taught both the nature and necessity of Faith in Divine Worship But Morall and Conjecturall Certainty is not Hypostasis which impliâ—th an Infallibility of Truth but an Hypothesis and supposition of that which may be otherwise and hath in it nothing but Vncertainty at all of which more hereafter Thirdly God himselfe commandeth his people by his Prophet saving Thou shalt worship me and in Greeke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shalt sweare by my Name Swearing then is an Adoration by Invocating of God and his owne peculiar Prerogative Hearken now By this Law of God none may sweare by any thing as God which he dare not sweare is God But your Romish Professors in your Masse Invocate this Sacrament thus O Lambe of God which takest away the sinnes of the world have mercy upon us And what Romish Professor is there who sweareth not by the Masse meaning the Consecrated Host as by Christ himselfe Notwithstanding no one of your Romish Priests by reason of the manifold Defects incident thereunto as you have heard durst eversweare that this which is now Consecrated by him on the Altar is not substantially Bread or that it is the Body of Christ It must therefore follow that your Adoration having no better Certainty than as you have confessed to adore it with an if it be Christ is a faithlesse profanation of the name of the Sonne of God and of his worship This point concerning Faith in every Worshipper will be confessed afterwards In the last place that we may ruinate the very foundation of your Excuse your Pretence of Morall Certainty commeth to be examined which you have exemplified by one giving an Almes to a poore man who peradventure hath no need and of Iacobs lying ignorantly with her that was not his wife These say we are Cases farre different from this which we have in hand because God's Almoner you know is not bound to enquire of a man whom he seeth to appeare to be miserable and poore whether he be a Counterfeit or no for Charity is not suspicious saith the Apostle Saint Paul Iacob indeed was bound to know onely his owne wife but if he had had any probable or Morall Cause of doubt would that holy Patriarke thinke you have beene so deluded or over-reached a second and a third time to defile his Body by an unchaste Bed But the Causes of your Doubtings are set forth and numbred by Threes Sixes Twenties Hundreds untill you come to a Thousand and as your Iesuite hath said Almost infinite Defects For indeed if there be as appeareth a Thousand hazards in every Masse of any one Priest then in two Priests as many more and so forward so that if one should heare in his time the Masses of Ten and Twenty Priests what multitudes of thousands of Defects would the reckoning make But we need say no more than hath already beene confessed of Almost infinite and consequently as many Doubts of an Idolatrous worship wherein there cannot be so much Morall Certainty as that in any one generation of men from Christ's time each one of that off-spring hath beene chastly borne whereunto what Christian is there that dare be sworne CHALLENGE COnsider we beseech you for God's Cause for we are now in the Cause of God whether our God who will be knowne to be transcendently Iealous of his owne Honour would ever ordaine such a worship of a Sacrament whereby men must needs be still more obnoxious to that which you call a Materiall Idolatry by many hundred-fold than possibly any can be to any materiall Parricide or materiall Murther or materiall Adultery or any other hainous and materiall Transgression that can be named under the Sunne Thus much of your first Pretence for this present untill we come to receive the Confessions of your owne Doctors in this very point That the Second Romish Pretence which is of a Good Intent cannot free your Adoration of the Host from Formall Idolatry SECT III. LET us heare your Cardinall Honour saith he dependeth upon the Intention so that as he who should contemptuously abuse the unconsecrated Bread thinking it to be Conserated should grievously offend Christ contrariwise he who certainly beleeving the Bread to be Christ's Body shall Adore the same doth principally and formally Adore Christ and not the Bread So he even with the same Sophistry from only such a seeming Contrariety wherewith you use to plead for Merits to wit if evill works deserve damnation then good workes deserve eternall life But will you be pleased to heare the same Cardinall speake in earnest from the Principles of true Logicke Although an evill Intention doth vitiate and corrupt an Act otherwise good yet it followeth not that a good intent should justifie an evill Act because no Act is good except all the Causes thereof be good but any Act is evill upon any one Defect So he which his Conclusion is held as universally true in all Schooles whether Christian or Heathen as any point of Morality can be Wherefore it followeth not that because a man doth something to the Contempt of Christ in abusing that which he thinketh to be Christ that therefore the honour which he doth to that which he falsely beleeveth to be Christ should be an Adoration of Christ as all Heathenish Idolatry in worshipping stocks and stones in an opinion of adoring the true God doe witnesse to the world as your owne Confessions will confirme CHALLENGE DOE you not perceive what a patched Cloake of Sophistry your Cardinall cast upon your Good Intent in your Adoration to cover the filthinesse thereof if it might be and how by another Position he rent the same in peeces when he had done Againe you stand thus farre furthermore condemnable in your selves in this point whilest as you seeke to free your Adoration from Idolatry by Pretence of a Good Intent and notwithstanding hold a Good Intention not to be sufficient thereunto except it be qualified and formed with an habituall Condition which is your Third and last Pretence as fond and false as either of the former That the Third Romish Pretence of an Habituall Condition in the Worshipper excuseth him not from formall Idolatry proved first by Scripture SECT IV. HAbituall Condition you have interpreted to stand thus If he that chanceth to worship onely Bread be in that Act so disposed in himselfe that he would not worship the same Bread as Christ if he knew it were but Bread and not Christ and by this you teach that the Act which you call a materiall Idolatry is made not onely excusable but your owne words honest and commendable also So you What execrable Doctrine is this that we heare which cannot be justifiable except you will justifie the Murtherers of the members of Christ and of Christ himselfe First of the members of Christ we reade of one Saul afterwards Paul breathing out threatnings and slanders against them Act. 9. 1. and persecuting the
having confessed already that It is not possible by any divine power that a spirit should be divisible after the manner of a Body doth hereby as fully confute himselfe as if hee had said there is no comparison to be made betweene Body and Spirit in respect of Locall being how much lesse betweene it and God the Father of all Spirits who cannot be so in many places at once that he is not likewise both in every intermediate space betweene place and place and also in all places without them this being the propertie of his infinitenes to containe all places and not to be contained of any And therefore cannot this manner of presence without irreligious impietie be applyed to any creature which notwithstanding your Cardinall blusheth not to do in that manner as was hitherto we thinke never imagined by any Divine before him namely a manner of being of a Body in a place which is neither Circumscriptively as naturall Bodies are nor Definitively that is so that being in one place it is not at the same time in another as Angels and Spirits are but a third how By only presence after the manner as God is in place So hee O golden Divine for who knoweth not that Existence in place onely by presence is a propertie of Divine Infinitenes which being attributed to any thing that is not God doth equall the creature with the Creator A Confutation of the former two Romish Instances in Man's Soule and God himselfe by Ancient Fathers in their Doctrine concerning Angels and Men's Spirits SECT III. ANcient Fathers we trow were profoundly learned both in Philosophicall and in Theologicall Mysteries who notwithstanding as your Iesuite witnesseth held it as a Doctrine of Faith that Angels which are Spirits have every one their owne definite places and space and that they cannot be in divers places but by moving from one place to another which cannot be said of any Body that as you say is without motion in divers places at once Surely if ever such strange and paraphysicall nay more then Hyperphysicall Crocheâ—s had entred into the minds of ancient Fathers we should have heard you alleage at least some one of them if not for proofe yet in pretext and colour of patronizing these your repugnant Paradoxes concerning a Bodie taking the right hand or left of it selfe and the like Velut aegri somnia vanae finguntur Species For your better satisfaction we shall alleage some Testimonies which may sufficiently declare their Iudgement of an Impossibilitie of a Spirit 's being in divers places at one time whether we consider the Spirits of Angels or of men yea or the humane Spirit or soule of Christ Of Angels Damascen They are so circumscribed in the place where they worke that they cannot possibly be in moe places at once Athanasius As the Holy Ghost filleth all places so Angels are contained in a certaine place Accordingly Ambrose Herein doe Angels differ from the holy Ghost which filleth all things that the Sâ—raphims doe move from place to place Pope Gregory would be heard speake Angels are câ—rcumscribed being in respect of our Bodies Spirits but in comparison of the uncircumscribed God they are to be esteemed as Bodies So they Our next speculation must be touching the soules of Saints departed The Author set out by your selves in the name of Athanasius unto this Obiection How doe the soules of Saints so often appeare at one moment of time in the Sepulchres as they seeme to have done Answereth that They are not the same Saints but rather visions and adumbrations of them by transfigurations of Angels He giueth his Reason why he thinketh the other impossible Because it is proper saith hee to God alone to be at one moment of time in two places at once So hee And if the Fathers shall say in effect as much of the humane soule of Christ you wee should thinke would require no more Tertullâ—an among his many divine Answers to prove Christ to be God hee urgeth the Arian Heretiques with this one as not the least Because Christ is present in all places where he is invocated upon which is a power not incident unto man but proper to the nature of God So hee How like you this And Augustine may not be thought to dissent when in arguing hee tooke as granted that the Soule of Christ when it departed this life could not be in Heaven and in hell at once As for the Beeing of God in divers places at once which was your Cardinal's instance for proof of a Possibility of the Being of Christ's Body in many places without Contradiction of making One not One by dividing it from it selfe wee know not whether rather to censure it â—gregiously absurd or extreamly impious seeing that the Being of God in divers places at once without Contradiction ariseth from the very nature of God's Infinitenes of Being in whatsoever place which is as your owne Schoole might have taught him so as Containing all places and not contained in any which the Fathers have as fully declared in making Being in all places as filling them with his presence to bee the property of his Deity Such then is the impietie of your arguing by labouring to defend the manner of the Being of a Bodie by the manner of Being of a Soule or Spirit denyed by Nazianzene and manner of the Being of a Creature by the manner of the Being of God the Creator excedeth all Absurdities that can be named The holy Fathers have something more to say to you but first we are willing to heare what you can say for your selves A Confutation of the Third Romish Pretence why they need not yeild to these Reasons whereby their Doctrine is proved to be so grossely Vnreasonable SECT IV. MYsteries of Faith saith your Cardinall which excede man's understanding are only to be apprehended by Faith Such as are the Articles of the Trinity of Christ his Incarnation of the Resurrection of the Creation and of Eternity it selfe and so ought this concerning the Presence of Christ his Body notwithstanding any Obiection from Reason So you Wee answere Some of these former Mysteries we confesse to be such as excede man's understanding yet such againe they are as are not contrary to understanding though above it that is to say such and this you will confesse with us as admit not Contradiction in themselves for it is no Contradiction to say of the Trinitie there is One God and Three Persons because the Essence of the Godhead is common to each person or to say in the Incarnation there is one Person and two natures no more than to say that in one man there is one person and two essentiall parts one his Body the other his Spirit or in the Resurrection to beleeve the same that was created might be restored to life more than to beleeve that one graine of Corne dying might revive againe or in
mans infirmity to descend raw through the Body into the Draught which in other meates is knowne sometime to be certaine you falling into this speculation tell us concerning the Egestion that it is held Probable that the Body of Christ doth not passe with the formes into the Draught in that Case So you affirming this to be but onely Probable whereas whosoever shall teach that the Body of Christ is not severed from the forme of Bread so long as it is uncorrupt which is your generall Tenet they must hold that the same Body in the like case of mans bodily infirmity doth passe by Egestion in like sort into the seege For if as you do also say the same Body of Christ hath beene once hidden in a Dunghill why may you not as wickedly beleeve that it may passe into the Draught That the Romish foresaid Indignities are contrary to holy Scriptures and iudgement of Ancient Fathers SECT III. HOly Writ teacheth us that there is as great difference betweene the humiliation of Christ when he was on earth and his now Exaltation in glory in Heauen as there is betweene Shame and Glory it being now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Body of Glory Now for you to believe and professe the personall burning devouring regorging yea and the hiding of that glorious Body of Christ in a dung hill and the like are such execrable speeches as that we stand astonished with horrour to heare them thinking that we have heard in these the scoffes reproaches and blasphemies of some Pagans against Christian Religion rather than the opinion of any that take to themselves one syllable of the name of Christians If this had beene the ancient Faith some Fathers doubtlesse upon some occasion by some one sentence or other would have revealed their Iudgement therein from whose diuerse and copious Volumes neither doe you alleage nor we reade any one word of mans spewing up or Mice eating or so much as the winde blowing away the Body of Christ much lesse of the other basenesse spoken of But contrariwise Origen and Cyrill distinguishing betweene the spirituall Bread which is the Reall Body of Christ and the Bread Sacramentall say That not that Body but this Bread goeth into the Draught Which to affirme of Christs Body were an Assertion abhominable That the Romish Answeres for defence of this their vile and beastly Opinion are but false and fond SECT IV. IT was said of Philosophers of old that nothing was so absurd but some one or other of them would take in hand to defend it the like may be said of our Romish Opposites whereof wee have given you divers Instances throughout this whole Treatise as in the most particulars so for the point now in Question And although many of your Disputers have for modesties sake passed by it yet have two among you as it were putting on Vizards on their faces come in with two fanaticall Answeres Both which are taken from the condition of Christ his humane Body whilest he was in the world Many saith your Cardinall can scarce endure to heare that Christ is included in a Boxe fallen to the earth burnt or eaten of beasts as though we doe not read that Christ was included in the wombe of the Virgin lay upon the earth and might without any miracle have beene eaten of beasts why may not such things now happen unto him but sine laesione without any hurt at all So he Ioyne with this the Determination of your Schoole That the substance of Christ his Body remaineth still although the Hoast be eaten with Dogs But Master Brerely more cunningly that he might not disguise your opinions but also make Protestants odious if it might be for their exceptions against them doth readily tell us that Pagans Iewes and Heretiques conceived Indignities against some mysteries of Christian Religion as against Christ his Incarnation and his Crucifying So he Both which Answeres are but meere tergiversations by confounding the two most different conditions of Christ That then in the state of his humiliation with This which is Now in the highest exaltation of Glory Wee therefore reioyne as followeth Your Disputers have so answered as if Christ his Incarnation in the wombe of a Virgin his Conversation upon earth and his Passion upon the Crosse were not obiects of Indignity notwithstanding the Spirit of God hath blazed them to the world to have beene the Indignities of all Indignities Thus Who being in the forme of God and thinking it no robbery to be equall with God yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 made himselfe of no reputation but tooke upon him the forme of a servant such was his Incarnation and became obedient to death even spoken for aggravating the Indignity thereof The shamefull death of the Crosse Than which never any thing could make more either for the magnifying of Gods grace and mercy or for the dignifying of Christ his merit for man as it is written God so loved the world that he sent his Sonne namely to suffer that whosoever should believe in him should not perish but have life everlasting How could your Answerers but know that it was not the observation of the indignities which Christ suffered that wrought to the condemnation of Pagans Iewes and Heretikes but their faithlessenesse in taking such scandall thereat as to deprive themselves by their Infidelitie of all hope of life by Christ crucified Hearken furthermore That the state of Christ his Humanity cannot be now obnoxious to bodily Indignities and that the comparing both the Estates in your answering is unworthy the learning of very Catechumenists and Petties in Christian Religion SECT V. THis Disproportion betweene Christ his estate in the dayes of his flesh in this world and his now present Condition at the right hand of God is as extreamely disproportionable as is Mortality and Immortality Shame and Glory Misery and Blessednes Earth and Heaven that being his state of humiliation and this contrariwise of his exaltation as all Christians know and professe And although the Body of Christ now in eternall Maiesty be not obnoxious to Corporall iniuries yet may Morall and Spirituall abasements be offered unto Christ as well in the Opinion as in the Practice of men Of the opinion wee have an Example in the Capernaites concerning Christ whensoever he should give his flesh to be eaten carnally for the Practice you may set before you the Corinthians who abusing the Sacrament of the Lord did thereby contemne him and were made guilty of high Prophanation against the glorious Body of Christ And what else soundeth that Relative iniury against Christ by murthering his Saints on earth complained off by his voice from Heaven Saul Saul why persecutest thou me Your Cardinall in answere to the Obiection of Indignity offered to Christ by putting him in a Boxe and of being Eaten with Wormes and the like opposed as you have heard saying Why may not such things