus recoiled back a little now he beginneth to make againe forward And 1. wheras they not knowing wel how to salu or shift of such absurdities as follow necessarily vpon this their senselesse conceit of the conuersion of bread into Christs body affirme that Christs body is therefore said to be made of bread and the bread said to be turned into Christs body because the bread ceasing to be there Christs body as they say doth onely come in the roome of it For they dare not say that Christs body is produced of it or that the Substance of the bread is that whereof as the materiall cause Christs body is framed as ashes are made of wood or glasse of some ashes And I thereupon reply that it is absurd to say that a thing is made of that in the roome whereof it onely succeedeth or is turned into that that succeedeth onely in the roome thereof That which Suarez himself also confesseth to be rather a translocation then a transubstantiatioÌ„ or a true substantiall conuersion He telleth me that if my poore iudgement would serue to consider it such a succession is
but hee addeth withall that our faith informeth vs that the bread is Christs body Yea but saith Bellarmine that sentence is most absurd and impossible if it be not meant figuratiuely In which manner Augustine as before was shewed expoundeth himselfe else-where 2. Doe the Fathers tell vs that in this holy Mystery we must not so much regard what our sense informeth vs as what our faith apprehendeth And doe they not say the same of Baptisme and of all mysteries or Sacraments in general Heare we one or two of them speake for all The Fathers of the Nicene Councell whom before he alleaged Our Baptisme say they must not with bodily eyes be considered but with spirituall Seest thou water vnderstand the power of God hidden in it conceiue it full of the holy Ghost and diuine fire And then wil they the same regard to be had also at the Lords Table That Ambrose that this Author and his Associates so oft cite as making so much for them You are come saith hee to the Font consider what you there saw consider what you said c. You saw the Font you saw water c. you saw all that you could see with your bodily eyes and humane aspect You saw not those things that worke and are not seene The Apostle hath taught vs that wee are to behold not the things that are seene but the things that are not seene For farre greater are the things that are not seene then those that are seene Beleeue not thy bodily eyes alone That is better seene that is not seene So Gregory Nyssene Both the spirit and water concurre in Baptisme And as man consisteth of two parts so are there medicines of like like appointed for either for the bodie water that appeareth and is subiect to sense for the soule the spirit that cannot bee seene nor doth appeare but is called by faith and commeth in an ineffable manner Yet the water that is vsed in Baptisme addeth a blessing to the Body baptised Wherefore doe not contemne the divine Laver neither make little account of it as common because of the water that is vsed in it For it is a greater matter that it worketh and marueilous effects proceed from it And a little after of the Eucharist y The bread also is at first common bread but when the Mystery hath sanctified it it is called Christs body And in like manner the wine though it be a thing of small price before the blessing yet after the sanctification which proceedeth from the Spirit both of them worke excellently And so in many other things if you regard it you shall see the things that appeare to be contemptible but the things wrought by them to be great and admirable And so Chrysostome speaking of those wordes of our Sauiour The wordes I speake are spirit and life To vnderstand saith hee things carnally is to consider the things simply as they are spoken and no otherwise Where as all mysteries and then not the Eucharist onely are to bee iudged not by the externall things that are visible but are to be considered with the inward eyes that is spiritually And in particular of Baptisme else-where The Gospell is called a mystery because we beleeue not in it what we see but wee see somethings and beleeue other things For that is the nature of our mysteries which my selfe therefore and an Infidell are diversly affected with c. Hee when hee heareth of a Laver thinketh it but bare water but I consider not the thing seene simply but the purging of the soule by the Spirit c. For I iudge not the things that appeare by my bodily sight but with the eyes of my minde Againe I heare Christs body I vnderstand the thing spoken one way and the Infidell another And as children or vnlettered persons when they looke on bookes know not the power of the letter nor know what they see but a skilfull man can finde matter in those letters contained liues or stories and the like c. So it is in this mystery the Infidels though hearing seeme not to heare but the faithfull hauing spirituall skill see the force of the things therein contained Nothing then in this kinde is said of the Eucharist but what is said of all Sacraments and of Baptisme by name Nothing therefore that argueth any miraculous change more in the one then in the other Nor doth it follow that we would haue men to beleeue nothing but what they see because we refuse to beleeue that that we see is not so We may not saith Tertullian call in question our senses lest in so doing we detract credit from Christ himselfe as if he might be mistaken when hee sawe Sathan fall downe or heard his Fathers voyce from heauen or mistooke the smell of the oyntment that was poured vpon him or the tast of the wine that he consecrated for a memoriall of his blood Neither was nature deluded in the Apostles Faithfull was their sight and their hearing on the mount Faithfull was their taste of the wine that had beene water Faithfull was the touch of incredulous Thomas And yet as Augustine well obserueth Thomas saw one thing and beleeued another thing Hee saw Christ the man and beleeued him to bee God Hee beleeued with his minde that which hee saw not by that which appeared to his bodily senses And when we are said to beleeue our eyes saith hee by those things that wee doe see wee are induced to beleeue those things that we doe not see In a word Rehearse mee saith Tertullian Iohns testimony That which we haue heard and seene with our eyes and felt with our hands that declare we vnto you A false testimony saith he an vncertaine at least if the nature of our senses in our eyes eares and hands be such But these men would haue vs as the sonnes of Eliah speake to thrust out our eyes and as the Iewish Rabbines say abusing a place of Scripture to that purpose that a man must beleeue the High Priest in all things yea though hee shall tell him that his left hand is his right and his right hand the left so they would haue vs to beleeue whatsoeuer the Pope or they say though they tell vs that that both our sight and sense informeth vs to be most false § 5. But to make good in part yet his former glorious flourish hee citeth a place of Hilarie where hee affirmeth that concerning the veritie of Christ in vs not speaking as hee here saith specially of the Eucharist but of our vnion and coniunction with him in generall vnlesse we speake as Christ hath taught vs wee speake foolishly and impiously that there is no place left to doubt of the verity of Christs body and blood that the Sacraments being receiued cause that Christ is in vs and we in him Now
once And is it not as impossible then for one to bee in two places at once And it is impossible that one single effect should haue diuerse totall causes and impossible therefore that one and the same accident should bee in diuerse subiects And why not as impossible for one subiect to haue diverse accidents as diuerse seates sites qualities and quantities at once which Christsbody must needs haue iâ— it bee with vs in the Eucharist It is impossible saith Durand that one and the same thing should mooue two contrary wayes at once And It is impossible saith Aquinas that the same body should by locall motion arriue in diuerse seuerall places at once And It is impossible that one and the selfe same thing should both rest and stirre at once And yet should Christs body if it were in the Host or if it were the very Host rather doe all this when at the same time it both resteth in the Pyx in one place and goeth in Procession in another place and is in diuerse processions or on sundry seuerall occasions carried contrary wayes to seuerall persons and places at the same instant No more therefore doe we curb or restraine Gods â—mnipâ—tency when we deny that a body can bee by any meanes in two distant places at once then they doe when they deny a possibility of the things before spoken And for the reason of our denyall let them heare be side Durands Aquinas his confession For one body saith hee to bee locally in two places at once it implieth a contradiction and therefore cannot a body be in two places at once no not by miracle neither For those things that imply contradiction God cannot do God therefore cannot make a body to bee locally in two places at once The very selfe same saith Aegidius too and Amolynus on him that although a thousand miracles were wrought nothing could bee effected that implyeth a contradiction as this doth CErtainely the holy Fathers doubted not to affirme that Christ left his body here on earth and yet assumed with him the same bodie into heauen hee held his body in his owne hands at his last Supper and distributed it severally to his Apostles as hath beene already out of S. Chrysostome S. Augustine and other holy Fathers formerly by me alleâ—dged Insomuch as Melancthon one of the maine pillars of Protestant Religion vnderstood the opinion of the holy Fathers so well in this point and attributed so much withall to Gods omnipotency as hee writeth thus of this very Argument I had rather offer my selfe to death then to affirme as Zwinglians doe that Christs body cannot bee but in one place at once And S. Augustine as Bellarmine prooueth was so farre from denying this to the bodie of Christ as he doubted whether the holy Martyrs may not be at the selfe same time in severall Churches and Memories erected of them albeit naturally no spirit nor body can bee more then in one place or remaine without some certaine place of beeing which latter is in the places ciced by this Minister out of him onely affirmed And if a perfect substance or nature as was the humanity of Christ could want the naturall personality and subsistence thereof supplyed by the divine person and hypostasis of the Sonne of God as our Christian faith teacheth vs why cannot in like manner by Gods omnipotency the accidents of bread and wine remaine without actuall inhering and being in their naturall subiect His other Arguments page 15. are drops of an afterstorme and obiections gathered out of S. Augustine which doe onely prooue that Christ is not visibly but in heauen not denying his sacramentall beeing in many places as this Minister would haue him And surely our Saviour himselfe in the 6. Chapter of S. Iohn verse 61. solueth this very obiection as S. Chrysostome vnderstandeth him when perceiving that his Disciples murmared at his promise of giuing his flesh for meate c. he said to them Doth this scandalize you If then you shall see the Sonne of Man ascending where he was before c. As if hee had said Are you scandalised that I said being now present with you I will giue my flesh for food what then will you doe or how farre will you be from beleeuing that I canso giue you my flesh when I â—…ll ascend to heauen and be absent so sarre from you § 2. THe places of the Fathers here pointed at were before answered where by him they were aâ— large alledged And howsoeuer Augustine spake modestly after his manner of a difficult Question not daring peremptorily to determine by what meanes that was effected that by diuers other meanes might be yet in his bookes against Faâ—stus the Manichie hee saith expressely and peremptorily that Christ in regard of his bodily presence could not bee at once in the Sunne and in the Moone and vpon the Crosse also as they absurdly imagined and maintained that he was And againe in his Comment aries on the Gospell of S. Iohn not as Bellarmine corruptly citeth him as hee doth also many others that Christs body in which he rose againe M AY be but as Peter Lombard and other of their owne Authors acknowledge him to say that it MVST be in one place howsoeuer his verity that is his Deitie be every where Yea discusing the question at large in one of his Epistles and hauing concluded the Negatiue hee saith that they take away the truth of his body that maintaine it to be in many places at once Whereas though immortality bee conferred on it yet nature is not taken from it To which purpose hee disputeth much of the nature of a true body and deliuereth those things which I presse out of him all which together with the testimonies of other of the Ancients this superficiall Answerer passeth ouer with sad silence onely boldly and bâ—asen facedly auouching that all that is alleadged out of Augustine prooueth nothing but this that Christ is not visibly but in Heauen Did hee thinke that his Reader would not cast an eye on them whem they were verbatim set downe before him § 3. Yea but our Saviour himselfe he saith solveth this Obiection Iohn 6. 61. as Chrysostome vnderstandeth him when hee saith Doth this scandalize you What if you shall see the Sonne of Man ascending where hee was before c as if hee had said Are you scandalized because I said being now present with you I will giue my flesh for food What then will you doe or how farre will you be from beleeuing that I can so giue you my flesh when I shall ascend to heauen and be so farre aboue from you 1. Where Chrysostome thus expoundeth the place I know not Vpon the place I am sure he hath nothing but this that Christ by these wordes did intimate to them his Deitie Yea so Iansenius also saith that Chrysostome vnderstandeth these words
vnto to be theirs 4. I say indeed that Christ is as truely present in the Word which he slyly passeth by and maketh not a word of and in Baptisme as in the Eucharist and wee receiue him as really and as effectually in the one as in the other Nor doth hee answer one word to the allegations of the Fathers to that purpose produced To which may be added that of Tertullian which shall hereafter be recited And this of Augustine which he saith of Mary that shee did eate him whom shee heard and prooueth what he saith by that place of Iohn I am the living bread which whosoeuer eateth shall liue for euer As that also of Ambrose He eateth that bread that observeth Gods word And further also that Bellarmine acknowledgeth that Clemens of Alexandria Basil of Caesarea he might haue added Origen also and Chrysostom and Hierome apply those words of our Sauiour He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood c. to the word which howsoeuer indeed they bee not directly spoken of there yet certaine it is that both in the iudgement of those Ancients who else would not so haue applied it and in truth it selfe also for neither dare Bellarmine himselfe therein controule them the thing there spoken of is in and by it also effectually performed But to passe by the Word and the vnutterable effects of it together with the vnconceiuable manner whereby it either worketh vpon our soules or conueigheth Christ into our soules for in receiuing of it we receiue Christ in it Doe not the ancient Fathers call the Sacrament of Baptisme an ineffable mysterie as was cited out of Gregorie Nyssene a little before Yea doe they not speake as much of the dignitie and excellency and of the vnconceiuable and vnutterable efficacy of it as either Calvin or Beza doe of the Eucharist And yet this shamelesse and blasphemous beast sticketh not to say if Christ be no otherwise present in the Eucharist then hee is in Baptisme it is but a bare signe or figure hauing no mystery at all worthie of admiration And so by necessary consequence he taxeth those Worthies to speake in his fribald language as meere Iuglers and Impostors that in speaking so honourably of it and ascribing such admirable power and efficacy vnto it seeke to plaister rotten walles and maske with great wordes the naked watrinesse of their Baptisme by them so much admired Let him shew how with any colour at all he can here cleere himselfe of impietie and blasphemy And let him if hee dare deny that Christ is effectually receiued both in the Word and in Baptisme in neither whereof yet there is any such reall transmutation or corporall presence as they necessarily require vnto the receiuing of Christ in the Eucharist Diuision 13. MY Aduersaries next Argument from the qualitie of the Communicants page 18. is this If Christs body be really and corporally present in the Eucharist then all that eate thereof must of necessity eate Christ in it But many eate of the Eucharist that yet eate not Christ in it for none but faithfull and liuely members of Christ eate him in this Sacrament In which Argument hee endeavoureth to prooue one falshood by another equally by vs denyed because the holy Fathers expressely affirme that Iudas and the Corinthians blamed by Saint Paul receiued albeit vnworthily and to damnation the body of Christ as the Apostles words 1 Cor. 11. euidently import and when S. Augustine and others seemed to deny them to receiue Christ in the Sacrament they speake not of bare sacramentall but of profitable and fruitfull receiuing of him MY sixt Reason is taken from the qualitie of the Communicants The Argument is briefly this Many eate of the Eucharist that eate not Christ in it Ergò Christ is not corporally in it The Antecedent is thus prooued None feed on Christ but the faithfull such as be in Christ and liue by Christ But many eate of the Eucharist that are vnfaithfull and are out of Christ Ergò c. The Proposition of this latter Syllogisme he denyeth and saith it is a meere falshood and why so forsooth they deny it themselues And why doe they so because the holy Fathers say that Iudas and the Corinthians blamed by S. Paul did receiue Christs body as the Apostles words evidently import 1. For the Apostle he saith expresly He that eateth this bread as plainely as can bee telling vs more then once or twice that it was bread that they did eat though tearmed also Christs body as hath oft beene said and as Augustine sheweth because a Sacrament of it 2. Is not this shamelesse dealing to say the Fathers affirme that Iudas receiued Christs naturall body for of that is the question yet not alleadging any one tittle out of any of them for the proofe of it and that when the saying of one them is produced directly to the coÌ„trary that Iudas ate Christs bread but not the bread Christ which he answereth not a word to If they say that Iudas ate with the rest Christs body they expound themselues what thereby they meane to wit Christs bread the Sacrament of his body § 2. Yea but the Fathers when they deny wicked men to receâ—â— Christ in the Sacrament they speake not of bare sacramentall but of profitable and fruitfull receiuing of him 1. It is true indeed they speake not of bare sacramentall eating And who saith they do Or what is this tothe purpose what is it but that I say They speake not of bare sacrametall eating when they say wickedmen eat not Christ in the Eucharist but they speake of it when they say they do eat yet of the Eucharist wherein they should eat Christ were Christ corporally in it which they say they doe not 2. They say you haue their owne wordes that it is not possible for any wicked man to eate Christs flesh and drinke his blood albeit they doe gnaw or chew the Sacrament with their teeth because our Saviour saith Whosoeuer eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood abideth in mee and whosoeuer eateth of this bread shall liue for euer 3. This Answer implieth that Christs body it selfe may vnfruitfully and vnprofitably be eaten as if the ancient Fathers had dreamed of a twofold eating of it a worthy and profitable and an vnworthie and vnprofitable eating To which I might answer with his owne Bishop I ansenius his words He that vnworthily eateth the bread of life in the Sacrament doth not truely eate of that bread of which it is said I am the bread of life and My flesh is meate in deed And hee addeth that it were an absurd thing to expound our Sauiour where he saith If a man eate of this bread he shall liue for euer as if he should meane If a man eate worthily of this bread he shall liue for euer as if any man could
that Christ as a louing Spouse doth there visitt and imbrace vs It is true indeed that their Priests vse much wanton dalliance with their breaden God while they make the poore people like silly ideots adore him and like Ixion for a substance embrace a meere shadow THis is that cleane hoast as S. Irenaeus affirmeth which the Gentiles were by Malachy foretold to offer vnto God in all places and the onely sacrifice of Christians as S. Augustine calleth it figured by Melchisedechs oblation of bread and wine as the holy Fathers ioyntly teach vs and represented by the Iewish as well bloody as vnbloody sacrifices not distinct from the sacrifice of the Crosse by which alone our redemption was consummated as S. Paul teacheth vs but the same in the hoast and chiefe offerer thereof daily repeated now in an other vnbloody and mysterious manner by the Ministery of Christs consecrated servants So as all Christian Nations of the world Grecians for example Rutenians Armenians Mozaribites Cataians Ethiopians and other Christians in India neere mount Libanus and in other the remotest places in the world such as haue not euer heard peraduenture of the Roman Church since their first Apostolicall conuersions or had any commerce between themselues are knowne to conspire not withstanding their other late errors with vs in the celebration and true beliefe of this great sacrifice and Sacrament as Dr. Philippus Nicolai a chiefe Protestant Diuine in his Commentary of Christs Kingdome and Sir Edwin Sands in his Relation of Religion c. with other aduersaries of our Church plainely acknowledge Which may bee to any wise and well minded man an euident argument that they receiued this common beliefe and celebration of this diuine sacrifice from no other fountaine but the instruction and example of their first Apostolicall conuerters And when Luther taught by the Diuell as hee plainely confesseth vpon plaine sophismes and doceitfull arguments by himselfe particularly related as I haue seene in his works first printed at Iene and now extant in the great Library at Oxford began to impugne that holy sacrifice which hee had formerly offered and presented that his hereticall doctrine and whole confession of Augusta to be accepted as he hoped by the Grecian Churches Ieremias their Patriarch in his Censure as he calleth his booke of the East Church yet extant in Greeke and Latine plainely condemneth amongst their other hereticall doctrines this very denyall of Christs sacrifice transubstantiation c. vrging as we doe invincible arguments and the vniuersall euer continued practise of Christs Church to prooue them vsing as I my selfe haue seene in their Churches alike forme to ours for the mysterious and decent celebration thereof causesly wont by our Aduersaries to be derided whereas their owne Liturgie or forme of diuine seruice is as a shadow chosen in place of the substance hauing nothing decent therein but what they haue stollen from vs and picked here and there out of our Missals gracing all with a riming Psalme sung to a liggish tune with iarring and for the most part vntunable voyces neuer vsed before in any Christian Churches The first Authors of this new Sect were Apostaâ—aes of our Church for their confessed disorders of life and miserable ends plainely discouered to haue been no Apostolicall persons whose endeauours haue neuer tended at any time to conuert Pagans to Christ as his true Church shall euer doe but to corrupt Christians truly already conuerted And they haue seldome planted themselues in any Countrey but vpon very carnall grosse occasions as here in England or with open rebellion and tragicall acts against lawfull Princes and Magistrates namely in Scotland France Flanders Swisserland Sueuia Polonia seuerall Prouinces of Germany Geneua it selfe and other Protestant territories The pretence of a Church and Religion like to theirs in former ages canot colourably be defended without many shifts contradictory deuices Some will haue it to haue beene latent and inuisible for 800. others 900 other 1000 or 1200. yeers Others contrarily teach it to haue beene euer visible and conspicuously dilated into many Christian Countries as the Oraculous predictions of the Prophets and expresse promises of God himselfe describe it Others say that our Church was euer the true Church of Christ onely in some parts of faith not fundamentall erring and by them since Luther reformed Others deny that euer our Church was the true Church of Christ or other than a preuailing faction in the true Church professing at all times visibly and in all Christian countries their present doctrine But no one of these dreamers and Church-deuisers as I may tearme them is able before Luther to assigne in any age since Christ or Country of the world one Parish of Protestant true prosessors or single person iumping in all points with any one sect of them their religion indeed being like a beggers cloake patched together out of olde condemned Heresies and vnsutably composed Their markes of a Church to wit preaching of true doctrine and a rightfull administration of Sacraments are such as any hereticall sect past or to come may equally peetend according to the maine grounds of Protestant doctrine which are to admit no common translation or interpretation of Scripture but what themselues list for discerning of true doctrine and rightly administring Sacraments § 4. HE magnifieth their Masse by telling vs that this is that cleane hoast that Irenaeus saith Malachie foretold the Christians onely sacrifice figured by that of Melchisedeck and represented by the Iewish as well bloody as vnbloody Sacrifices not distinct from the Sacrifice of Christ on the Crosse but the same repeated in another vnbloodie manner 1. It is true indeede that Irenaeus vnderstandeth by that pure Offring in Malachie the Eucharist now in vse and that the Avncients many of them suppose it resembled in that action of Melchisedeck And they call it the Christians yet not the onely Christian Sacrifice succeeding in the roome of the Iewish Sacrifices the Sacrament I say of the Eucharist not their Sacrifice of the Masse In what sense Augustine will tell vs A Sacrifice of praise saith he out of the Psalmist shall glorifie me and there is the way that I will shew him my Saluation The flesh and blood of this Sacrifice before Christs comming was promised by Sacrifices resembling it in Christs passion it was exhibited in the truth it selfe since his ascension it is celebrated in a Sacrament of remembrance And againe The Hebrewes in their Sacrifices of beasts which they offered vnto God did celebrate a prophecie of the Sacrifice to come that Christ offred And Christians now celebrate the memorie of the same Sacrifice past in an holy oblation and participation of Christs body and blood And Procopius vpon Genesit Christ dranke to his Disciples in mysticall Wine saying This is my Blood and gaue them withall a type figure or image of his Body no more admitting or
that he maketh the word the quickner because the word is spirit life and he called it also his flesh because the Word also became flesh and is therefore to be longed aâ—ter for life to be deuoured by the hearing chewed by the vnderstanding and digested by faith Heere is the eating that our Sauiour spake of in that place not carnall but spirituall which our Aduersarie also earstwhiles confessed Neither vrge we this alone as he vntruely here affirmeth But wee vrge diuerse other passages also as before hath beene shewed wherein our Sauiour expoundeth himselfe obserued by Augustine long since and by their Flaunders Bishop Iansenius of late beside diuerse others of their owne And if he had had any thing of moment to say against this our exposition why did hee not then produce it where the place was discussed But he thought it better and safer it seemeth to let all this alone there lest the allegations to the contrary being then in the eie might easily conuince him of grosse and palpable falshood 3. Doe we alone thus expound that place Doe not very many of their owne writers herein agree with vs Or do those of theirs build onely vpon the clause he here mentioneth To which purpose howsoeuer enough hath already beene said yet for his better information concerning both the soundnes of our exposition of that place and the reasons thereof drawne from our Sauiours owne wordes let him heare one though not then Pope yet that afterward came to bee Pope and was as learned a Pope as any of late times Aeneas Syluius writing against the Bohemians It is not saith he any sacramentall drinking but a spirituall that our Sauiour speaketh of in that 6. of Iohn For there is as Albertus Magnus she weth a threefold drinking of Christ a sacramentall that the Priests onely receiue an intellectuall that the people take in the species of bread and a spirituall which all vse that are to be saued by daily deuout meditation ruminating on Christs incarnation and his passion And of this drinking our Sauiour speaketh in Iohn 6. as the very series of the Euangelists wordes clearely sheweth For when some of them that heard it murmured our Sauiour said Doth this scandalize you What if you should see the Sonne of Man ascend where before he was It is the spirit that quickeneth the flesh profiteth nothing In which wordes he declareth that hee speaketh not there of any carnall eating or drinking But would you plainly see that he speaketh of spirituall eating that is by faith Marke what hee saith He that eateth and drinketh He speaketh in the present tense not in the future There were euen then those that so ate him and dranke him when as the Sacrament was not yet instituted And how did they then eate and drinke Christ but spiritually by faith and loue and doing his wordes For he said also before I am the bread of life hee that commeth vnto mee shall not hunger and he that beleeueth in me shall not thirst For Christs speech was figuratiue So also the Glosser vnderstandeth this Gospell and so doth that great Augustine noble both for doctrine and modestie whose glory is so great that no mans commendation can adde to his credit no mans dispraise can disparage him And yet dare this shamelesse out-facer confidently affirme that none of the Fathers euer so expounded the place and that the Heretickes as he esteemeth them as if none but they so expounded it had no other inducement so to expound it but those wordes onely It is the spirit that quickeneth the flesh profiteth nothing all which you see are nothing but grosse vntruths SEcondly whereas we prooue that Christs wordes This is my body c. as being vttered to the Apostles to whom it was giuen to vnderstand the mysteries of Christs Church plainely and without parable and containing in them the institution of a Sacrament fit in plaine wordes to be deliuered and vnderstood by all Christians bound to receiue it are as we say literally to bee vnderstood and not in tropicall and figuratiue senses as our Aduersaries expound them producing for our opinion all the Fathers successiuely in all ages since Christ so vnderstanding them Protestant Diuines slenderly obiect first that of the sacramentall Chalice Christ affirmed that he would no more drinke of the fruit of the vine vntill after his passion ergò it was wine contained in the Chalice wee answer that S. Luke expressely mentioneth two Chalices one drunke after the Paschall Lambe eaten and the other afterwards blessed by Christ and distributed to his Apostles and that Christ onely called the first the fruit of the vine c. So S. Ierome S. Bede and other great Authors explicate and solue this difficulty with vs. Secondly they obiect those words of Christ Doe this in memory of me ergò the Sacrament is a bare memorie of Christs body and blood c. We answer and make S. Paul to interpret these words of our Sauiour for vs 1 Cor. 11. saying As oft as you shall doe this you shal represent or declare Christs death till hee come Which is best declared and represented by the parts of the Sacrifice and Sacrament as they containe the very body and blood of our Sauiour in them For so himselfe present seemeth to triumph more gloriously and exhibite vnto vs a more liuely memorie of his passion then if the Sacrament were no more then a bare signe thereof § 8. HAuing affirmed that all the holy Fathers in all ages from Christ haue expounded the wordes of our Sauiour This is my body literally and not tropically as they also do The contrary wherevnto hath as clearely been shewed as that the Sunne is vp at noone-day nor had this trifler ought of moment to except thereunto where the same is shewed and yet now craketh as their manner is of all the Fathers when indeed they cannot bring any one vndoubted testimony to confirme what they so confidently affirme Hee will at length forsooth for fashion sake vndertake to answer two slender obiections of ours to the contrary 1. Christ say wee calleth that in the Cup or Chalice the fruit of the vine He answereth that S. Luke mentioneth two Chalices the Paschall and the Euangelicall or Eucharisticall and so S. Ierome and S. Bede solue this difficulty 1. Hee spake of slender obiections And so it seemeth indeed he esteemeth them for he returneth very slender answers to them For who would be so senslesse as to reason on this manner S. Luke mentioneth two Chalices ergò our Sauiour did not speake any such thing of the Eucharisticall Cup as yet both Mathew and Marke say expressely he did 2. Ierome and Bede saith he so solue the difficulty He would make his Reader beleeue that Ierome and Bede had long since propounded this obiection and so assoiled it as he doth Whereas the truth is they take no notice either of them of the two
For Commenting on the storie of the Institution of this Sacrament The old Paschall solemnity saith hee being ended which was celebrated in memorie of the deliuerance out of Egypt Christ passeth to a new one which hee would haue the Church vse in memory of redemption by him instead of the flesh and blood of a Lambe substituting a Sacrament of his body and blood in a figure of bread and wine c. And hee breaketh himselfe the bread that he deliuereth to shew that the breaking of his bodie to come was by his owne will and procurement And againe because bread strengtheneth the flesh and wine breedeth blood the one is mystically referred to Christs body and the wine vnto his blood Where is any tittle here that may stand well with their Transubstantiation much lesse that soundeth ought that way A Sacrament of his body and blood a memoriall of his redemption bread broken and giuen and both bread and wine hauing a mysticall reference to the body and blood of Christ. It was well and aduisedly therefore done by Bellarmine to leaue Bede cleane out of the Catalogue of his Authors though a writer of the greatest note in those times because he could finde nothing in him that might seeme but to looke that way which if he could we should be sure to haue heard of Yea that long after Augustines time the same beleefe of the Sacrament that we at this day hold was commonly taught and professed publikely in this Iland notwithstanding the manifold monuments by that Popish faction suppressed appeareth by some of them in ancient Manuscripts yet extant and of late published also in print Among others of this kinde are the Epistles and Sermons written in the Saxon tongue of one Aelfricke a man of great note for learning that liued about the yeere 990. wherein the same doctrine is taught concerning the Sacrament that we hold at this day and the contrary Popish doctrine is impugned In an Epistle of his written for Wulfsine then Bishop of Shyrburn to his Clerks bearing title of a Sacerdotall Synode he saith that The holy Housell is Christs bodie not bodily but ghostly Not the body that he suffered in but the body of which he spake when hee blessed bread and wine to housell and said by the blessed bread This is my body and by the holy wine This is my blood And that the Lord that then turned that bread to his body doth still by the Priests hands blesse bread and wine to his ghostly body and his ghostly blood And in another Epistle to Wulstane Archbishop of Yorke that The Lord halloweth daily by the hands of the Priest bread to his body and wine to his blood in ghostly mystery And yet notwithstanding that liuely bread is not bodily so nor the selfe same body that Christ suffered in nor that holy wine is the Sauiours blood which was shed for vs in bodily thing but in ghostly vnderstanding And that that bread is his body and that wine his blood as the heauenly bread which we call Manna was his body and the cleere water which did then run from the stone in the wildernes was truely his blood as S. Paul saith And that stone was Christ. And in the Paschall Homily by him translated out of Latine and read commonly then on Easter-day Men saith hee haue often searched and doe as yet search how bread that is gathered of corne and through fires heat baked may be turned to Christs body or how wine that is pressed out of many grapes is turned through one blessing to the Lords blood To which he there answereth that it is so by signification as Christ is said to be Bread a Rocke a Lamb a Lion not after truth of nature And againe hauing demanded Why is that holy housell then called Christs body and his blood if it be not truely that that it is called Hee answereth It is so truely in a ghostly mysterie And then explicating further the manner of this change As saith he an heathen childe when hee is Christened yet hee altereth not his shape without though hee be changed within and as the holy water in Baptisme after true nature is corruptible water but after ghostly mystery hath spirituall vertue And so saith he The holy Housell is naturally corruptible bread corruptible wine but is by might of Gods word truely Christs body and blood yet not bodily but ghostly And afterward hee setteth downe diuerse differences betweene Christs naturall body and it Much is betwixt the body that Christ suffered in and the body that he hallowed to housell 1. The body that hee suffered in was bred of the flesh of Mary with blood and bone and skin and sinewes in humane limmes and a liuing Soule His ghostly body which we call the housell is gathered of many cornes without blood and bone limme and soule And it is therefore called a mystery because therein is one thing seen and another thing vnderstood 2. Christs body that he suffred in and rose from death neuer dieth henceforth but is eternall and impassible That housel is temporall not eternall corruptible and dealed into sundry parts chewed betweene the teeth and sent into the belly 3. This mysterie is a pledge and figure Christs body is truth it selfe This pledge doe we keepe mystically vntill we come vnto the truth it selfe and then is this pledge ended Truly it is as we said Christs body and blood not bodily but ghostly And yet further he addeth that As the Stone in the wildernesse from whence the water ran was not bodily Christ but did signifie Christ though the Apostle say That stone was Christ so that heauenly meate that fed them 40. yeeres and that water that gushed from the Stone had signification of Christs body and blood and was the same that wee now offer not bodily but ghostly And that As Christ turned by inuisible might the bread to his body and the wine to his blood before he suffred so he did in the wildernesse turne the heauenly meate to his flesh and the flowing water to his owne blood before hee was borne That when our Sauiour said Hee that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath euerlasting life He bad them not eate the body wherewith he was enclosed nor to drinke that blood which hee shed for vs but he ment that holy housel which is ghostly his body and his blood and hee that tasteth it with beleeuing heart hath euerlasting life That As the sacrifices had a sore-signification of Christs body which he offered to his Father in Sacrifice So the housell that wee hallaw at Gods Altar is a remembrance of Christs body which he offered for vs and of his blood which he shed for vs which suffering once done by him is daily renewed in a mystery of holy housell Lastly that This holy housell is both Christs body and the bodie of all faithfull men after ghostly mysterie and so