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A28850
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A treatise of Communion under both species by James Benigne Bossuet.; Traité de la communion sous les doux espèces. English.
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Bossuet, Jacques Bénigne, 1627-1704.
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1685
(1685)
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Wing B3792; ESTC R24667
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102,656
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385
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which conserves it But as nourishment followes birth if the Church had not known her selfe taught by God she durst not any longtime refuse to Christians regenerated by Baptisme that nourishment which JESUS-CHRIST has prepared for them in the Eucharist For neither JESUS-CHRIST nor the Apostles have ordained any thing left by writing concerning it The Church then has learnt by another way but alwayes equally certain what she can give or take away without doing any injury to her children and they have nothing to do but to rely upon her faith Let not our adversaryes thinke they can avoid the force of this argument under pretence that they do not understand these two passages of the Gospel as wee do I know very well they do neither understand of Baptisme with water this passage where it is said If you be not regenerated or borne again of water and the Holy Spirit nor of the eating and drinking of the Eucharist this other where it is writt If you eat not and drinke not so that they finde themselves no more obliged by these passages to give the Eucharist then Baptisme to little infants But without pressing too close upon these passages let us make them only this demande This precept Eat you this and drinke you all of it which you think is so universall dos it comprehend little children that are baptized If it comprehend all Christians what words of Scripture exclude little children Are they not Christians Woust wee give the victory to the Anabaptists who say they are not and condemne all antiquity which has acknowledged them as such But why do you except them from so generall a precept without any authority of Scripture In a word upon what foundation has your Discipline made this precise law Discip ch 12. art 2. Children under twelve yeares old shall not be admitted to the Supper but for those above that age it shall be left to the discretion of the Ministers 1. Cor. 11.28 c. Your children are they not Christians before that age Do you reject them till that age because Saint Paul has said Let a man prove himselfe and so let him eate But wee have already seene that it is no lesse precisely written Math. 21. Marke 16. Act. 2.38 Teach and baptize he that shall believe and be baptized do pennance and receive Baptisme And if your Catechisme interpret that it ought to be only in regard of such as are capable Dim 50. why shall wee not say as much of the proofe recommended by the Apostle Be it as it will the Apostle dos not decide which is the age proper for this probation One is at the age of reason before he is twelve yeares old one may before this age both sin and practise vertue why do you dispence with your children in a divine precept wherof they are capable If you say that JESUS-CHRIST has remitted that to the Church show me that permission in Scripture or believe with us that all that which is necessary to the understanding and practise the Gospel is not written and that wee must rely upon the authority of the Church § XI A reflection upon the manner how the Pretended Reformers make use of Scripture SAINT Basile advertises us that those who dispise unwritten Traditions do at the same time dispise the Scriptures themselves which they boast to follow in all things Basil de Sp. S. c. 27. This misfortune has arrived to the Gentlemen of the Pretended Reformed Religion They speake to us of nothing but of Scripture and boast they have established all the practises of their Church upon this rule Notwithstanding they easily dispence with many important practises which wee read in expresse tearmes in Scripture They have taken away the Extreame-Unction soe expressely ordained in the Epistle of Saint James James 5 1â—.15 tho this Apostle has annexed to it so cleare a promis of the remission of sins They neglect the imposition of hands practised by the Apostles towards all the faithfull in giving the Holy Ghost and as if this divine Spirit ought not to descende otherwise then visibly they dispise the ceremony by which he was given because he is now no more given after this visible manner They have no greater esteeme for the imposition of hands Discip ch 1. art s. Observ by which the Ministers were ordained For although they do ordinarily practise it they declare in their Discipline they do not believe it essentiall and that one might dispense with a practise so clearly set downe in Scripture Poit 1560. Par. 1565. Two nationall Synods have decided there was no necessity of making use of it and neverthelesse one of these Synods adds they ought to make it their businesse to conforme to one another in this ceremony because it is expedient for edification conformable to the custome of the Apostles and to the practise of the antient Church So that the custome of the Apostles manifestly written and in so many places in the words of God is no more a law to them then the practise of the antient Church to beleive ones selfe obliged to this custome is a superstition reprehended in their discipline Ch. 1. art 8. such false ideas do they frame to themselves of Religion and christian liberty But why do wee speake here of particular articles The whole state of their Church is visibly contrary to the word of God I do here with them tearme the state of the Church the society of Pastors and people which wee see there established Conf. de Foy art 31. this is that which is called the state of the Church in their confession of Faith and they there declare that this state is founded upon the extraordinary vocation of their first Reformers In vertue of this article of their Confession of Faith one of their nationall Synods has decided that when the question shall be concerning the vocation of their Pastors who have reformed the Church or concerning the establishment of the authority they had to reforme and to teach it must be referred according to the XXXI article of the Confession of Faith to an extraordinary vocation by which God interiourly pushed them on to their ministery yet in the mean time they neither prove by any miracle that God did push them interiourly to their ministry neither do they prove which is yet more essentiall by any text of Scripture that such a vocation should ever have place in the Church from whence it followes that their Pastors have no authority to preach according to these words of Saint Paul Rom. 10.15 How shall they preach unlesse they be sent and that the whole state of their Church is without foundation They flatter themselves with this vain thought that JESUS-CHRIST has left a power to the Church to give her selfe a forme and to establish Pastors when the succession is interrupted this is what M. Jurieux and M. Claude endeavour to prove without finding any thing that
about this matter But it may be they would say that in these practises I have related those who communicated sometimes under one species communicated also sometimes under the other which suffices in the whole to accomplish the precept of our Lord as if our Lord would at the same time inspire us with a firme faith that wee loose nothing by takind one species only and yet oblige us under paine of damnation to receive them both a cavill so manifest that it dos not merit to be refuted Wee must therefore at length examin once again what is essentiall to the Eucharist and prescribe our selves a rule to understand it aright This is what these Gentlemen will never do if they come not back to our principles and to the authority of Tradition M. Exam. T. VI. sect s. p. 465. Jurieux goes too far when he proposes for a rule according to the principles of his Religion to doe universally all that JESUS-CHRIST did in such sort that wee should regard all circumstances he observed at being of absolute necessity These are his own words He alleges to this purpose the antient Passeover of the Jewes where after having cut the throat of a lambe in the morning Ibid. Sect. 6.474.475 another was to have his throat cutt in the evening to be roasted to be eaten with bitter hearbs to be consumed the same night and nothing of it to be reserved till the following day He represents the necessity of all these ceremonyes and not only the substance but all the circumstances This word of JESUS-CHRIST Do this makes him conclude the same of the Eucharist So that wee should be restrained according to his principles to all that JESUS-CHRIST did and not only to bread and wine but moreover to the hour and to the whole manner of receiving it Sup. 2. p. art VI. p. 296. and the rather because as wee have seene every one had its reason and mistery as well as that which Moyses ordained concerning the antient Passeover Neverthelesse how many things have wee remarked which neither these Ministers nor wee observe Ibid. But beholde one which I omitted and which may in this place give great light Amongst other things which our Lord observed in the last Supper one of those which the Calvinists believe as most necessary is the breaking of the bread The Lutherans are of a contrary opinion and make use of round breads which they breake not This is a matter of great contest betwixt these Gentlemen The Calvinists lay much stresse upon this that the Evangelists and Saint Paul do of one common accord write that the same night JESUS CHRIST was delivered to the Jewes 1. Cor. 11.24 he tooke bread blessed it brooke it and gave it They insiste much upon this breaking of the bread which according to them represents that the Boby of our Lord was broken for us upon the Crosse and remarke with great care that Saint Paul after having said that JESUS broke bread 1. Cor. 11.24 makes him say according to the Greeke text This is my Body broken for you to shew as they pretend the reference this Bread broken has to the Body immolated So that this breaking appeares to them necessary to the mystery and this is it which makes those of Heidelberg say in their Catechisme much esteemed by those of their party Catech. Heid qu. 75. that as truly as they see the bread of the Supper broken to be given to them so truly has JESUS-CHRIST been offered and broken for us There was a proposall made for an accord or union with the Lutherans Colloq Cassel an 1661. and a conference was held for this about twenty yeares since that is in the yeare 1661. The Calvinists of Marpourg hereupon found quickly a distinction and in the declaration which they gave to the Lutherans of Rintell they said that the breaking appertained not to the essense but only to the integrity of the Sacrament as beeing necessary because of the example and command of JESUS-CHRIST so that the Lutherans ceased not to have without this breaking of the Bread the substance of the Supper and thus they might mutually tolerate one another The Calvinists have not beene that I know of reprehended by any of theirs and the union which was made had on their side its entire effect in so much that they cannot hereafter insist upon the words of the institution seing one may by their own acknowledgement haye the substance of the Supper without entirely subjecting himselfe to the institution example and expresse command of our Lord. What would they say if we should make use of such an answer But as all is permitted to the Lutherans so all is insupportable amongst Catholicks The other objections carry no greater weight and are as easily solved The concomitancy upon which the Roman Church grounds Communion under one species is not say you found in antiquity First what I have drawn from the antient Church to establish this Communion is matter of fact and if Communion under one species suppose concomitancy togeather with the reality it followes from thence that both the one and the other were believed in antiquity where Communion under one kind was so frequent Secondly Gentlemen open your own bookes open Aubertin the most learnest defendor of your doctrine Aub. lib. III. p. 431. 485. 505. 539. 570. c. you will finde there in almost every page passages taken from Saint Ambrose Amb. lib. I. in Luc. Cyr. Hieros Cat. 5. myst Greg. Nyss orat Cathec Cyr. Alex. lib IV. in Joan. c. 3. 4. Chrys hom 51.83 in Mat. lib. 3. de Sacerd 4. c. from Saint Chrysostome from the two Cyrilles and from many others where you may read that in receiving the sacred Body of our Lord they received his person it selfe seing they received say they the King in their hands they received JESUS-CHRIST and the Word of God they received his Flesh as living not as the flesh of a meere man but as the Flesh of a God Is not this to receive the Divinity togeather with the Humanity of the Son of God and in a word his entire person After this what would you call concomitancy As for those precautions used least the Eucharist should be let fall upon the ground there needes only a little fincerity to acknowledge they are as antient as the Church her selfe Aubertin will shew you them in Origines Orig. in Exod. hom 13. Cyr. Hier. Cat 5. myst Aug. 50. homil 26. Aub. lib. II. p. 431. 432. c. in S. Cyrill of Jerusalem and in Saint Augustin not to mention others You will see in these holy Doctors expressions strange to the ear of Reformere viz that to let full the least particles of the Eucharist is as if one should let fall gold and pretious stones is as if one should prejudice even his owne limbes is as if one should let slip the word of God which is annonced to us and