indeed simply as it is flesh without any other respect for so it is not given neither would it profit us but as it is crucified and given for the redemption of the world neither doth it hinder the truth and substance of the thing that this eating of Christ's body is spiritual and that by it the souls of the Faithful and not their stomachs are fed by the operation of the Holy Ghost For this none can deny but they who being strangers to the Spirit and the divine vertue can savour only carnal things and to whom what is Spiritual and Sacramental is the same as if a meer nothing 7. As to the manner of the presence of the body and bloud of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament we that are Protestant and Reformed according to the ancient Catholick Church do not search into the manner of it with perplexing inquiries but after the example of the primitive and purest Church of Christ we leave it to the power and wisdom of our Lord yielding a full and unfeined assent to his words Had the Romish maintainers of Transubstantiation done the same they would not have determined and decreed and then imposed as an Article of faith absolutely necessary to Salvation a manner of presence newly by them invented under pain of the most direful Curse and there would have been in the Church less wrangling and more peace and unity than now is CHAP. II. 1 2 and 3 c. The unanimous consent of all Protestants with the Church of England in maintaining a real that is true but not a carnal presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament proved by publick Confessions and the best of Authorities 1. SO then none of the Protestant Churches doubt of the real that is true and not imaginary Presence of Christ's body and bloud in the Sacrament and there appears no reason why any man should suspect their common Confession of either fraud or error as though in this particular they had in the least departed from the Catholick faith 2. For it is easie to produce the consent of Reformed Churches and Authors whereby it will clearly appear to them that are not wilfully blind that they all zealously maintain and profess this truth without forsaking in any wise the true Catholick Faith in this matter 3. I begin with the Church of England wherein they that are in holy Orders are bound by a Law and Canon Never to teach any thing to the people to be by them believed in matters of Religion but what agrees with the Doctrine of the Old and New Testament and what the Catholick Fathers and Ancient Prelates have gathered and inferred out of it Vnder pain of Excommunication if they transgress troubling the people with contrary Doctrine It teacheth therefore that in the Blessed Sacrament the body of Christ is given taken and eaten so that to the worthy Receivers the consecrated and broken bread is the communication of the body of Christ and likewise the consecrated Cup the communication of his bloud But that the wicked and they that approach unworthily the Sacrament of so sacred a thing eat and drink their own damnation in that they become guilty of the body and bloud of Christ And the same Church in a solemn Prayer before the consecration prays thus Grant us gracious Lord so to eat the flesh of thy dear SonJesus Christ and to drink his bloud that our sinful bodies may be made clean by his body and our souls washed through his most precious bloud and that we may evermore dwell in him and he in us The Priest also blessing or consecrating the Bread and Wine saith thus Hear us O merciful Father we most humbly beseech thee and grant that we receiving these thy Creatures of Bread and Wine according to thy Son our Saviour Jesus Christ's holy institution in remembrance of his Death and Passion may be partakers of his most blessed body and bloud Who in the same night that he was betrayed took bread and when he had given thanks he brake it and gave it to his Disciples saying take eat this is my body which is given for you do this in remembrance of me Likewise after Supper he took the Cup and when he had given thinks he gave it to them saying drink ye all of this for this is my bloud of the New Testament which is shed for you and for many for the remission of sins Do this as oft as ye shall drink it in remembrance of me The same when he gives the Sacrament to the people kneeling giving the bread saith The body of our Lord Jesus Christ which was given for thee preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life Likewise when he gives the Cup he saith The bloud of our Lord Jesus Christ which was shed for thee preserve thy body and soul to everlasting life Afterwards when the Communion is done follows a thanksgiving Almighty and ever living God we most heartily thank thee for that thou dost vouchsafe to feed us who have duly received these holy Mysteries with the spiritual food of the most precious body and bloud of thy Son our Saviour Jesus Christ With the Hymn Glory be to God on high c. Also in the publick Authorized Catechism of our Church appointed to be learned of all it is answered to the question concerning the inward part of the Sacrament that it is the body and bloud of Christ which are verily and indeed taken and received by the Faithful in the Lords Supper And in the Apology for this Church writ by that worthy and Reverend Prelate Jewel Bishop of Salisbury it is expresly affirmed That to the faithful is truly given in the Sacrament the body and bloud of our Lord the life-giving flesh of the Son of God which quickens our souls the bread that came from heaven the food of immortality grace and truth and life And that it is the Communion of the body and bloud of Christ that we may abide in him and he in us and that we may be ascertained that the flesh and bloud of Christ is the food of our souls as bread and wine is of our bodies 4. A while before the writing of this Apology came forth the Dialectick of the famous Dr. Poinet Bishop of Winchester concerning the truth nature and substance of the body and bloud of Christ in the blessed Sacrament writ on purpose to explain and manifest the Faith and Doctrine of the Church of England in that point In the first place it shews that the holy Eucharist is not only the figure but also contains in it self the truth nature and substance of the body of our blessed Saviour and that those words nature and substance ought not to be rejected because the Fathers used them in speaking of that Mystery Secondly He inquires whether those expressions truth nature and substance were used in this Mystery by the Ancients in their common acceptation or in a sense more particular
Bloud of Christ was truly presented given and received together with the visible signs of Bread and Wine by the operation of our Lord and by vertue of his institution according to the plain sound and sense of his words and that not only Zuinglius and Oecolampadius had so taught but they also in the publick Confessions of the Churches of the Vpper Germany and other Writings confest it so that the Controversie was rather about the manner of the presence or absence than about the presence or absence it self All which Bucer's Associates confirm after him He also adds That the Magistrates in their Churches had denounced very severe punishments to any that should deny the presence of the Body and Bloud of Christ in the Lords Supper Bucerus did also maintain this Doctrine of the blessed Sacrament in presence of the Landgrave of Hesse and Melancthon confessing That together with the Sacrament we truly and substantially receive the body of Christ Also That the Bread and Wine are conferring signs giving what they represent so that together with them the Body of Christ is given and received And to these he adds That the Body and Bread are not united in the mixture of their substance but in that the Sacrament gives what it promiseth that is the one is never without the other and so they agreeing on both parts that the Bread and Wine are not changed he holds such a Sacramental Union Luther having heard this declared also his opinion thus That he did not locally include the Body and Bloud of Christ with the Bread and Wine and unite them together by any natural connexion and that he did not make proper to the Sacraments that vertue whereby they brought Salvation to the Receivers but that he maintained only a Sacramental Vnion betwixt the Body of Christ and the Bread and betwixt his Bloud and the Wine and did teach that the power of confirming our Faith which he attributed to the Sacraments was not naturally inherent in the outward signs but proceeded from the operation of Christ and was given by his Spirit by his Words and by the Elements And finally in this manner he spake to all that were present If you believe and teach that in the Lords Supper the true Body and Bloud of Christ is given and received and not the Bread and Wine only and that this giving and receiving is real and not imaginary we are agreed and we own you for dear Brethren in the Lord. All this is set down at large in the twentieth Tome of Luthers Works and in the English Works of Bucer 14. The next will be the Gallican Confession made at Paris in a National Synod and presented to King Charles IX at the Conference of Poissy Which speaks of the Sacrament on this wise Although Christ be in heaven where he is to remain until he come to judge the World yet we believe that by the secret and incomprehensible virtue of his Spirit he feeds and vivifies us by the substance of his Body and Bloud received by Faith now we say that this is done in a spiritual manner not that we believe it to be a fancy and imagination instead of a truth and real effect but rather because that Mystery of our Vnion with Christ is of so sublime a nature that it is as much above the capacity of our senses as it is above the order of nature Item We believe that in the Lords Supper God gives us really that is truly and efficaciously whatever is represented by the Sacrament with the signs we joyn the true Possession and fruition of the thing by them offered to us And so that Bread and Wine which are given to us become our spiritual nourishment in that they make it in some manner visible to us that the Flesh of Christ is our food and his Bloud our drink Therefore those Fanaticks that reject these Signs and Symbols are by us rejected our blessed Saviour having said This is my body and this Cup is my bloud This Confession hath been subscribed by the Church of Geneva 15. The Envoyes from the French Churches to Worms made a declaration concerning that Mystery much after the same manner We confess say they that in the Lords Supper besides the benefits of Christ the substance also of the Son of man his true body with his bloud shed for us are not only figuratively signified by Types and Symbols as memorials of things absent but also truly and certainly presented given and offered to be applied by signs that are not bare and destitute but on Gods part in regard of his offer and promise always undoubtedly accompanied with what they signifie whether they be offered to good or bad Christians 16. Now follows the Belgick Confession which professeth it to be most certain that Christ doth really effect in us what is figured by the signs although it be above the capacity of our reason to understand which way the operations of the Holy Ghost being always occult and incomprehensible 17. The more ancient Confession of the Switzers made by common consent at Basil and approved by all the Helvetick-Protestant Churches hath it That while the Faithful eat the bread and drink the cup of the Lord they by the operation of Christ working by the Holy Spirit receive the Body and Bloud of our Lord and thereby are fed unto Eternal life But notwithstanding that they affirm that this food is spiritual yet they afterwards conclude That by spiritual food they understand not imaginary but the very body of Christ which was given for us 18. And the latter Confession of the Switzers writ and Printed in 1566. affirms as expresly the true presence of Christs body in the Eucharist thus Outwardly the bread is offered by the Minister and the words of Christ heard Take eat this is my Body drink ye all of this this is my Bloud Therefore the Faithful receive what Christs Minister gives and drink of the Lords Cup And at the same time by the power of Christ working by the Holy Ghost are fed by the flesh and bloud of our Lord unto eternal life c. Again Christ is not absent from his Church celebrating his holy Supper The Sun in heaven being distant from us is nevertheless present by his efficacy how much more shall Christ the Sun of righteousness who is bodily in heaven absent from us be spiritually present to us by his life-giving virtue and as he declared in his last Supper he would be present Joh. 14. 15 16. Whence it follows that we have no Communion without Christ Now to this Confession not only the Reformed Switzers did subscribe but also the Churches of Hungary Pannonia or Transilvania Poland and Lithuania which follow neither the Augustan nor Bohemian Confessions It was subscribed also by the Churches of Scotland and Geneva 19. Lastly Let us hear the renowned Declaration of the Reformed Churches of Poland made in the Assembly of Thoran
mortal to save us mortals so he might by a thing visible fitly represent to us a thing invisible Some receive the Sacred Sign at the Lords Table to their Salvation and some to their Ruine but the thing signified is life to every man and death to none whoever receives it is united as a member to Christ the head in the Kingdom of Heaven for the Sacrament is one thing and the efficacy of it another For the Sacrament is received with the mouth but the grace thereof feeds the inward man And as the first is turned into our substance when we eat it and drink it so are we made the Body of Christ when we live piously and obediently Therefore the Faithful do well and truly receive the body of Christ if they neglect not to be his members and they are made the Body of Christ if they will live of his Spirit All these agree not in the least with the new Doctrine of Rome and as little with that opinion they attribute to Paschasius and therefore he is rejected as erroneous by some Romish Authors who writ four and six hundred years after him But they should have considered that they condemned not only Rabanus but together with him all the Doctors of the Primitive Church 32. Johannes Erigena our Country-man whom King Alfred took to be his and his Childrens Tutor and to credit the new founded University of Oxford while he lived in France where he was in great esteem with Charles the Bald wrote a Book concerning the Body and Bloud of our Lord to the same purpose as Rabanus and back'd it with clear Testimonies of Scripture and of the Holy Fathers But entring himself into the Monastery of Malmsbury as he was interpreting the Book of Dyonisius about the heavenly Hierarchy which he translated into Latine and withal censuring the newly-hatcht Doctrine of the Carnal Presence of Christ in the Eucharist he was stabb'd with Pen knives by some unworthy Schollars of his set on by certain Monks though not long after he was by some others numbred among Holy Martyrs 33. Walasridus Strabo about the same time wrote on this manner Therefore in that Last Supper whereat Christ was with his Disciples before he was betrayed after the solemnities of the ancient Passeover he gave to his Disciples the Sacrament of his Body and Bloud in the substance of Bread and Wine and instructed us to pass from carnal to spiritual things from earthly to heavenly things and from shadows to the substance 34. As for the opinion of Bertram otherwise called Ratramnus or Ratramus perhaps not rightly it is known enough by that Book which the Emperour Charles the Bald who loved and honoured him as all good men did for his great learning and piety commanded him to write concerning the Body and Bloud of our Lord. For when men began to be disturbed at the Book of Paschasius some saying one thing and some another the Emperour being moved by their disputes propounded himself two questions to Bertram 1. Whether what the Faithful eat in the Church be made the Body and Bloud of Christ in Figure and in Mystery 2. Or whether that natural body which was born of the Virgin Mary which suffered died and was buried and now sitteth on the right hand of God the Father be it self dayly received by the mouth of the Faithful in the Mystery of the Sacrament The first of these Bertram resolved Affirmatively the second Negatively and said that there was as great a difference betwixt those two bodies as betwixt the earnest and that whereof it is the earnest It is evident saith he that that Bread and Wine are figuratively the Body and Bloud of Christ According to the substance of the Elements they are after the Consecration what they were before For the Bread is not Christ substantially If this mystery be not done in a figure it cannot well be called a Mystery The Wine also which is made the Sacrament of the Bloud of Christ by the Consecration of the Priest shews one thing by its outward appearance and contains another inwardly For what is there visible in its outside but only the substance of the Wine These things are changed but not according to the material part and by this change they are not what they truly appear to be but are some thing else besides what is their proper being For they are made spiritually the Body and Bloud of Christ not that the Elements be two different things but in one respect they are as they appear Bread and Wine and in another the Body and Bloud of Christ Hence according to the visible Creature they feed the body but according to the vertue of a more excellent substance they nourish and sanctifie the souls of the Faithful Then having brought many Testimonies of holy Scripture and the ancient Fathers to confirm this he at last prevents that Calumny which the followers of Paschasius did then lay on the Orthodox as though they had taught that bare signs figures and shadows and not the Body and Bloud of Christ were given in the Sacrament Let it not be thought saith he because we say this that therefore the Body and Bloud of Christ are not received in the Mystery of the Sacrament where Faith apprehends what it believes and not what the eyes see for this meat and drink are spiritual feed the soul spiritually and entertain that life whose fulness is eternal For the question is not simply about the real truth or the thing signified being present without which it could not be a Mystery but about the false reality of things subsisting in imaginary appearances and about the Carnal Presence 35. All this the Fathers of Trent and the Romish Inquisitors could not brook and therefore they utterly condemned Bertram and put his Book in the Catalogue of those that are forbidden But the Professors of Doway judging this proceeding much too violent and therefore more like to hurt than to advance the Roman Cause went another and more cunning way to work and had the approbation of the Licencers of Books and the Authors of the Belgick Index expurgatorius That Book of Bertram say they having been already Printed several times read by many and known to all by its being forbidden may be suffered and used after it is corrected for Bertram was a Catholick Priest and a Monk in the Monastery of Corbie esteemed and beloved by Charles the Bald. And being we bear with many errors in Ancient Catholick Authors and lessen and excuse them and by some cunning device behold the good mens fidelity often deny them and give a more commodious sense when they are objected to us in our disputes with our Adversaries we do not see why Bertram should not also be amended and used with the same Equity lest Hereticks cast us in the teeth that we burn and suppress those Records of Antiquity that make for them And as we also fear
whereby they profess that as to what concerns the Sacrament of the Eucharist they assent to that opinion which in the Augustan Confession in the Bohemian and that of Sendom is confirmed by Scripture Then afterwards in another Declaration they explain their own Mind thus saying 1. That the Sacrament consisteth of earthly things as Bread and Wine and things heavenly as the Body and Bloud of our Lord both of which though in a different manner yet most truly and really are given together at the same time earthly things in an earthly corporal and natural way heavenly things in a mystick spiritual and heavenly manner 2. Hence they in fer That the Bread and Wine are and are said to be with truth the very Body and Bloud of Christ not substantially indeed that is not corporally but Sacramentally and Mystically by vertue of the Sacramental Union which consisteth not in a bare signification or obligation only but also in a real exhibition and communication of both parts earthly and heavenly together at once though in a different manner 3. In that sense they affirm with the Ancients That the Bread and Wine are changed into the Body and Bloud of Christ not in nature and substance but in use and efficacy in which respect the sacred Elements are not called what they are to sense but what they are believed and received by faith grounded on the Promise 4. They deny to believe the signs to be bare inefficacious and empty but rather such as truly give what they seal and signifie being efficacious instruments and most certain means whereby the Body and Bloud of Christ and so Christ himself with all his benefits is set forth and offered to all Communicants but conferred and given to true Believers and by them received as the saving and vivifying food of their Souls 5. They deny not the true presence of the body and bloud of Christ in the Lords Supper but only the Corporal manner of his Presence They believe a Mystical Vnion betwixt Christ and us and that not imaginary but most true real and efficacious 6. Thence they conclude That not only the vertue efficacy operation or benefits of Christ are communicated to us but more especially the very substance of his Body and Bloud so that he abides in us and we in him 20. Now because great is the fame of Calvin who subscribed the Augustan Confession and that of the Switzers let us hear what he writ and believed concerning this sacred Mystery His words in his Institutions and elsewhere are such so conformable to the stile and mind of the Ancient Fathers that no Catholick Protestant would wish to use any other I understand saith he what is to be understood by the words of Christ that he doth not only offer us the benefits of his Death and Resurrection but his very body wherein he died and rose again I assert that the body of Christ is really as the usual expression is that is truly given to us in the Sacrament to be the saving food of our souls Also in another place Item That word cannot lie neither can it mock us and except one presumes to call God a deceiver be will never dare to say that the Symbols are empty and that Christ is not in them Therefore if by the breaking of the bread our Saviour doth represent the participation of his body it is not to be doubted but that he truly gives and confers it If it be true that the visible sign is given us to seal the gift of an invisible thing we must firmly believe that receiving the signs of the body we also certainly receive the body it self Setting aside all absurdities I do willingly admit all those terms that can most strongly express the true and substantial Communication of the Body and Bloud of Christ granted to the Faithful with the Symbols of the Lords Supper and that not as if they received only by the force of their imagination or an act of their minds but really so as to be fed thereby unto Eternal life Again We must therefore confess that the inward substance of the Sacrament is joyned with the visible sign so that as the Bread is put into our hand the Body of Christ is also given to us This certainly if there were nothing else should abundantly satisfie us that we understand that Christ in his Holy Supper gives us the true and proper substance of his Body and Bloud that it being wholly ours we may be made partakers of all his benefits and graces Again The Son of God offers daily to us in the holy Sacrament the same body which he once offered in sacrifice to his Father that it may be our spiritual food In these he asserts as clearly as any one can the true Real and substantial Presence and Communication of the Body of Christ but how he undertakes not to determine If any one saith he ask me concerning the manner I will not be ashamed to confess that it is a secret too high for my reason to comprehend or my tongue to express or to speak more properly I rather feel than understand it Therefore without disputing I embrace the truth of God and confidently repose on it He declares that his Flesh is the food and his Bloud the drink of my Soul And my Soul I offer to him to be fed by such nourishment He bids me take eat and drink his Body and Bloud which in his holy Supper he offers me under the Symbols of Bread and Wine I make no scruple but he doth reach them to me and I receive them All these are Calvins own words 21. I was the more willing to be long in transcribing these things at large out of publick Confessions of Churches and the best of Authors that it might the better appear how injuriously Protestant Divines are calumniated by others unacquainted with their opinions as though by these words Spiritually and Sacramentally they did not acknowledge a true and well-understood real Presence and Communication of the Body and Bloud of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament whereas on the contrary they do professedly own it in terms as express as any can be used CHAP. III. 1. What the Papists do understand by Christ being spiritually present in the Sacrament 2. What St. Bernard understood by it 3. What the Protestants 4. Faith doth not cause but suppose the presence of Christ 5. The Union betwixt the Body of Christ and the Bread is Sacramental 1. HAving now by what I have said put it out of doubt that the Protestants believe a spiritual and true presence of Christ in the Sacrament which is the reason that according to the example of the Fathers they use so frequently the term spiritual in this subject it may not be amiss to consider in the next place how the Roman Church understands that same word Now they make it to signifie That Christ is not present in the Sacrament either after that manner which
Eucharist after the Invocation of the Holy Ghost is no longer ordinary Bread but is the Body of Christ so this holy Oyntment is no longer a bare common Oyntment after it is consecrated but is the gift or grace of Christ which by his Divine Nature and the coming of the Holy Ghost is made â—fficacious so that the Body is anointed with the Oyntment but the soul is sanctified by the holy and vivifying Spirit Can any thing more clear be said Either the Oyntment is transubstantiated by consecration into the spirit and grace of Christ or the Bread and Wine are not transubstantiated by Consecration into the Body and Bloud of Christ Therefore as the Oyntment retains still its substance and yet is not called a meer or common ointment but the Charisme or grace of Christ So the Bread and Wine remaining so as to their substance yet are not said to be only Bread and Wine common and ordinary but also the Body and Bloud of Christ Vnder the Type of Bread saith he the Body is given thee and the Bloud under the type of the Wine This Grodecius doth captiously and unfaithfully interpret under the appearances of Bread and Wine for those meer appearances or accidents subsisting without a subject never so much as entred into the mind of any of the Ancients 15. Much to the same purpose we have in the Anaphora or Liturgy attributed to St. Basil We have set before you the Type of the Body and Bloud of Christ which he calls the Bread of the Eucharist after the Consecration If it be the Type of the Body then certainly it cannot be the Body and nothing else For as we said before nothing can be the figure of it self no more than a man can be his own Son or Father There be also Prayers in that Liturgy That the Bread may become the Body of Christ for the remission of sins and life eternal to the receivers Now true it is that to the faithful the Element becomes a vivifying Body because they are truly partakers of the heavenly bread the Body of Christ but to others who either receive not or are not believers to them the Bread may be the Antitype but is not neither doth become the Body of Christ for without Faith Christ is never eaten as is gathered from the same Father 16. St. Gregory Nyssene his Brother doth clearly declare what change is wrought in the Bread and Wine by Consecration saying As the Altar naturally is but common stone but being consecrated becomes an holy Table a spotless Altar so the bread of the Eucharist is at first ordinary but being mysteriously sacrificed it is and is called the Body of Christ and is efficacious to great purposes and as the Priest yesterday a Lay-man by the Blessing of Ordination becomes a Doctor of Piety and a Steward of Mysteries and though not changed in body or shape yet is transformed and made better as to his soul by an invisible power and grace so also by the same consequence water being nothing but water of it self yet blest by a heavenly grace renews the man working a spiritual regeneration in him Now let the Assertors of Transubstantiation maintain that a Stone is substantially changed into an Altar a man into a Priest the water in Baptism into an invisible grace or else that the Bread is not so changed into the Body of Christ For according to this Father there is the same consequence in them all 17 Likewise St. Ambrose explaining what manner of alteration is in the bread when in the Eucharist it becomes the Body of Christ saith Thou hadst indeed a being but wert an old creature but being now Baptized or consecrated thou art become a new creature The same change that happens to man in Baptism happens to the Bread in the Sacrament If the nature of man is not substantially altered by the new Birth no more is the bread by Consecration Man becomes by Baptism not what Nature made him but what Grace new-makes him and the Bread becomes by Consecration not what it was by Nature but what the Blessing consecrates it to be For Nature made only a meer man and made only common bread but Regeneration of a meer man makes a holy man in whom Christ dwells spiritually And likewise the Consecration of common bread makes Mystick and Sacramental bread Yet this change doth not destroy Nature but to Nature adds Grace As is yet more plainly exprest by that holy Father in the fore-cited place Perhaps thou wilt say saith he this my bread is common bread it is bread indeed before the blessing of the Sacrament but when it is consecrated it becomes the Body of Christ This we are therefore to declare how can that which is bread be also the body of Christ By Consecration And Consecration is made by the words of our Lord that the venerable Sacrament may be perfected You see how efficacious is the word of Christ If there be then so great a power in the word of Christ to make the Bread and Wine to be what they were not how much greater is that power which still preserves them to be what they were and yet makes them to be what they were not Therefore that I may answer thee it was not the Body of Christ before the Consecration but now after the Consecration it is the Body of Christ he said the word and it was done thou thy self wert befere but wert an old Creature after thou hast been consecrated in Baptism thou art become a new creature By these words St. Ambrose teacheth how we are to understand that the Bread is the Body of Christ to wit by such a change that the Bread and Wine do not cease to be what they were as to their substance for then they should not be what they were and yet by the Blessing become what before they were not For so they are said to remain as indeed they do 〈◊〉 what they were by nature that yet they are changed by grace that is they become assured Sacraments of the Body and Bloud of Christ and by that means certain pledges of our Justification and Redemption What is there can refute more expresly the dream of Transubstantiation 18. St. Chrysostome doth also clearly discard and reject this carnal Transubstantiation and eating of Christs Body without eating the bread Sacraments saith he ought not to be contemplated and considered carnally but with the eyes of our souls that is spiritually for such is the nature of mysteries where observe the opposition betwixt carnally and spiritually which admits of no plea or reply again As in Baptism the spiritual power of Regeneration is given to the material water so also the immaterial gift of the Body and Bloud of Christ is not received by any sensible corporal action but by the spiritual discernment of our faith and of our hearts and minds Which is no more than this that
famous and so worthy a Father as Theodoret alledge that he was accused of some errours in the Council of Ephesus though he repented afterwards as they themselves are forced to confess Fain would they if they could get out at this door when they cannot deny that he affirmed that the Elements remain in their natural substance as he wrote in the Dialogues which he composed against the Eutychian Hereticks with the applause and approbation of the Catholick Church And indeed the evidence of this truth hath compelled some of our Adversaries to yield that Theodoret is of our side For in the Epistle before the Dialogues of Theodoret in the Roman Edition set forth by Stephan Nicolinus the Popes Printer in the year 1547 it is plainly set down That in what concern'd Transubstantiation his opinion was not very sound but that he was to be excused because the Church of Rome had made no decree about it 22. With Theodoret we may joyn Gelasius who whether he were Bishop of Rome or no as Bellarmine confesseth was of the same age and opinion as he and therefore a witness ancient and credible enough He wrote against Eutyches and Nestorius concerning the two natures in Christ in this manner Doubtless the Sacrament of the Body and Bloud of Christ which we receive is a very divine thing whereby we are made partakers of the divine nature and yet it doth not cease to be Bread and Wine by substance and nature And indeed the image and resemblance of the Body and Bloud of Christ is celebrated in this mysterious action By this therefore we see manifestly enough that we must believe that to be in Christ which we believe to be in his Sacrament that as by the perfecting vertue of the Holy Ghost it becomes a divine substance and yet remains in the propriety of its nature so this great Mystery the Incarnation of whose power and efficacy this is a lively image doth demonstrate that there is one intire and true Christ consisting of two natures which yet properly remain unchanged It doth plainly appear out of these words that the change wrought in the Sacrament is not substantial for first the sanctified Elements are so made the Body and Bloud of Christ that still they continue to be by nature Bread and Wine Secondly The Bread and Wine retain their natural properties as also the two natures in Christ Lastly The Elements are said to become a divine substance because while we receive them we are made partakers of the Divine Nature by the Body and Bloud of Christ which are given to us These things being so their blindness is to be deplored who see not that they bring again into the Church of Rome the same Error which Antiquity piously and learnedly condemned in the Eutychians And as for their thread-bare objection to this That by the substance of Bread and wine the true substance it self is not to be understood but only the nature and essence of the accidents it is a very strange and very poor shift There is a great deal more of commendation due to the ingenuity of Cardinal Contarenus who yielding to the evidence of truth answered nothing to this plain Testimony of Gelasius 23. Now I add Cyril of Alexandria who said That the Body and Bloud of Christ in the Sacrament are received only by a pure faith as we read in that Epistle against Nestorius which six hundred Fathers approved and confirmed in the Council of Chalcedon I omit to mention the other Fathers of this Age though many things in their Writings be as contrary to Transubstantiation and the independency of accidents as any I have hitherto cited 24. I come now to the Sixth Century about the middle whereof Ephrem Patriarch of Antioch wrote a Book which was read and commended by Photius concerning sacred Constitutions and Ceremonies against the Eutychians therein that he might prove the Hypostatical Union that in Christ there is no confusion of natures but that each retains its own substance and properties he brings the comparison of the Sacramental Union and denies that there should be any conversion of one substance into another in the Sacrament No man saith he that hath any reason will say that the nature of the palpable and impalpable and the nature of the visible and invisible is the same For so the Body of Christ which is received by the faithful remains in its own substance and yet withal is united to a spiritual grace and so Baptism though it becomes wholly spiritual yet it loseth not the sensible property of its substance that 's water neither doth it cease to be what it was made by grace 25. It is not very long since the works of Facundus an African Bishop were Printed at Paris but he lived in the same Century Now what his Doctrine was against Transubstantiation as also of the Church in his time is plainly to be seen by those words of his which I here transcribe The Sacrament of Adoption may be called Adoption as the Sacrament of the Body and Bloud of Christ consecrated in the Bread and Wine is said to be his Body and Bloud not that his Body be Bread or his Bloud Wine but because the Bread and Wine are the Sacrament of his Body and Bloud and therefore so called by Christ when he gave them to his Disciples Sirmondus the Jesuit hath writ Annotations on Facundus but when he came to this place he had nothing to say but that the Bread is no Bread but only the likeness and appearance of Bread An opinion so unlike that of Facundus that it should not have been Fathered upon him by a learned and ingenuous man as Sirmondus would be thought to be For he cannot so much as produce any one of the ancient Fathers that ever made mention of accidents subsisting without a subject called by him the appearances of Bread And as for his thinking That some would take the expressions of Facundus to be somewhat uncouth and obscure how unjust and injurious it is to that learned Father may easily be observed by any 26. Isidore Bishop of Hispal about the begining of the Seventh Century wrote thus concerning the Sacrament Because the bread strengthens our body therefore it is called the Body of Christ and because the Wine is made bloud therefore the Bloud of Christ is expressed by it Now these two are visible but yet being sanctified by the Holy Spirit they become the Sacraments of the Lords Body For the Bread which we break is the Body of Christ who said I am the Bread of life and the Wine is his Bloud as it is written I am the true Vine Behold saith he they become a Sacrament not the substance of the Lords Body for the Bread and Wine which feed our Flesh cannot be substantially nor be said to be the Body and Bloud of Christ but Sacramentally they are so as certainly as that they are
Christ 17. Let the Champions of Transubstantiation strut and vapour now with their two and thirty stout Seconds who have stood for them as they say before the time of Pope Innocent the Third For what Innocent the Third decreed and the Council of Trent defined that it was ever the perswasion of the Catholick Church that the Bread is so changed into the Body of Christ that the substance of the bread vanishing away only the flesh of Christ should remain under the accidents of the bread is so far from being true that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation not only as to the name but as to the thing it self is wholly destitute of the Patronage of Antiquity and left to shift for it self Alphonsus à Castro said that in ancient Writers mention was made very seldom of Transubstantiation had he said never it had been more true For so our Jesuites in England confessed That the business of Transubstantiation was not so much as toucht by the ancient Fathers which is very true as will appear more at large in the following Chapter CHAP. VII Of the Writers of the Eleventh and Twelfth Century from whom we may easily deduce and trace the History of Papal Transubstantiation 1. What manner of Popes they were in those times 2. The unhappy Age wherein Divines were divided about the Point of the Eucharist 3. The opinion of Fulbertus 4. Followed by his Disciple Berengarius who is opposed by others 5 6. The Doctrine of Berengarius defended 7. The roaring of Leo the Ninth against Berengarius 8. The Synod of Tours under Victor the Second which cleared Berengarius as free from Error 9. Pope Nicolas the Second gathers another Synod against Berengarius who is forced to make a wondrous kind of Recantation 10. The Authors of the ordinary Gloss censure the Recantation imposed on Berengarius 11. He saith that he was violently compelled to make it for fear of being put to death Lanfrancus and Guitmundus write against him 12. Of Pope Hildebrand and his Roman Council wherein Berengarius was again cited and condemned in vain 13. The Doctrine of St. Bernard approved 14. The Opinion of Rupertus 15. Lombard could define nothing of the Transubstantiation of the Bread and reasons poorly upon the independency of the accidents 16. Otho Frisingensis and those of his time confest that the Bread and Wine remain in the Eucharist 17. P. Blesensis and St. Eduensis were the first that used the word of Transubstantiation 18. Of the thirteenth Century wherein Pope Innocent the Third published his Decree of the Transubstantiation of the Bread and Wine into the Body and Bloud of Christ 19 and 20. The wonderful pride of Innocent the Third The Lateran Council determined nothing concerning that Point 21. The cruelty of the same Innocent who by the Rack and the Fire sought to establish his new Doctrine 22. What Gerson said of the Roman Church in his time Many more Inventions proceed from Transubstantiation Inextricable and unheard of questions 23. New Orders of Monks and of the School-men 24. Of their fine wrangling and disputing 25. The Sacrament abused most grosly by the Patrons of Transubstantiation 26 and 27. Holkot Aquinas Albertus Magnus and other Schoolmen though sometimes they be not for Transubstantiation yet they wholly submit to the Judgment of the Pope 28. Of the Council of Constance which took the Cup from the Laity 29. Cardinal Cameracensis denies that Transubstantiation can be proved by holy Scripture 30. Of the Council of Florence and the Instruction of the Armenians by Pope Eugenius the Fourth 31. The Papal Curse in the Council of Trent not to be feared The Conclusion of the Book 1. WE have proved it before that the Leprosie of Transubstantiation did not begin to spread over the body of the Church in a thousand years after Christ But at last the thousand years being expired and Satan loosed out of his Prison to go and deceive the Nations and compass the Camp of the Saints about then to the great damage of Christian Peace and Religion they began here and there to dispute against the clear constant and universal consent of the Fathers and to maintain the new-started opinion It is known to them that understand History what manner of times were then and what were those Bishops who then governed the Church of Rome Sylvester II John XIX and XX Sergius IV Benedictus VIII John XXI Benedict IX Sylvester III Gregory VI Damasus II Leo IX Nicolas II Gregory VII or Hildebrand who tore to pieces the Church of Rome with grievous Schisms cruel Wars and great Slaughters For the Roman Pontificat was come to that pass that good men being put by they whose Life and Doctrine was pious being oppressed none could obtain that dignity but they that could bribe best and were most ambitious 2. In that unhappy Age the Learned were at odds about the presence of the Body of Christ in the Sacrament some defending the ancient Doctrine of the Church and some the new-sprung up opinion 3. Fulbert Bishop of Chartres was Tutor to Berengarius whom we shall soon have occasion to speak of and his Doctrine was altogether conformable to that of the Primitive Church as appears clearly out of his Epistle to Adeodatus wherein he teacheth That the Mystery of Faith in the Eucharist is not to be lookt on with our bodily eyes but with the eyes of our mind For what appears outwardly Bread and Wine is made inwardly the Body and Bloud of Christ not that which is tasted with the mouth but that which is relish'd by the hearts affection Therefore saith he prepare the palate of thy Faith open the throat of thy Hope and inlarge the bowels of thy Charity and take that Bread of life which is the food of the inward man Again The perception of a divine taste proceeds from the faith of the inward man whilst by receiving the saving Sacrament Christ is received into the soul All this is against those who teach in too gross a manner that Christ in this Mystery enters carnally the mouth and stomach of the Receivers 4. Fulbert was followed by Berengarius his Scholar Archdeacon of Anger 's in France a man of great worth by the holiness both of his life and doctrine as Platina Vincentius Bergomensis and many more Witness this Encomium writ soon after his death by Hildebert Bishop of Mans a most learned man is thus recorded by our William of Malmsbury That Berengarius who was so admired Although his name yet lives is now expired H' out-lives himself yet a sad fatal day Him from the Church and State did snatch away O dreadful day why didst thou play the Thief And fill the world with ruine and with grief For by his death the Church the Laws and all The Clergies glory do receive a fall His sacred wisdom was too great for fame And the whole World 's too little for his name Which to its
proper Zenith none can raise His merits do so far exceed all praise Then surely thou art blest nor dost thou less Heaven with thy Soul Earth with thy Body bless When I go hence O may I dwell with thee In thine appointed place where e're it be Now this Berengarius was not only Archdeacon of Anger 's but also the Scholasticus or Master of the Chair of the same Church which dignity is ever enyoyed by the Chancellor of the Vniversity for his Office is in great Churches to teach the Clergy and instruct them in sound doctrine All this I have produced more at large to manifest the base and injurious Calumnies cast upon this worthy and famous man by latter Writers as John Garetius of Lovain William Alan our Country-man and others who not only accuse him of being an Heretick but also a worthless and an unlearned man 5. Berengarius stood up valiantly in defence of that Doctrine which 170 years before was delivered out of Gods Word and the holy Fathers in France by Bertram and John Erigena and by others elsewhere against those who taught that in the Eucharist neither Bread nor Wine remained after the Consecration Yet he did not either believe or teach as many falsly and shamelesly have imputed to him that nothing more is received in the Lords Supper but bare Signs only or meer Bread and Wine but he believed and openly profest as St. Austin and other faithful Doctors of the Church had taught out of Gods Word that in this Mystery the souls of the Faithful are truly fed by the true Body and Bloud of Christ to life eternal Nevertheless it was neither his mind nor his doctrine that the substance of the Bread and Wine is reduced to nothing or changed into the substance of the natural Body of Christ or as some then would have had the Church believe that Christ himself comes down carnally from heaven Intire books he wrote upon this subject but they have been wholly supprest by his Enemies and now are not to be found Yet what we have of him in his greatest Enemy Lanfrank I here set down By the Consecration at the Altar the Bread and Wine are made a Sacrament of Religion not to cease to be what they were but to be changed into something else and to become what they were not agreeable to what St. Ambrose had taught Again There are two parts in the Sacrifice of the Church this is according to St. Irenaeus the visible Sacrament and the invisible thing of the Sacrament that is the Body of Christ Item The Bread and Wine which are Consecrated remain in their substance having a resemblance with that whereof they are a Sacrament for else they could not be a Sacrament Lastly Sacraments are visible Signs of divine things but in them the invisible things are honoured All this agrees well with St. Austin and other Fathers above cited 6. He did not therefore by this his Doctrine exclude the Body of Christ from the Sacrament but in its right administration he joyned together the thing signified with the sacred Sign and taught that the Body of Christ was not eaten with the mouth in a carnal way but with the Mind and Soul and Spirit Neither did Berengarius alone maintain this Orthodox and ancient Doctrine for Sigibert William of Malmesbury Matthew Paris and Matthew of Westminster make it certain that almost all the French Italians and English of those times were of the same opinion and that many things were said writ and disputed in its defence by many men amongst whom was Bruno then Bishop of the same Church of Anger 's Now this greatly displeaseth the Papal faction who took great care that those mens Writings should not be delivered to Posterity and now do write that the Doctrine of Berengarius owned by the Fathers and maintained by many famous Nations sculkt only in some dark corner or other 7. The first Pope who opposed himself to Berengarius was Leo the Ninth a plain man indeed but too much led by Humbert and Hildebrand For as soon as he was desired he pronounced sentence of Excommunication against Berengarius absent and unheard and not long after he called a Council at Verceil wherein John Erigena and Berengarius were condemned upon this account that they should say that the Bread and Wine in the Eucharist are only bare Signs which was far from their thoughts and farther yet from their belief This roaring therefore of the Lion frighted not Berengarius nay the Gallican Churches did also oppose the Pope and his Synod of Verceil and defend with Berengarius the oppressed truth 8. To Leo succeeded Pope Victor the Second who seeing that Berengarius could not be cast down and crusht by the Fulminations of his Predecessor sent his Legate Hildebrand into France and called another Council at Tours where Berengarius being cited did freely appear and whence he was freely dismist after he had given it under his hand that the Bread and Wine in the Sacrifice of the Church are not shadows and empty figures and that he held none other but the common Doctrine of the Church concerning the Sacrament For he did not alter his judgment as modern Papists give out but he persisted to teach and maintain the same Doctrine as before as Lanfrank complains of him 9. Yet his Enemies would not rest satisfied with this but they urged Pope Nicholas the Second who within a few months that Stephen the Tenth sate succeeded Victor without the Emperours consent to call a new Council at Rome against Berengarius For that sensual manner of presence by them devised to the great dishonour of Christ being rejected by Berengarius and he teaching as he did before That the Body of Christ was not present in such a sort as that it might be at pleasure brought in and out taken into the stomach cast on the ground trod under foot and bit or devoured by any beasts they falsly charged him as if he had denied that it is present at all An hundred and thirteen Bishops came to the Council to obey the Popes Mandate Berengarius came also And as Sigonius and Leo Ostiensis say when none present could withstand him they sent for one Albericus a Monk of Mont Cassin made Cardinal by Pope Stephen who having asked seven days time to answer in writing brought at last his Scroll against Berengarius The Reasons and Arguments used therein to convince his Antagonist are not now extant but whatever they were Berengarius was commanded presently without any delay to recant in that form prescribed and appointed by Cardinal Humbert which was thus I Berengarius c. assent to the holy Roman and Apostolick See and with my heart and mouth do profess that I hold that Faith concerning the Sacrament of the Lords Table which our Lord and Venerable Pope Nicholas and this sacred Council have
so called But this he declares yet more clearly Lib. 6. Etymol cap. 19. For as the visible substance of Bread and Wine nourish the outward man so the Word of Christ who is the bread of Life refresheth the souls of the faithful being received by Faith These words were recorded and preserved by Bertram the Priest when as in the Editions of Isidore they are now left out 27. And the same kind of expressions as those of Isidorus were also used by Venerable Bede our Country-man who lived in the Eighth Century In his Sermon upon the Epiphany of whom we also take these two testimonies following In the room of the flesh and bloud of the Lamb Christ substituted the Sacrament of his Body and Bloud in the figure of Bread and Wine Also At Supper he gave to his Disciples the figure of his holy Body and Bloud These utterly destroy Transubstantiation 28. In the same Century Charles the Great wrote an Epistle to our Alcuinus wherein we find these words Christ at Supper broke the bread to his Disciples and likewise gave them the Cup in figure of his Body and Bloud and so left to us this great Sacrament for our benefit If it was the figure of his body it could not be the Body it self Indeed the Body of Christ is given in the Eucharist but to the faithful only and that by means of the Sacrament of the Consecrated bread 29. But now about the beginning of the Ninth Century started up Paschafius a Monk of Corbie who first as some say whose Judgment I follow not among the Latines taught that Christ was Consubstantiated or rather inclosed in the Bread corporally united to it in the Sacrament for as yet there was no thoughts of the Transubstantiation of Bread But these new sorts of expressions not agreeing with the Catholick Doctrine and the Writings of the ancient Fathers had few or no Abettors before the Eleventh Century And in the Ninth whereof we now treat there were not wanting learned men as Amalarius Archdeacon of Triars Rabanus at first Abbot of Fulda and afterwards Archbishop of Ments John Erigena an English Divine Walafridus Strabo a German Abbot Ratramus or Bertramus first Priest of Corbie afterwards Abbot of Orbec in France and many more who by their Writings opposed this new Opinion of Pascasius or of some others rather and delivered to Posterity the Doctrine of the Ancient Church Yet we have something more to say concerning Paschasius whom Bellarmine and Sirmondus esteemed so highly that they were not ashamed to say that he was the first that had writ to the purpose concerning the Eucharist and that he had so explained the meaning of the Church that he had shewn and opened the way to all them who treated of that subject after him Yet in that whole Book of Paschasius there is nothing that favours the Transubstantiation of the Bread or its destruction or removal Indeed he asserts the truth of the Body and Bloud of Christs being in the Eucharist which Protestants deny not he denies that the Consecrated Bread is a bare figure a representation void of truth which Protestants assert not But he hath many things repugnant to Transubstantiation which as I have said the Church of Rome it self had not yet quite found out I shall mention a few of them Christ saith he left us this Sacrament a visible figure and character of his Body and Bloud that by them our Spirit might the better embrace spiritual and invisible things and be more fully fed by Faith Again We must receive our spiritual Sacraments with the mouth of the Soul and the taste of Faith Item Whilst therein we savour nothing carnal but we being spiritual and understanding the whole spiritually we remain in Christ And a little after The flesh and bloud of Christ are received spiritually And again To savour according to the flesh is death and yet to receive spiritually the true Flesh of Christ is life eternal Lastly The Flesh and bloud of Christ are not received carnally but spiritually In these he teacheth that the Mystery of the Lords Supper is not and ought not to be understood carnally but spiritually and that this dream of corporal and oral Transubstantiation was unknown to the Ancient Church As for what hath been added to this Book by the craft without doubt of some superstitious forgerer as Erasmus complains that it too frequently happens to the Writing of the Ancients it is Fabulous as the visible appearing of the Body of Christ in the form of an Infant with fingers of raw flesh such stuff is unworthy to be Fathered on Paschasius who profest that he delivered no other Doctrin concerning the Sacrament than that which he had learned out of the Ancient Fathers and not from idle and uncertain stories of Miracles 30. Now it may be requisite to produce the testimony of those Writers before mentioned to have written in this Century In all that I write saith Amalarius I am swayed by the Judgment of holy men and pious Fathers yet I say what I think my self Those things that are done in the Celebration of Divine Service are done in the Sacrament of the Passion of our Lord as he himself commanded Therefore the Priest offering the Bread with the Wine and Water in the Sacrament doth it in the stead of Christ and the Bread Wine and Water in the Sacrament represent the Flesh and Bloud of Christ For Sacraments are somewhat to resemble those things whereof they are Sacraments Therefore let the Priest be like unto Christ as the Bread and Liquors are like the Body and Bloud of Christ Such is in some manner the immolation of the Priest on the Altar as was that of Christ on the Cross Again The Sacrament of the Body of Christ is in some manner the Body of Christ For Sacraments should not be Sacraments if in some things they had not the likeness of that whereof they are Sacraments Now by reason of this mutual likeness they oftentimes are called by what they represent Lastly Sacraments have the vertue to bring us to those things whereof they are Sacraments These things writ Amalarius according to the Expressions of St. Austin and the Doctrine of the purest Church 31. Rabanus Maurus a great Doctor of this Age who could hardly be matcht either in Italy or in Germany publisht this his open Confession Our blessed Saviour would have the Sacrament of his Body and Bloud to be received by the mouth of the Faithful and to become their nourishment that by the visible body the effects of the invisible might be known For as the material Food feeds the body outwardly and makes it to grow so the Word of God doth inwardly nourish and strengthen the soul Also He would have the Sacramental Elements to be made of the fruits of the earth that as he who is God invisible appeared visible in our Flesh and