Aretius Zanchius to that purpose to shew that â—raction may be omitted in the very act of the Supper But Zanchy in an Epistle to a noble man hath this passage The bread is to be broken before the people after the example of Christ the Apostles and all the ancient Church and also to expresse the mystery of the passion and death of Christ which are lively represented by that action The breaking of the bread signifies 1. How we should be broken in humiliation for our sins and the pouring out of the wine how our bloud and life should be shed and poured out for our sins if we had that we deserve 2. They represent unto us how the body of Christ was broken and his bloud poured out for our sins M. Perkins Not the Palatine the French or English Churches have lately invented or brought in the breaking of the bread but the whole Apostolical ancient Church above 1500 years ago and since that time have used it according to Christs command Do this Paraeus de Ritu fractionis in S Eucharistia c. 5. See his 6th Chapter where he shews how frivolous that argument is Frangere Hebraica phrasi nihil aliud est quà m distribuere and gives this rule Where ever in Scripture the word Break concerning bread is put alone it is an Hebraism and signifies to distribute because the Hebrews above other nations used not to cut bread with a knife but to break it with their hands when they took it themselves or gave it to others to take but when the word â—ive is expresly added to it it signifieth the true breaking or dividing of the whole bread into parts as Matth. 14. 19. Mark 6. 41. Luke 9. 26. Matth. 15. 36. Mark 8. 6. and in the institution of the Supper Mat. 26. 26. Mark 14. 22. Luk. 22. 19. It is not necessarily required that the Lords Supper be administred in unleavened bread For bread is often times named and repeated but the word unleavened is never added Wherefore as it is in it self indifferent whether the wine be red or white and whatsoever the kinde or colour be if it be wine so it is not greatly material whether the bread be leavened or unleavened so it be bread Attersol of the Sac. l. 3. c. 5. The Papists pretend the institution of Christ who say they made the Sacrament of unleavened bread instituting it after he had eaten the Passeover which was to be eaten with unleavened bread according to the Law of Moses neither was there any leaven to be found in Israel seven dayes together We deny not saith Attersol but Christ mâ—ght use unleavened bread at his last Supper having immediately before eaten the Paschal Lamb yet no such thing is expressed in the Gospel The Evangelists teach He took bread but make no mention or distinction what bread b he took nor determine what bread we should take no more then limit what wine we shall use but leave it at liberty to take leavened bread or unleavened as occasion of time place persons and other circumstances serve so we take bread If Christ on this occasion used unleavened bread it was because it was usual common and ordinary bread at that time as we also should use that bread which is common It is therefore no breach of Christs Ordinance nor a transgression of the first original institution of the Lords Supper to eat either the one or the other The Papists give a mystical reason why the bread must be unleavened because hereby is signified our sincerity but this is ridiculous for if unleavened bread because it is unmixed must signifie my sincerity then the wine because it is mingled with water must signifie my duplicity and hypocrisie Whether it be leavened or unleavened bread we will not strive but take that which the Church shall according to the circumstance of the times and persons ordain Yet this we dare boldly say That in the use of leavened bread we come nearer to the imitation of Christs action then those which take unleavened For our Saviour took the bread that was usual and at hand there being only unleavened bread at the Feast of the Passeover and no other to be gotten We therefore taking the bread which is in ordinary use and causing no extraordinary bread to be made for the nonce are found to tread more nearly in the steps of our Saviour Christ. Therefore unlesse you will renew the Jewish Passeover of banishing all leaven at the time of the holy Communion your precise imitation of unleavened bread is but apish Although Azymes were used by Christ it being then the Paschal Feast yet was this occasioned also by reason of the same Feast which was prescribed to the Jews Protestants and Papists both grant it not to be of the essence of the Sacrament that it be unleavened but in its own nature indifferent When the Ebionites taught unleavened bread to be necessary the Church commanded consecration to be made in leavened bread The Grecians use leavened bread the Papists unleavened and that made up in such wafer-cakes that it cannot represent spiritual nourishment We hold either indifferent because in the institution we reade of bread without commanding leavened or unleavened De panis qualitate nos non contendimus si modo verus sit solidus panis quod de hostia Papistarum vix potest affirmari Ames Bell. Enerv. Tom. 3. Disp. 32. Cassander himself complaineth that the Papists bread is of such extream thinnesse and lightnesse that it may seem unworthy the name of bread Whereas Christ used solid and tough bread which was to be broken with the hands or cut with the knife The custome of the Christian Church by the space of above a thousand years was to put upon the sacred Table after Christs and the Apostles example a solid loaf which was broken into pieces among the Communicants for all the people did communicate Now this quantity of bread is reduced into round and light wafers in the form of a peny whereof they give this mystical reason because that Christ was sold for thirty pence and because that a peny is given for a hire unto those that have wrought in the Vineyard Matth. 20. 10. Upon these Hostes they have put the Image of a Crucifix Pet. du Moulin of the Masse lib. 1. cap. 7. lib. 3. cap. 3. The use of the Wafer-cake is defended by the Papists and some Lutherans as Gerh. loc commun Tom. 5. de Sacra Coena c. 7. but Christ used it not whose action is our instruction and also there is no Analogy or a very obscure one between the sign and thing signified Whether it be necessary to mingle water with the Eucharistical wine Aquinas saith Water ought to be mingled with wine but it is not de necessitate hujus Sacramenti Some Papists for mingling water with wine pretend the Antiquity of Councels and Fathers But we say 1. There is no such thing in
eat the Bread and drink the wine which signifies the particular applying of Jesus Christ with all the benefits of his mediation to ones own soul. Whether Christ be corporally present with the symboles in the Eucharist Corpore de Christi lis est de sanguine lis est Lis est de modo non habitura modum Christ is ascended into heaven and he is contained there Acts 3. 21. till he come to Judgement therefore he is not there under the shape of bread and wine See Matth. 26. 11. Iohn 16. 7. Acts 3. 21. 2. All the circumstances about the first Institution of the Sacrament do declare that Christ was not bodily there especially Christ eating and drinking of it himself which Cloppenburg Peter du Moulin and D. Featley hold urging Matth. 26. 29. Mark 14. 25. for that purpose Those words say they necessarily imply that before he uttered them he had drunk of the Cup which he gave to them Aquinas also holds this and the Fathers likewise saith Peter du Moulin The nature of the action saith Peter du Moulin in the place last quoted required that Christ should communicate to shew the Communion he had with us as also he did partake of our Baptism Matth. 3. 16. from whence cometh the custome of the Church that the Pastor first communicates and the people afterwards When the publick Authority of this Land were for the Papists subscription was not urged upon such violent and bloudy terms unto any Articles of their Religion as unto that of the real presence D. Iack. Epist. to the Read For the same Christ was not visibly at the Table and spake and yet invisibly under the bread and wine he did not eat and drink himself The end of the Sacrament is a remembrance of Christs death Do this in remembrance of me and You shew forth his death till he come Now how can there be any remembring of him when he is present His corporal presence and eating is made unprofitable Iohn 6. though Christ said his flesh was meat indeed yet he did not mean that it should be eaten and and drunk corporally the flesh profiteth nothing but his words are Spirit and Life Our Union and Conjunction with Christ is inward and spiritual which consists in Faith and Love it is true we are united to his body but not after a bodily manner It is against reason and sense We believe Christ to be present spiritually in the hearts of the Communicants sacramentally in the Elements but not corporally Real is 1. Opposed to that which is imaginary and importeth as much as truely 2. To that which is meerly figurative and barely representative and importeth as much as effectually 3. To that which is spiritual and importeth as much as corporally or materially The presence of Christ in the Sacrament is reall in the two former acceptions of real but not in the last for he is truly there present and effectually though not carnally or locally Doctor Featleys Transubstantiation Exploded Really and corporally are not all one that which is spiritually present is really present unlesse we will say that a Spirit is nothing The bloud of Christ is really present in Baptism to the washing away of sinne Christ is really present to the faith of every true believer even out of the Sacrament Downs Defence against the Reply of M. N. We deny that Christ is so present in the Sacrament under the forms of bread and wine as that whosoever receive the Sacrament do truely receive Christ himself The Papists say Christs natural body is present we that the merit and vertue of his body broken upon the Cross and of his bloud shed upon the Cross is present to the believing soul in the Sacrament The body of the Sun is in heaven in its sphere locally and circumscriptively but the beams are on the earth And when the Sun beams shine into our house we say here 's the Sun though it be the beams not the body of the Sun So the Scripture saith of the Sacrament This is my body Christ ascended up into Heaven as for that exception he is visibly in heaven but invisibly here it answereth not those testimonies which prove he is so there that he is not here Mat. 28. 6. q. d. he could not be in both places at once an angelical argument Aquinas saith It is not possible by any miracle that the body of Christ should be locally in many places at once because it includeth a contradiction by making it not one for one is that which is not divided from it self It is impossible say the Papists according to the course of nature but not absolutely impossible by divine miracle it may be Consubstantiation overthroweth the grounds 1. Of reason the body of one and the same man cannot be present in many places all together but must needs remain in some definite and certain place 2. Religion because Christ was taken up into heaven there to abide till the end of the world It was above a hundred years before Transubstantiation They did adore Christ as co-existent with the bread which perhaps gave occasion to Averroes to say That Christians did adore their God and then eat him Averroes his resolution was Quandoquidem Christiani adorant quod comedunt sit anima mea cum Philosophis The quarrel between Luther and Zuinglius was about Christs presence in the Sacrament which Luther held to be by way of Consubstantiation which how it could be unlesse the body of Christ were every where Zuinglius and others could not conceive Luther being pressed therewith he and his followers not being able to avoid it maintained that also But how By reason of the hypostatical Union and Conjunction thereof with the word For the word being every where and the humane nature being no where severed from it How can it be say they but every where The humanity of Christ according to its Essence or natural Being is contained in one place but according to its subsistence or personal being may rightly be said to be every where Zanch. Misc. Iud. de Dissid Coen Dom. and D. Field lib. 3. c 35. of the Church The Papists constant Doctrine is That in worshipping the Sacrament they should give unto it Latriae cultum qui vero Deo debetur as the Councell of Trent hath determined that kinde of service which is due to the true God determining their worship in that very thing which the Priest doth hold betwixt his hands This is artolatry an idolatrous worship of the bread because they adoâ—e the host even as the very person of the Sonne of God It is true they conceive it not bread but the body of Christ yet that doth not free them from bread-worship for then if the Heathen did take his stone to be a God it did free him from idolatry Hence saith a Jesuite If the bread be not turned into the body of Christ we are the greatest
and worst idolaters that ever were as upon my soul saith he it is not Adoration is not commanded in the institution of it 2. Nothing is to be worshipt with Divine Worship but God Of Transubstantiation The word Transubstantiation as the Papists grant was not used of any ancient Fathers and it was not so named among them before the Councel of Laterane which was 1215 years after Vocabulum ante Concilium Lateranense inauditum The Jesuites which call Protestants in scorn Tropists because they defend a tropical and figurative sense in that speech of Christ This is my body are yet themselves constrained to acknowledge six tropes in the other words of Christs institution of this Sacrament a figure in the word Bread another in Eat a third in Given a fourth in Shed a fifth in Cup a sixth in Testament B. Morton of the Masse lib. 6. cap. 2. Sect. 4. The Papists to avoid one signe runne into many strange ones by the demonstrative Hoc they understand they know not what neither this Body nor this Bread but an individuum vagum something contained under the accidents of Bread which when the Priest saith Hoc it is Bread but when he hath muttered out Meum it is Christs body By the copulative Est is they understand either shall be as soon as the words are spoken or is converted unto or by Body they understand such a Body as indeed is no body without extension of place without faculty sense or motion The very term Matth. 26. 26. manifestly evinceth the truth This What That which he took viz. Bread therefore it must needs be a figurative speech 1 Cor. 10. 4. The Apostle speaking of the Bread being consecrated still calleth it Bread six times at least He calleth it indeed the Bread and this Bread to shew the difference of it from other Bread and the excellency of it above other bread but yet bread Therefore it is still bread of the same substance as other bread is though in respect of use incomparably better And so for the wine Matth. 26. 29. after consecration he saith I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the Vine He doth not say in general Of the fruit of the Vine but particularly with a demonstrative pronoun Of this fruit of the Vine viz. that which he had blest and delivered to the Apostles Transubstantiation was first occasioned by the unwary speeches of Damascene and Theophylact they were hyperbolical in their expressions about the real presence of Christ in the Sacrament Some of the ancient Fathers speaking of the sacramental Elements after consecration being then set apart from common use called it a mutation saying that the Elements were changed into another nature but withall they expresse their meaning to be not the changing of their substance but their use from being common bread and wine to become sacramental or sacred 1 Cor. 11. 27. The Apostle distinguisheth these four things Bread Body Cup and Bloud the Bread and Wine therefore receive no other change but that of use signification and relation 1 Cor. 10. 16. He distinguisheth also Bread from the Body Bread is the subject of the proposition and the Communion of his Body the predicate Reasons against Transubstantiation First Then Christ must hold himself in his own hands eat and drink his own flesh and bloud for the Papists say He did eat the Sacrament with his Disciples Secondly Christ must needs have two Bodies the one broken and having the bloud separated from it in the Cup the other whole and having the bloud in it which holds the Cup. Thirdly Christs bloud then should be shed before his crucifying and so a propitiatory Sacrifice offered to God before the Sacrifice of Christ upon the Crosse. Fourthly One body should be now in a thousand places at a time Fifthly A true body should be without bignesse void of all dimensions Corpus non quantum Sixthly Accidents should be without a subject but Aristotle saith Accidents are entis rather then entia Accident is esse est inesse the very essence of an Accident as it is an Accident is to be in some subject Vide Aquin. 1a 1ae Quaest 90. Artic. 2. Seventhly The same thing should be and not be at the same time or should be before it was Eightly This is an inhumane thing none eat mans flesh but Cannibals Ninthly Then the senses should be deceived we see bread we smell bread we touch bread and taste bread Tenthly There is no alteration in the sign of Baptism and there is the same use of the sign of the Lords Supper Matth. 26 26. Iesus took bread and blessed and brake it and gave it to his Disciples and said Take Eat This is my Body What our Saviour took that he blessed what he blessed that he brake what he brake he delivered to the Disciples what he delivered to them of that he said This is my Body But it was Bread that he took the Evangelist so saith and Bread therefore that he blessed Bread that he brake Bread that he delivered and Bread consequently of which he said This is my Body The universal custom of the Scripture in all places where like kinde of speaking is used plainly leades us to a figure see 1 Cor. 10. 4. The Hebrews wanting a proper word to set forth that which we mean by signifying do ever in stead of that use the word is When Ioseph had heard Pharaohs dream he saith The seven years of good corn are seven years of plenty and the seven thin ears seven years of dearth Gen. 41. 26 27. so the seven fat kine are seven years that is by way of signification and representation So Ezek. 37. 11. Dan. 2. 38. 7. 17. whence it comes that in the New Testament where the manner of speaking by the Hebrews is imitated the word is in matter of signs is used for the word signifie So in the Parable That which is sowed upon stony ground is he that heareth and after The seed is the Word Luk. 8. 11. the Reapers the Angels so I am the Vine Revel 17. 12. The ten Kings are ten horns Hagar is mount Sinai in Arabia 2. The Apostle Paul clearly goes before us in this interpretation for he saith the bread which we break is the communion of the body of Christ because it was appointed for a certain means of making us partakers of his body Our Saviour said long before viz. John 6. 63. that the flesh profiteth nothing that is the flesh by eating of it profits nothing for in no other sense can it be said to profit nothing See 2 Cor. 5. 16 17. Their Legend tels us that some Boyes getting by heart and pronouncing the words of Consecration Hoc est Corpus meum turned all the Bakers bread in the street into flesh In the Book of the Conformities of St Francis there is a miracle recorded for Transubstantiation that on a time Prier Francis
we come to see that the Sacraments are the Lords Ordinances and that those things which he promiseth in the Covenant of Grace and sealeth in the Sacrament are farre better then all profits and pleasures in this world By it we come to be stirred up to desire and long after these benefits and so to covet them that nothing in this world will satisfie us without them We should exercise faith at the Lords Table view the arguments the Ordinance it self affords 1. Here is Christ crucified before thine eyes and he clearly offers it to thy soul in particular he applies it to thee This is my body which was broken for thee and my bloud which was shed for thee Run over the sad story of Christs agony and say This was done by my Lord for my poor soul. 2. The Lord cals thee hither on purpose because thou art weak He will cherish weak beginnings Mat. 12. 20. For our affections we must behave our selves with joy comfort and reverence See 2 Chron. 30. 21. Mat. 26. 30. Thy heart should be cheerful in God and thankful praise him Thankfulnesse and joy are the effects of faith the Ordinances are often compared to feasts and banquets because of the spiritual delight and rejoycing which the soul ought to take in them Hence the very Sacrament is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because of the giving thanks unto God for his mercies The outward duty is comfortable Circumcision was a bloudy rite yet this is nothing to the inward sweetnesse Iohn 4. 32. In one of the Evangelists it is said Christ blest the bread in another it is said Christ gave thanks Christ when he instituted this Sacrament gave thanks to God the Father that he was pleased to send him into the world to die for poor souls Fear is proper to the duty of the Supper because of those excellent mysteries Chrysostom cals this Table Horribilis mystica mensa Psal. 68. 35. mixt affections do best in a mixt state in the whole worship of God Psal. 2. 11. Hos. 3. 7. For our thoughts We must meditate 1. On the outward signs and what they signifie 2. On the dainties prepared 3. The love of him that prepared them 4. On our communion with Christ his Graces and faithful people The effect of these affections and thoughts will be stirring up the heart to thanksgiving When we taste the wine we should consider its properties Psal. 104. 15. Iudg. 9. 13. so there is satisfaction to God and comfort to the creature in the bloud of Christ wine ingenders new spirits warms and refines them the bloud of Christ infuseth a new vigour into the soul. Our Communion with Christ in the Supper is not only with his gifts and graces but with his Person whole Christ. There are two Elements to signifie this Bread his Body and Wine his Bloud Our Communion is with his whole Person with Christ invested with all kinde of Offices to do us good and furnished with rich graces and comforts 1 Iohn 5. 16. We partake of his wisdom as a Prophet righteousnesse as a Priest grace and glory as a King What must be done after the Sacrament We must endeavour to finde an increase of faith love and all saving graces in us abounding more and more in well-doing We should speak of the sweetnesse of Christ to others Psal. 34. 8. Some Disciples have gone from this Supper triumphing and trampling upon Satan as Lions breathing fire saith Chrysostome terrible to the Devils themselves If we finde not the fruit of this Ordinance presently either it may come from want of preparation or from trusting in our own preparation 2 Chron. 26. 15 16. or want of thankfulnesse for our preparation 1 Chron. 29. 14. or from want of stirring up the graces we have received in that duty Isa. 57. 8. 2 Tim. 1. 6. Or Because we were not humbled for former neglects Psal. 32. 4 5. God may deny us the present sense of our benefit 1. To train us up to live by faith 2 Cor. 5. 7. 2. To try our graces 3. That we may more diligently search into our own souls Psal. 77. 6. How oft ought the Sacrament to be received Amongst the Papists the people communicate only once a year viz. at Easter which superstitious custom many of our ignorant people follow Calvin 4. Institut 43. 46. roundly professeth that it behoveth that the Eucharist be celebrated at least once a week The Christians in some parts of the Primitive Church took the Sacrament every day because they did look to die every day Now in many places it is administred every moneth Object The Passeover unto which the Lords Supper succeedeth was celebrated once a year and therefore once only for this Sacrament is sufficient Answ. God ordained that the Passeover should be celebrated but once only in the year and on a certain moneth and day the Jews had many other visible signs to represent Christ and his benefits they had Sacrifices every day and legal washings but he hath appointed that this Feast of the Lords Supper should be often solemnized and that we should come often unto it 1 Cor. 11. 25 26. That the frequent celebration of the Sacrament is a duty is inferred from this Text by Peter Martyr Calvin Musculus Aretius Hyperius Tossâ—nus Pareus Piscator Dickson and Mr Pemble See Iohnsons Christian Plea Chap. 14. In the time of the Apostles the purest age of the Church they solemnized it every Lords day Acts 20. 7. yea it was their daily exercise as often almost as they had any publick meeting for the service of God Acts 2. 42. And this custom long continued in the Primitive Church after the Apostles times not only in the dayes of Iustin Martyr and Tertullian but also of Chrysostom and Augastine as appeareth by their writings untill by mans corruption and Satans malice the commonnesse of the action exposed it to contempt We should come often to the Sacrament there is no exception but want of occasion or some just impediment There was in old time a custom there should be a Communion every Lords day every one not receiving without lawful excuse being excommunicated which Charls the Great in some sort renewed and which Bucer advised K. Edward in this Land to restore again Whether if an Ordinance and namely the Sacrament of the Lords Supper though there seems to be the like reason in other Ordinances cannot be so administred but that by some which partake of it it will notoriously be prophaned that be a sufficient reason for the non-administration of it Or Whether for want of order and government to keep off such as are notoriously unworthy the administration of the Sacrament may and ought to be suspended Again Whether a Minister may lawfully and with a good conscience continue there in the exercise of his Ministery having a Pastoral charge where he hath not power to administer the Sacrament of
Sixthly Those that are used to great visions of God Salomons heart departed from the Lord that appeared to him twice Eclipsis lunaris nunquam contingit nisi in plenilunio The Saints of God are often gainers by their sinne Rom. 8. 28. Good comes to them this way by accident the Lord over-ruling it by his wisdom and grace First Hereby a man is discovered to himself sees that in his own heart which he never saw before 2 Chron. 32. 31. Secondly The work of his humiliation and repentance is perfected this use Paul made of his grievous sins I was a persecutor saith he Thirdly The work of regeneration is perfected Luke 22. 32. Fourthly He exalts the grace of God so Paul Fifthly It makes him watch over his own heart and shun the occasions of sinne the more Sixthly It makes him the more compassionate to others when they fall Gal. 6. 1. CHAP. XII Two Questions resolved about sinne Quest. 1. HOw can grace and corruption stand together so that corruption poisons not grace nor grace works out corruption when the admitting of one sin by Adam kill'd him presently Answ. Perfect holinesse cannot stand with any corruption but when the first lines only of Gods Image are drawn they may stand with corruption If corruption should destroy grace or grace corruption formally yet they may be mixed together in gradu remisso God hath undertaken not to withdraw himself from them God though he could take away the seeds of sins yet suffers such remainders of corruption to abide in his people for divers good reasons 1. Because the Lord delights in this world rather to shew grace to the persons of his servants then to their natures 2. Because he would humble them as Paul when exalted above measure and have them live on free grace 2 Pet. 1. 9. The Devil tempted Adam though he was created perfect telling him he should be as God if from a state of sin there should be such a sudden change to perfection men would be apt to swell The Antinomians will have nothing to do with the Law and then since by the Law comes the knowledge of transgression they think they are without sin and after that they are perfect like God 3. He delights in their fervent hearty prayers he would have his children daily begging of him 4. He would have them long to be dissolved and to be at home with him 5. That he might magnifie the power of the in-dwelling vertue of his Spirit that a little grace should dwell amidst great corruptions 6. That we might deal gently with our brethren when they fall Gal. 6. 1. Quest. 2. Wherein lies the difference between a man sanctified and unsanctified in regard of the body of corruption Answ. There are these apparent differences 1. An unregenerate man hath a body of corruption in him and nothing else all his thoughts in him are only evil continually a regenerate man hath a body of grace as well as of corruption 2. The natural man carries the guilt of it with him the reward of his body of sinne is death and destruction but in the regenerate man the guilt that is the power to binde him over to the wrath of God is wholly done away in the bloud of Christ Gods displeasure doth not redundare in personam the person is pardoned though the sin remain 3. The body of corruption hath the whole rule in the unregenerate man it is the active principle from which all is wrought but in the other grace strugleth against it The Papists say 1. There is no such body of corruption left in a man when he is regenerate in Baptism or when Regeneration is wrought the body of corruption is taken away 2. They say Concupiscence never was a sin but was in Adam in the state of Innocency 3. That the good workes of regenerate men are perfect This may minister consolation to the people of God who finde these reliques of corruption they are unteachable sinful can do nothing well 1. This is the condition more or lesse of all the servants of God 2. These corruptions are not imputed to thee the Lord loves thee as well as if thou wert rid of them 3. Thy loathing thy self for them is as pleasing to God as if thou couldst perform perfect duties 4. Christ will reign in thee in the midst of these his enemies 5. He will deliver thee from these reliques of corruption when he hath done good to thee by them 6. This should make thee humble and watchful CHAP. XIII Of the Saints care to preserve themselves from sin and especially their own iniquities GODS people must and will carefully preserve themselves from wickednesse 2. They must bend their care most against their own sins The first Proposition is proved out of 1 Iohn 5. 18. Our Saviour saith Take heed to your selves of the leven of the Pharisees and take heed of covetousnesse take heed to your selves that your hearts be not oppressed with surfetting and drunkennesse Paul bids Timothy to keep himself pure 2 Cor. 7. 11. Among other fruits of godly sorrow the Apostle begins with care or diligence which is the duty we are now speaking of viz. a care not to sin Psal. 119. I hid thy law in my heart that I might not sinne against thee I took pains to with-draw my self from sinne Let every one that nameth the name of the Lord depart from iniquity Reasons 1. Why the people of God ought to keep themselves in this manner 2. Why they can and will do so First They are bound to do so in divers respects 1. Because of the many advantages which sinne hath against them in regard of which they will be miserably overtaken with it if they do not look to themselves 1. A naughty nature within them by which they are apt to all sinne as occasion temptation and their natural ability doth serve which if it be not opposed will break forth very much 2. We have an enemy the Devil who doth observe and watch us with all subtilty and malice with unwearied diligence it is his businesse to draw us to sinne to suggest evil fancies into us and to work upon our corruption we see how he impoisoned our first parents when they were not careful 3. The world is stored with variety of means to draw a man to every sin objects to every sense incouragements provocations examples Great danger of sinning requires great diligence to prevent the danger 2. We must consider of the hurt that will befall us from sinne if through our carelesnesse we suffer it to get the better of us not to speak of the mischief of eternal death a holy man may run into great sins and shall surely do so without great care and watchfulnesse and those will be very hurtful unto him they will break off his communion with God interrupt the peace of his conscience deface Gods Image in him and disable him from praying or doing any good duty and fill him
men of most fame and reputation not for command and wealth alone but also for learning and piety These did seek to discredit him out of their repining envy these vilified his Person depraved his best actions and did cast the worst imputation they could upon him They vilified our Saviours person by the basenesse of his parents his kindred and profession Is not this Iosephs son is not Mary his mother and his brethren Iames and Ioses Simon and Iude Is not he the Carpenter They gave it forth that he was a drunkard a glutton a rioter a companion with the basest fellows even Publicans and sinners they depraved his actions 1. His Doctrine as heretical crossing Moses his Law and treasonous that he forbad to pay tribute unto Caesar. 2. His miracles as magical they reported that he did all those miracles for which the people did so much honour him not by the power and singer of God but by the black Art of hellish conjuration even by the aid and working of Beelzebub the chief of Devils These said he was a wicked and prophane fellow a man that did not regard the Sabbath of the Lord. These were bold to lay to his charge that horrible and sacrilegious crime of blasphemy saying Why doth this man blaspheme and for thy blasphemy we seek to stone thee Lo to be traduced of men famous for knowledge and religion and for honour and wealth as a boon companion as a wine bibber a fellow for harlots a prophane polluter of the Sabbath an horrible blasphemer of God this was the bitter cup which our Lord Jesus was fain to drink Could he suffer greater and more intollerable ignominy Nay at one time they were so audacious as to tell him to his face Thou art mad and hast a Devil Now consider thirdly his Labour his travel on foot many a weary step and long journey from Galilee to Ierusalem from Ierusalem to Galilee and from quarter to quarter and Countrey to Countrey sometimes on foot with sweat and toil till he was even weary and tired again glad to sit down and rest him as once at the Well of Iacob sometimes by Sea in a Ship when the furious windes conspired against him and raised such a storm as if the ship must have been swallowed up in the vast belly of the waves and as if the Devil would have watched his opportunity to have drowned him sleeping for as for riding upon a beast he never took that ease unto himself except alone one time and that the last of all that he went to Ierusalem and then poorly mounted upon the bare back of a silly fole of an Ass that was never accustomed to the saddle before with a jerkin or a coat or two cast on him in stead of better furniture A toilsom life indeed to do nothing else but go afoot from City to City and sometimes also to be ready to be prest to death with the throng of a rude and unmannerly multitude You have his Labours now consider Fourthly His Dangers He lived in quietnesse and safety enough during his Carpenters imployment but when he came to be a Minister he was still persecuted At Nazareth his own City where he was not born but bred up the first Sermon as I think that ever he preached there because he was somewhat plain in telling them of their faults they laid violent hands upon him and would have broke his neck down a steep hill on which the Town was built After as he grew more famous for wonders so he was more hated and maligned by the Rulers many times they conspired to take and intrap him sent Officers to apprehend him took up stones to dash out his brains and commanded that whosoever knew where he was should make it known that they might apprehend him and that he which would confesse him to be the Christ should be excommunicated insomuch that he was called A stone of offence and a sign to be spoken against and he saith The world hateth me yea they have hated me without a cause Insomuch that he could not walk openly amongst them but was fain to hide himself after a sort and to flie for his life for they were scarce ever without some or other device to take him and put him to death You have heard of his Perils let us speak Fifthly of his Sorrows He was a man of Sorrows full of grief and tears for he was not a stone or a piece of iron that all these things did not touch him but he was sensible of these evils and felt the heat of his Fathers displeasure against him for our sins for which he had undertaken to answer in all these things and especially the memorial of his last passion did wonderfully grieve and trouble him Luk. 12. 50. How am I straitned or pained till it be accomplished not with such a grief as made him unwilling to come to it but with such as made him desire that it were once over He often set his thoughts a work upon his last sufferings he foretold his Disciples of it some four or five times no question but he considered of it himself many hundred times and not one of them without a vehement working of sorrow as if one of us should know that some two or three year hence he must be put to the rack or burned at a stake he could not but bestow full many a heavy thought upon that hour so did our Lord without all controversie with many frequent requests and humble tearfull mournfull prayers supplicating to God for aid and help against that hour according as the many complaints and praiers made by David his Type in the Psalms do manifestly evince Now come we to the last scene of this Tragedy his end The conclusion of his life just like a Tragedy was most distressed and lamentable of all the other parts whether you consider the things he suffered from God immediatly or the things he endured before in and after his death The first and great work of his Passion was the agony and bloudy sweat grief astonishment and extream heavinesse which he sustained in the garden He began to be heavy and greatly grieved saith one Evangelist and To be astonished saith another and He was in an agony saith the third in so much that great drops of bloud trickled from him to the ground The two tormentingst passions that man doth wrestle withall in this life more insufferable then any rack or disease of the body are sorrow and fear which if they be in the greatest extremity that can be are the greatest miseries that can be Now so they were in him for the word saith he complained thus My soul is sorrowfull round about even to death so much as was enough to have killed him not with the suddennesse of it for that kils easily and quickly but with the extream inwardnesse and weight of it and his fear is called astonishment and amazement There is 1. An amazement
Pet. 1. 12. Iam. 2. 19. 3. Sensible 1. Because they have their operation chiefly on the sensitive part of man manifest themselves there and forcible because they move with force 1 Chron. 29. 3. 4. According to the object propounded Affections are but the shaping or forming of the will in several motions according to the object presented Their use is to shunne evil and pursue good The manner of doing is by certain stirrings motions workings of the bloud and spirit about the heart They are commonly called passions Iam. 5. 17. because they imprint some passion on the body by working In the infancy they are affections in the youth and age passions when they over-rule reason perturbations Passions abstractively considered are neither good nor bad morally but as they are determined to this or that object as they are in man the subject who is wholly flesh and dead in sinne his affections and passions are defiled with sinne as well as the understanding and the will The Papists though they say the superiour faculties of the soul like the upper region are altogether clear and undefiled yet the inferiour faculty viz. the sensitive appetite in which are lodged the affections they say is vitiated with sin Their sinfulnesse appears 1. In that they are not carried to the right object the object of love was God and his Law of hatred sin now these passions are clean contrary 2. If to the right object then inordinately they cannot joy but overjoy love but overlove Ephes. 4. 26. 3. There is a contrariety in them this is implied in that Phil. 4. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be careful for nothing the word implies a tearing and torturing of the heart 4. In their distraction this differeth from contrariety that is when one passion sets against another this when one passion is too inordinately set upon his object then the other cannot do his proper office because the heart is finite the Apostle would have us hear and pray without wrath since the heart hereby is so distracted that it cannot attend 5. The importunity of passion Ahab fell sick because of Naboths vineyard Quicquid volunt valde volunt 6. Their tyranny over the will and understanding Iam. 1. 14. 7. Their incertainty and inconstancy as Ammon loathed Tamar after he had his desire more then he liked her before To be above passions will be our happinesse in heaven rightly to order them should be our great care here First The Scripture bids us not cast off but rectifie our affections Colos. 3. 1. 1 Iohn 2. 15. Secondly They are natural faculties planted in the soul by God himself and so in themselves good Christ which was free from all sinne was not without affections He was angry did grieve rejoyce Now we must not dare to abuse any power which he did sanctifie Thirdly Affections rightly ordered much further and help our course in godlinesse If we joy not in prayer delight not in obedience the work is tedious but good affections make the work delightsom they are spurs in our sides which whosoever wanteth goes on but in a dull and slow pace Fourthly Manifold are the evils which come from disordered passions 1. They blinde the judgment Perit omne judicium cum res transit ad affectum Impedit ira animum ne possit cernere verum If the Spectacles be of green or red glasse all things through them seem to be of the same colour 2. They seduce the will for the will sometimes is guided by reason it is often also carried away by passion 3. They fill the heart with inward unquietnesse they interrupt prayers 1 Pet. 5. 7. and hinder the working of the Word 1 Pet. 2. 1. They disturb reason and hinder a man in Meditation whereby his heart is quieted When fear anger jealousie begin to stirre then is judgement disturbed and hindered Again these passions fight one with another fear with anger and anger with fear joy with sadnesse and sadnesse with joy one passion carries a man one way and another another way Passion can never be satisfied 4. They often when they are excessive hurt the body some by immoderate joy have ended their dayes because the spirits slie out too suddenly to the object and so leave the heart destitute of them more by grief and fear because the bloud and spirits so hastily slie to the heart that they choak it anger hath stopt many a mans breath envy is the rottennesse of the bones The regenerate man is renewed in all his passions as we may see in Davids love Psal. 119. 9. in his hatred Psal. 130. 22. in his desire Psal. 35. 9. in his fear Psal. 119. 120. in his delight Psal. 119. 6. Psal. 16. 2. in his sorrow Psal. 119. 138. Some make zeal to be sanctified anger There are in repentance melting affections sorrow for sinne Zech. 12. 10 11 12. shame before God Ezra 9. 6. Lam. 3. 29. 3. sear of offending him Prov. 28. 14. Marks of sanctified affections 1. They must be universal carried to all good and against all evil Some love to hear the Word some to reade some to pray but they are not as carefull to subdue passion they will be angry pettish discontented they will give way to doubting The affections are regular when they are set on their right objects inlarged when they take in the whole object He that loves God loves whole God loves him not only as gracious merciful but as just holy faithful he that hates sin hates all the evil of it Ephes. 3. 18. 2. They are subjected to grace in the rise measure and continuance of them they must rise and fall ebbe and slow at the command of faith according to the nature of the thing presented Faith will make us affect things according as the Lord doth in cases which concern his glory affections must be raised up to the highest pitch Adams passions were subject to reason 1. In their rise they were commanded by him 2. In their measure 3. In their continuance 3. Sanctified affections do constantly and most immediately discover themselves in Meditations projects inward desires and indeavours of the soul if thy thoughts of sin be pleasant thou hatest it not 4. The true metal of Sanctification is sincerity and the edge of it zeal in every faculty Motives to get the affections sanctified 1. All Christians are really as their affections are and God judgeth of them by their affections A man that is carnal in his affections is judged a carnal man and one who hath his affection set on heavenly things is judged a spiritual man I am my Beloveds and my Beloved is mine he doth not say I am Christs and Christ is mine 2. Without sanctified affections one is no Christian at all Deut. 5. 29. 3. Most of the Gospel promises are made to the affections Mat. 4. 6. and so to love fear delight and confidence in God 4. Holy and enlarged affections from God are one
It is a great debasement for a man to be under that which should be his slave Directions how to get this faculty sanctified 1. We shall never get it under the yoke untill we can get the soul to finde satisfaction in better things Communion with God Paul could abound and want All the Philosophy in the world cannot take thy soul off till grace doe their own rules took not their hearts off because they had not better things to satisfie it 2. Watch diligently over thy senses Satans Cinque-ports what undid Achan I saw a fine garment and then I coveted The Whore in the Proverbs allured the young man by inveigling most of his senses I made a Covenant with my eyes saith Iob. 3. We must be careful of our inward senses our thoughts of earthly things 4. Pray much to the Lord that he would keep us in his holy fear The vegetative soul is a power of attracting concocting and expelling what is superfluous it was not gracious in innocency nor sinful by the fall the perversness of it was brought in by sin but sub ratione poenae CHAP. XXVIII Of the Sanctification of Mans Body and all the External Actions THe body as well as the soul was redeemed by the price of Christs bloud taken into union with him and shall be glorious to all eternity I shall here handle four things 1. The Nature of the Body 2. The Image of God in it before the fall 3. It s Corruption 4. It s sanctifying by the Spirit Of the first It is one of the most curious pieces of all Gods workmanship Psal. 139. 14 15. The operation of the soul much depends on the temper or distemper of the body 2. What the Image of God was in mans body before the fall God is a Spirit how can the body be his Image The Schoolmen say it stood in three things 1. In the admirable frame and composure of it this is not probable 2. In its Majesty which carried a beam of God in it bruit beasts did stoop to him as their Lord. 3. It bore Gods Image significativè it was the vessel wherein the soul did act that holinesse which was Gods Image The comlinesse of any mans body depends not on outward decking but when it is imployed in the works of holinesse 3. The depravation of the body since mans fall It is a great Question Wherein the sinfulnesse of the body lies because there is no sin in it till the soul comes nor when it is gone Yet that there is sin in it appears by 1 Thess. 5. 23. It s sinfulnesse consists in three things 1. In its fitnesse to sin Rom. 6. 13. 2. In its readinesse to sin there is not only a passive fitnesse but an active readinesse in the members to sinne Act. 13. 10. The feet are swift to shed bloud 3. In its greedinesse to the service of sin Deut. 29. 19. The whole body of original corruption dwels in our bodies Rom. 6. Let not sin reign in your mortal bodies This corruption desiles the body within and issues out likewise sometimes it will inwardly burn with lust and anger The members of our bodies are the instruments of sin The Tongue was given man to be an instrument of Gods glory therefore David calleth it his Glory since our fall the Spirit of God saith It is a world of wickednesse One hath written a large Treatise of the sins of the Tongue with that we curse God and rail on men much uncleannesse is acted by it One reckoneth up four and twenty several sins of the Tongue lying swearing ribaldry scoffing flattering quarrelling deceiving boasting tatling c. It is compared to a sharp two-edged sword to a razor to sharp arrows to an Adders sting to the poyson of an Asp to fiery coles to the fire of hell Eyes Eyes full of adultery 1 Pet. 2. an evil eye a covetous eye Ears A deaf ear to that which is good itching ears Hands Full of violence oppressing Feet Swift to shed bloud 4. The work of Grace in sanctifying mans body When the whole work of Sanctification is intended God sometimes names onely the sanctifying of mans body Rom. 12. 1 Thess. 4. 3 4. Rom. 6. 12 13. 1 Cor. 6. 13 19. The work of Grace in sanctifying the body stands not in making it the immediate and proper subject of Grace that being spiritual cannot have its seat in mole corporea but in these particulars 1. It shall be no longer at the command of the devil or a lust 1 Cor. 6. 15. Iob 31. 1. Psal. 141. 3. 2. It is consecrated to the Lord Rom. 12. 1. 1 Cor. 6. 19 20. It is made the Temple of the holy Ghost where the holy Ghost resides he will spiritually adorn it that it shall be no more inthralled to sin 3. It is taken into a real and indissoluble union with God himself 1 Cor. 6. Your bodies are the members of Christ. 4. Our bodies are the instruments by which the Spirit of God and our souls work Sanctification Rom. 6. Give up your members as instruments of righteousnesse 1 Cor. 6. 20. David often calleth on his tongue to blesse God naming it his glory it exalts Gods praises ministers grace to the hearers Psal. 141. 3. The bridling of the tongue standeth 1. In forbearing words 1. Sinful simply whether 1. Impious against Gods 1. Being Authority and Greatnesse 2. Worship and Word 3. Name and Honour 4. Sabbath and Rest. 2. Injurious against 1. Those that we have relation to 1. Betters irreverent 2. Equals comparing and disgracing 3. Inferiours vilifying contemning 2. All men viz. 1. Unkinde passionate provoking and bitter words against the sixth Commandment 2. Impure unclean against the seventh 3. Fraudulent and deceitfull against the eighth Commandment 4. Whispering slandering flattering bragging backbiting against the ninth Commandment 2. Superfluous too many Prov. 10. 8 10. 1 Tim. 5. 11. 3. Impertinent not to the purpose not concerning ones self Psal. 73. 9. 4. Idle to no purpose Matth. 13. 36. 5. Unseasonable uttered out of time and place as to apply the comforts of the Gospel to him which is not at all humbled or denounce the terrours of the Law against one who is too much already pressed with the sense of his sins 2. In using speech which is 1. Alwayes gracious viz. 1. Discreet 2. Gentle 3. Lowly 4. True 2. Often religious Motives to preserve our bodies in purity Consider First What an excellent piece the body of man is in the Lords Creation of it wherein the Power Wisdom and Goodnesse of God appears Secondly Rather then it should be lost Christ hath bought it with his precious bloud 1 Cor. 6. Thirdly Thy body is joyned to Christ and all the members are made members of his body Fourthly The holy Ghost dwels in it God hath two thrones the highest heavens and the body and soul of a believer God would not let any natural filthiness be amongst them while he was present
so called because it is to be received Sacramente Tertullian was the first that used this word the Church hath used it a long time it being above fourteen hundred years since he wrote Some think the names of Gods appointing are better then what are given by Ecclesiastical custom II. The Proper Nature of a Sacrament It is an applying of the Covenant of Grace to Gods people for their good by visible Signs Signum est quod praeter speciem quam ingerit sensibus aliud quidpiam in cognitionem inducit A sign is that which represents one thing to the eye and outward senses and another to the minde Circumcision is called a sign and a seal Rom. 4. 11. See Gen. 17. 11. Some signs are only significant as the ivie of wine some obsignative as the seal the thing contained in the Writ some exhibitive as anointing the Prophetical Kingly or Priestly Office The Sacraments do not only signifie the promise of Grace in Christ but also seal and exhibit the thing promised Vossius de Sacramentorum vi efficacia The Sacraments are signs to represent Instruments to convey Seals to confirm the Covenant Others thus distinguish of Signs First Some only serve to signifie and call to remembrance as the Picture of a man is such a sign as cals him to remembrance Secondly A ratifying sign as a Seal if one conveys Lands or Goods to another and sets his Seal to it this further clears his Title Thirdly Which exhibit the putting on a Cap or Ring makes him a Master or Doctor the delivering of one a Staff is the making of him a Lord Chamberlain the Sacrament is all these Christ cals to thy remembrance and sets before thy eyes all the benefits that come by him and shews thee all thy duties thou owest him 2. It is a sealing sign so circumcision is called Christ Grace the Promises Heaven are thine 3. It is an exhibiting sign brings Christ to the beleever communicates him more to him What ever other Ordinance the Church hath wanted ever since the Lord had a Church on earth it hath had this When man was perfect God gave him Sacraments even in Paradise the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Some Sacraments God gave unto man 1. In his innocent estate which were two 1. The Tree of Life 2. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. 2. In his corrupt estate 1. Either before Christ prefiguring him 2. Or after Christ as memorials of him The Sacraments before Christ were 1. Either such as did belong to all sorts of people 1. The Flood and Noahs preservation in it 2. The Rainbow 2. Such as were peculiarly appointed to the Jews 1. Extraordinary during but for once or a short time and answering either to Baptism as 1 Cor. 10. 1. The Red Sea 2. The Cloud or to the Lords Supper 1. Manna 2. The Water flowing out of the Rock 2. Ordinary as 1. Circumcision answering to our Baptism Col. 1. 2. 2. The Passeover answering to the Lords Supper The Sacraments after Christs coming to continue till the end of the world were 1. Baptism 2. The Lords Supper III. What is the use of the Sacraments in the Church and what benefit the people of God receive from them They convey the mercies of the whole Covenant of Grace therefore Circumcision is called the Covenant Gen. 17. All the benefits of Christ are applied in the Sacraments the water out of the Rock is called Christ 1 Cor. 10. God doth nothing by the Word or Prayer but this Ordinance doth the same thing the one of the Sacraments is for begetting of life the other for confirming it It is an application of the whole Covenant of grace in a sign IV. The Parts of a Sacrament A Sacrament taken in its full extent comprehendeth two things in it 1. Rem terrenam That which is outward and visible which the Schools call properly Sacramentum And 2. Rem coelestem That which is inward and invisible which they term Rem Sacramenti the principal thing exhibited in the Sacrament 3. This sign must have the expresse Commandment of Christ for none can institute a Sacrament but he that can give the inward grace 4. There must be a promise of divine grace else it is no seal and it must be annexed to the Sacrament by God The command is for our warrant the promise for our encouragement In Baptism 1. the signum is washing with water 2. the signatum the bloud of Christ applied by the Spirit Iohn 3. 5. Tit. 3. 5. This was represented by the vision at our Saviours Baptism of the holy Ghost descending upon him in the similitude of a Dove As in our natural birth the body is washt with water from the pollution it brings with it into the world so in our regeneration or second birth the soul is purified by the Spirit from the guilt and pollution of sinne See Ezek. 16. 4 5. and Iohn 15. 5. 3. Christs command is Matth. 28. 19. Go and baptize 4. His promise is He that beleeves and is baptized shall be saved So in the Eucharist the outward and visible sign is the Bread and Wine 2. There is an Analogy between Bread and Wine which nourisheth the body and Christs body and bloud which nourisheth the soul. 3. A promise of saving grace to all that use the outward rites according to Christs institution Matth. 26. 28. V. The Necessity of the Sacraments They are necessary only Necessitate Praecepti not medii men may be saved without them That is necessary to the salvation of man without which he cannot possibly be saved These things are either 1. Simply necessary on mans part acknowledgment of sinne faith in Christ Jesus and repentance 2. So farre necessary as that the contempt or neglect of them bars a man of salvation Such are the Sacraments and outward profession The neglect of Circumcision and of the Passeover and the abuse of the Sacrifice of Peace-offerings by eating the same in uncleannesse wittingly was to be punished with cutting off No man was circumcised in those fourty years in which the Israelites were in the wilderness but many were born and died in that time Mark 16. 16. he saith He that beleeves not shall be condemned not he that beleeves not and is not baptized shall be condemned See that place Iohn 3. 5. answered in my Annotations VI. The Efficacy of the Sacraments The Papists say the Sacraments conferre grace by the work wrought as the pen of itself writeth the hand of the writer moving it so the Sacraments of themselves sanctifie being administred by the Minister They hold the efficacy of the Sacraments to be so great that there needeth no preparation or qualification of the receiver The Reformed Churches maintain That except the receiver be thus and thus qualified he loseth the benefit of the Sacraments See Acts 10. 47. Sacraments do not conferre grace by the actual doing and
opinion of tying grace to the Sacraments overthroweth 1. The highest and most proper cause of our salvation which is Gods free election to which only grace is tied 2. The only meritorious cause of our Regeneration which is the bloud of Christ properly purging us from all sin 3. The most powerfull next and applying efficient which is the holy Ghost Titus 3. 5. The Papists thrust the souls of such babes as die without Baptism into a Limbus puerorum a place very near hell and their bodies out of Christian burial as they call it into an unhallowed place The Thief on the Crosse wanted the outward Baptism yet was saved Luke 23. 43. He that beleeveth and is baptized shall be saved See M. Perk. Cas. of Consc. l. 2. p. 108. to 115. Baptism is necessary not only as a thing commanded but as an ordinary means of Salvation yet that necessity is not so absolute that the denial of Baptism even to Infants should be a certain argument of perdition The Persons who must baptize The Papists say Those that are not ordained and women in case of necessity may baptize No woman is a fit Minister of Baptism For 1. The Minister in his ministerial actions sustaineth the person of Christ which a woman cannot do 2. Those which are called to baptize are called also to preach for the Sacrament without the Word is a dumb Ceremony and as a Seal to a blank and Paul who would not permit a woman to teach ministerially would much lesse suffer her to baptize If any man should set the Kings broad Seal to any instrument but the Lord Keeper his fact were high treason And is there lesse danger in counterfeiting the great Seals of Gods Covenant Aquinas parte tertia Quest. 67. Artic. 3. saith Laiâ—us potest baptizare and Art 4. mulier potest baptizare That place Matth. 28. is as strong against womens baptizing as it is against their preaching For the Ministery of the Word and Sacrament cannot be pulled asunder which the Lord hath joyned together from time to time The Priests and Levites which were appointed to teach the people were also appointed to sacrifice and minister other Sacraments in the Church Cartwright denieth Women and Laicks power Whitgift and Hooker plead for it but K. Iames would have it appropriated to the Minister The ordinary Minister of Baptism is a person consecrated Baptism being the solemn Rite of initiating Disciples and making the first publick profession of the institution it is in reason and analogy of the Mystery to be ministred by those who were appointed to collect the Church and make Disciples D. Taylors Divine Instit of the offices Ministerial Sect. 4. Zippora circumcised her sonne before her husband Moses which was a Prophet of the Lord and to whom the office of Circumcision did appertain 2. She did it in choler If the essentials of Baptism be observed viz. washing In the Name of the Father Sonne and holy Ghost it is Baptism The Baptism of Hereticks is Baptism and therefore it is imputed to Cyprian for an errour that he affirmed Baptizatos ab Haereticis esse rebaptizandos and the Donatists are esteemed Hereticks for that reason No man may baptize himself Smith was a Se-baptist he baptized himself which neither Iohn Baptist nor any did before him How Christs Baptism and Iohns differ There was the same Doctrine the same Rite the same Oblation of Grace in the Baptisme of Iohn and Christ Therefore it was the same Baptism for Substance and of the same efficacy Vide Scultet Exercit. Evangel lib. 1. cap. 35. The Persons who are to be baptized Infidels converted to the faith and the Infants of one or both Christian Parents Some deny Baptism they acknowledge not the baptizing of Infants or others but onely the inward Baptisme of the Spirit See Matthew 28. 19 20 Mark 16. 26. The Scriptures teach that this Sacrament is necessary for Infants Iohn 3. The Scriptures shew that Infants are in Covenant Ezek. 6. 20. that is at the birth his by vertue of the Covenant and were in times past sealed with the seal of the Covenant They witnesse that the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to Infants Matth. 19. By Baptism Christians are admitted into the Society of this Kingdom Antipoedobaptists acknowledge from Matth. 9. 14. Rom. 9. 11. that Infants are saved See Psal. 103. 17. Christ commands all Nations to be baptized Infants are part of a Nation Mat. 28. 11. I think the Apostle doth plainly hold Col. 2. that Baptism hath succeeded in the room of Circumcision which is also the common and received opinion of Divines Gillesp. Miscel. c. 18. Infants of Christian Parents ought to be baptized because the children of the Jews in Covenant were circumcised for let the particular differences between Circumcision and Baptism be never so many yet in this they agree that they are both Sacraments of initiation and so belong to them that be in Covenant the faithful and their seed M. Ball. Vide Rivet in Gen. 17. That which confirms me in the belief that the Apostles did baptize Infants where they baptized housholds where fathers and children were together is because of the continued practice of it in the Church of God ever since of which we have as good evidence as of any controverted point in Ecclesiastical History Supposing Infant-baptism a nullity I cannot understand how any in the world should this day be lawfully baptized unlesse it can be made good that a person unbaptized himself may be a lawful Minister of Baptism to others for certainly untill the Anabaptists arose in Germany all the baptized world were baptized while they were Infants and consequently the first Anabaptist was baptized by an unbaptized person and so in conclusion we must all turn Seekers and be content without Baptism till Christ give some extraordinary commission from Heaven unto some men to be Apostles in this businesse M. Martials Def. of Infant-bap p. 245. A man by embracing one errour undertakes for all of the same cognation and line as for example He that is entangled with the errour of those who deny the lawfulnesse of Infant-baptism stands obliged through his engagement to this one errour to maintain many erroneous and Anti-Evangelical opinions Where ever God takes parents into Covenant he takes their children also See Deut. 27. 14 15. 2. Infants are as capable of the benefits of Baptism as men there is no benefit of Baptism but the party that receiveth it is passive we are said to be baptized into Christ to be made one with him the union begins on his part so to receive remission of sin 3. Infants while they are so may be truly members of a visible Church Luke 18. 16. One hath better ground to go by to administer Baptism to a childe of believing Parents then to men of years a mans profession may be unsound and hypocritical for the other I have Gods promise I will be
especially when he hath no power committed unto him by God and the Church of repelling the wicked from this holy Communion 4. Because the punishment denounced against unworthy receivers is appropriated to them who thus offend and reacheth not to the innocent because they are in their company 1 Cor. 11. 29. It were much to be desired saith M. Downame that all wicked persons were excluded from this outward Communion with the Saints for what have dogs to do with holy things or swine with pearls and it were a great comfort to the godly if none but such as are like unto themselves had fellowship with them at this feast our Love Zeal and Devotion is more enlivened in this action by our mutual prayers when with one minde and heart we joyn together yet it should not wholly discourage us from coming to this sacred Feast though wicked persons be there present if we our selves be duly prepared For though we would not willingly eat with slovenly persons nor permit them to put their unclean hands into our dish yet if we have a good appetite and cannot help it we will rather admit such inconvenience then for want of food pine with hunger Theodosius the Emperour being a man guilty of rash effusion of bloud coming upon a Sabbath-day to the place of publick worship would have received the Sacrament Ambrose seeing him coming goes and meets him at the door and speaks thus to him How dare those bloudy hands of yours lay hold on the body and bloud of Christ who have been the shedders of so much innocent bloud Which speech did so startle him that he went away and was humbled for his sinne and afterwards came and made his publick confession and then was received in Whence we may see that Kings yea Emperours have been kept back from the Sacrament The Canons of our Church Can. 26. straitly charge every Minister That he shall not in any wise admit to the Communion any of his flock which are openly known to live in notorious sin without repentance Whether Iudas received the Sacrament of the Lords Supper M. Gillespie in his Aarons Rod blosâ—oming chap. 8. holds he did not and chap. 9. questions Whether he received the Sacrament of the Passeover that night in which our Lord was betrayed and chap. 10. saith If it could be proved that Iudas received the Lords Supper it maketh nothing against the Suspension of known wicked persons from the Sacrament One saith The evidence of this fact hath ever appeared so fully to the Church that this alone hath been ground sufficient to deduce their right of free admission D. Drake in his Barre to free Admission to the Sacrament pag. 5 6. urgeth reasons that Iudas did not receive the Sacrament and saith that it makes nothing for free Admission if he did M. Selden De Synedriis veterum Ebraeorum cap. 8. saith Seriò perpendatur Judam ipsum Furem Proditorem Scelestissimum hisque nominibus satis notum publicè peccantem in ipsa institutione cum reliquis undecim Sacramenti Eucharistiae juxta plerosque Veterum Recentiorum participem fuisse nec omninò ea interdictum He hath much more there out of divers ancient and modern Writers to confirm that opinion At what time the Lords Supper was instituted Christ instituted it at night because occasion so required we have not the like occasion therefore are not bound unto it In Trajans and Tertullians time Christians did celebrate the Sacrament before day Tempore antelucano because of persecution they durst not receive it in the day time in St Augustines time Tempore Antemeridiano so now It behoved that Christ should suffer at the time of the Passeover to shew himself the true Passeover 1 Cor. 5. 7. and immediately after the eating of the last Passeover should institute this Sacrament to shew that now he abrogated the Jewish Ordinance and did appoint this in stead of it A fair intimation that Baptism follows in the room of Circumcision as the Lords Supper doth the Passeover The consideration of this circumstance should be of great force to make us respect and reverence the Sacrament seeing Christ instituted it then when he was about to depart out of this life and to suffer death for us we usually remember the words of a dying friend The Elements of the Eucharist They are two not only differing in number but also in their kinde Bread and Wine the first of which is solid and belongs to meat the later liquid and serves for drink The body is sufficiently nourished if it have bread and drink Christ cals himself both Iohn 6. 58. Bread because it strengtheneth the body is therefore called Christs body and wine because it turneth into bloud is therefore called Christs bloud Isidor These two creatures are 1. Of ordinary use not rare gotten in every Countrey 2. Such creatures as God of old made representations of his grace Isa. 25. 6. and 55. 3. 3. They are creatures best in their kinde of all things we eat bread is most nourishing and universally necessary for all kinde of bodies Panis à pascendo and wine of all drinks 1 Cor. 10. 17. We are all one body in as much as we are partakers of one bread The Analogy standeth thus as many grains of Corn make one loaf of bread and many Grapes make one measure of wine in the Cup So many Christians partaking faithfully of this Sacrament become one mystical body of Christ by the union of faith and love The Lord hath appointed those Elements to shew that men should come with an appetite and thirsting to receive the Sacrament in ancient times was as much as desiderare è cujus manu desideravit In Baptism we have one sign as the material part in the Supper we have two signs partly to note out our whole full and perfect nourishment in Christ having whatsoever is requisite for our salvation and partly to shew a fuller remembrance of his death for the wine which is a figure of his bloud doth as it were represent it before our eyes Attersol of the Sacr. l. 3 c. 5. Vide Aquin. Sum parte 3. Quaest. 74. Art 1. There are two representing signs in the Sacrament of the Lords Supper 1. That we might know thaâ—â—â— Christ wâ— have whole and perfect spiritual nourishment and whatsoever is â—â—qâ—isite to â—alâ—â—â—ion 2. For a more â—â—vely representation of Christ his death and pâ—ssion in which his bloud was separated from his body These elements are to be administred in both kindes severally Christ at his last Supper delivered first bread by it self and then wine and not bread and wine together in a sop or bread dipt in wine In the sop the wine is not dâ—unâ— but eaten Of receiving the Sacrament in both kindes Bread and Wine The Communion was instituted by Christ in both kindes as three Evangelists shew Mark 14. 23. Luke 22. 20. Matth. 26. 27. It was
administred by the Apostles in both kindes 1 Cor. 11. 26 28. 10. 16. It was received in the ancient Church for the space of fourteen hundred years in both kindes as it is confessed by their own Councel of Constance and that of Trent also This was constantly practised in the Church for divers hundred years untill the Councel of Constance in the year of the Lord 1414. Some Northern Councels there are saith Bellarmine Tom. 3. de Sacr. Eccles. l. 4. c. 28. where wine is not to be had therefore for uniformity sake the Church thought fit that every where the Sacrament should be administred but in one kinde Although there be not wine or wheat in some Countreys yet it may easily be carried to all as much as sufficeth for the use of this Sacrament Aquinas part 3. Quaest. 74. Art 1. Object Some saith Bellarmine are abstemious and abhorre wine they cannot endure it and it may offend sickly persons Answ. Extraordinary cases must not justle out ordinary laws and custom Vinum in modica quantitate sumptum non potest multum aegrotanti nocere Wine moderately taken cannot much hurt the sick Aquin ubi supra Object Whosoever shall eat this bread or drink this Cup unworthily shall be guilty of the body and bloud of Christ the conjunction Or say they doth so dis-joyn both kindes that it is free to take one without the other Answ. If this be true then it shall be lawful also to take the Cup without the Bread that disjunctive is put not for that it is lawful to take one kinde and omit the other but that greater caution may be used and he spake of both severally because irreverence may be used in both signs and to shew that it sufficieth not to carry our selves holily in part unlesse we finish the whole action holily otherwise in the same place Bread and Wine are joyned together eight times Object Act. 2. 42. 20. 7. Answ. Suppose the bread of the Lords Table be there meant yet it is a Synecdoche whereby the part is put for the whole otherwise you may as well say they had no thanksgiving because Luke maketh only mention of prayers as to say they had not the Cup because mention is made only of bread vers 46 speaking of the common Table from the similitude whereof the Lords Table is taken he useth the same phrase of breaking of bread without making mention of any drink he saith breaking bread they took bread which can hardly be said of the Lords Supper Christ as fore-seeing the sacriledge of the Papists commandeth all not to eat of the bread but to drink of the Cup Matth. 26. 27. Mark 14. 23. 1 Cor. 12. 13. and Mark saith They all drank of it Certainly I perswade my self that our Saviour expressed the note of universality viz. in delivering the Cup to all saying Drink you all of this and not so in giving the bread of set purpose to prevent that abuse which the Romish Church of late hath brought by taking away the Cup. As in like manner the Apostle saith of marriage It is honourable in or amongst all men Heb. 13. 4. and he saith not so of Virginity or single life although it be honourable because the holy Ghost foresaw that some hereticks would deny marriage to be honourable amongst all and prohibit it to some viz the Clergy Which two Texts of Scripture the Romanists leudly pervert and ridiculously contradict themselves in the interpretation of them extending all to the Laity in the one and excluding the Clergy and extending all to the Clergy in the other and excluding the â—aity Marriage is honourable among all say they that is all save Priests Drink you all of this that is all save the people Doctor Featleys Grand Sacriledge of the Church of Rome ch 2. Drink you all of this saith the Author of the Sacrament he saith not expresly Eat you all of this as foreseeing that impiety which in time humane presumption should bring in upon and against his own institution fulfilled in the Church of Rome at this day B. Mountag Answ. to the Gagger of Protest Sect. 36. The Papists say That the universal particle All belongs to the twelve Apostles who were Priests say they and alone present at the institution of this first Supper and therefore it belongs only to Priests not Lay-men and they receive the bloud with the body ratione concomitantiae By this reason they may as well take away the bread from the people The Apostles in the first Supper did not represent the order of Priests but the whole Church of Communicants and Christ administred the Sacrament to them not as Apostles but as Disciples therefore Paul extends this particle All to all the Christians in the Church of Corinth and to men of all order condition state and sex 1 Cor. 11. 25 26 27 28 29. The Sacrament represents Christs death and his bloud shed out of his veins Matth. 26. 27 28. That Helena of concomitancy which the Lutherans also admit as we may see in Gerhard doth abound with so many absurdities and was so unknown to antiquity that it is a wonder that judicious men will defend it only that they may maintain their figments of Consubstantiation and Transubstantiation This Argument from Concomitancy proveth as well that they may drink the wine only and not receive the bread 2. Though Christ wholly be sealed to us in the use of the bread really yet not wholly sacramentally Vide Pâ—cher de missa cap. 4. Object Bellarmine de Eucharist l. 4. c. 25. saith There is a plain difference between the Bread and Cup for 1 Cor. 11. he saith of the Bread absolutely Do this but of the Cup conditionally As oft as ye do it therefore those words do not signifie that the Cup should alwayes be given when the Sacrament is administred but they only prescribe the manner that if it be so then it should be done in memory of Christs passion Answ. But this is a most frivolous cavil for the words do both command the thing and also shew the end of doing it In the verse immediately following the Apostle hath those words speaking as well of the Bread as Cup. As often as ye eat of this bread and drink of this Cup. Therefore there is one and the same reason of both the Bread and the Cup. We must take and eat the one and take and drink the other and whensoever we do so we must do it in remembrance of Christs death Object More irreverence will be shewed to the Sacrament by spilling of it to which in a great multitude of Communicants the wine must needs be subject to Answ. Reverence due to the Sacrament consists in a religious partaking of it not in a necessary abstinence from one of the Elements The Papists have cut out their Sacrament according to the measure of their doctrine for as they teach Christ to be but half a Saviour by making their works joynt-purchases
of their salvation with him so they minister half a Sacrament of salvation Cartw. against the Rhem. on Iohn 6. Our practice and profession is the receiving the Communion in both kindes for which I joyn issue with all Papists living that it is the prime original institution of our Saviour which giveth birth and being to a Sacrament that it is sacriledge to alter it therefrom that it was never otherwise used in the Church of God for above two thousand years after Christ. Let all the Papists living prove the contrary and I will subscribe to all Popery B. Mountag Answer to the Gagger of Protest Sect. 36. This was the custom in all the Fathers times as I could deduce almost out of every one This is every where the custom in all the world unto this day but in the Romane exorbitant Church as Cassander saith and was not quite abolished in that Church till about thirteen hundred years after Christ and by much art colluding and fine forgery was retained from being cast out of that Church in the late Conventicle of Trent only kept in for a faction but mightily opposed by learned honest and conscionable Catholicks Id. ibid. First If none may drink of the consecrate wine but the Priests then none should eat of the bread but Priests for to whom Christ said Take and eat to those he gave the Cup and said Drink ye The signs being both equal all Communicants must drink of the one as well as eat of the other there being the same warrant for the one that there is for the other Secondly The Cup is a part of Christs Will and Testament Galat. 3. 15. Hebr. 9. 16 17. the dead mans Will may not be changed The Lords Supper is a Sacrament proper to the New Testament Luke 22. 20. Thirdly The bloud of Christ shed upon the Crosse belongeth not onely to the Pastors and Teachers but to all the faithfull that come to the Table of the Lord Matth. 26. 28. Luke 22. 20. why then should the Cup of the Lord be barred from them Fourthly All the faithful that come to the Lords Table must shew forth his death untill be come and this is done by them as well by drinking of the Cup as by eating of the bread therefore all the Communicants must receive the Sacrament under both kinds To which these reasons may be added 1. From the institution for Christ commanded them to drink the wine as well as to eat the bread therefore this is a violation of Gods command 2. The Apostle bids every one to try themselves and so to eat of that bread and drink of that wine so they did not only eat and drink then but they were commanded so to do 3. To celebrate the Sacrament otherwise is to make void Christs two main ends in appointing the Sacrament 1. To represent his death and bloud shed out of the veins 2. To shew that Christ is full nourishment to the soul as bread and drink to the body The bread and wine being the matter of the Sacrament may not be changed in the Lords Supper Reasons 1. The institution of the Supper and the example of Christ himself whom the Church is to imitate and follow 1 Cor. 11. 25. 2. No other signs are so significant and effectual as these are for this purpose to strengthen and comfort them that are in trouble and almost in the present estate of death Psal. 104. 14 15. Prov. 31. 6. 3. The matter and form of every thing do constitute its essence So it is in the Sacraments where the signes are the matter and the words of institution the form 4. If the bread and wine might be changed in the Supper and yet the Sacrament in substance remain then in like manner water in Baptism might be changed and yet be true Baptism but the Minister cannot baptize with any other liquour or element then with water as the matter of that Sacrament 5. If we grant a change in the signs at the pleasure of men why may we not also change other parts of the Sacrament why may we not in stead of the Minister appointed oâ— God and called by the Church admit private persons and receive other alterations inforced upon the Church by the Papists Bucan institut loc 48. Beza Epist. 2. think that where there is no store of bread and plenty of wine sufficient for this purpose some other thing may be taken in stead of them Thus it may come to passe saith Attersol that we shall have nothing which Christ commanded and sanctified by his example and yet boast that we have his Supper and do that which he appointed For whereas we make four outward parts of this Sacrament the Minister the Word the Signs and the Receiver There are which hold there is no necessity of the Minister Others that there is no necessity of the words of Institution Others that there is no necessity of the Signs Others that there is no necessity of the Receiver So if we once admit any alteration in any of the parts we open a gap to all innovation and being in great uncertainty in the Sacraments Whether the breaking of the bread be an indifferent Ceremony Some make the breaking of the bread to be simply necessary and an essential part of the Supper so that without it there can be no Sacrament 1. Because the Sacrament is called the breaking of bread and this breaking of bread is said to be the Communion of the body of Christ â— Cor 10. 16. 2. Others make this breaking to be meerly indifferent and not necessary accidental and not of the substance 3. Others hold a middle way between both extreams that it is necessary yet not as an essential but an integral part The Ceremony of breaking bread was continually observed by Christs first institution by the practice of the Apostles by the ancient and universal custom of the whole Church of Christ as well Greek as Latine This act of breaking of bread is such a principal act that the whole celebration of this Sacrament hath had from thence this appellation given to it by the Apostles to be called breaking of bread it is also a Symbolicall Ceremony betokening the crucifying of Christs body upon the Crosse 1 Corinth 11. 24. But the Papists yet doe not break it but gâ—ve it whole and this they pretend to doe for reverence sake least some crums of bread should fall to the ground Three Evangelists mention the breaking of the bread It is not material whether the bread be broken or cut but it is more probable that Christ broke it from the custom of the Jews saith Vossius but Balduinus the Lutheran saith they receive a perfect Sacrament who intermit this fraction in the use of the Supper because Christ broke the bread that he might distribute it therefore say Gerhard and he Perinde est sive in ipsa actione coenae sive antea â—rangatur Balduin quotes Beza
the Institution 2. The authority of these is not divine but meerly humane 3. It was an ancient custom in Tertullians time to give milk and honey in Baptism to the Infant yet the Papists themselves do not keep it So that unlesse we had Christs institution we cannot do it especially knowing that it is dangerous to add to any essential part of the Sacrament such as the wine is But then they are most ridiculous when they will make a mystical signification in this that the union of the water with the wine must signifie the union of the people which is denoted by waters Revel 17. with Christ Thus Bellarmine But it signifies not this union either naturally for then it would signifie so in common feasts nor by divine institution for then then the Scripture would have delivered it Besides Rev. 17. Great waters not a few drops signifie the people and that not of believers but Heathens and if it signifie the communion of the people with Christ why do they deny it them The drink then used being called the fruit of the vine Matth. 26. 29. it is evident that there was no mixture of water for then it had not been the fruit of the vine but another drink compounded of water and wine Some say this reason is not of force for he that drinks vinum dilutum drinks the fruit of the grape as well as he that drinks merum And therefore that our Saviour Christ and his Apostles ever mingled water with wine in the sacramental Cup cannot be shewed by any testimony out of the word of God As for the water gushing forth with the bloud out of our Saviour Christ it is frivolous the wine in the Cup is not a Sacrament of the bloud of Christ which was shed after that he was slain but of the bloud which he shed before his death This was an ancient custom Iustin Martyr makes mention of it and Cyprian pleads for it yet Iansenius doth ingeniously confesse that there are evident testimonies of Scripture for wine but none for water though Bellarmine impudently affirm That there is as much proof for the one as the other viz. Tradition for both Scriptures for neither and labours violently to wrest the plain places another way yet at length he doth not deny but it is Calix Domini though there be no water in it and he tels us that the greater part of Divines hold that water is not de necessitate Sacramenti Iansenius saith it appears by Scripture though not expresly yet implicitely that there was water in the Cup which Christ consecrated because there was wine in it and in those hot Countreys they used not to drink meer wine but allayed with water this is an uncertain conjecture The beginning of it was lawful because there were in the Church that could not beat the strength of the wines especially in the East and South Countreys where the wines are strong The Christians in the Primitive Church had a custom of mixing water with the wine as there came water and bloud out of Christs side which how ever it might have a natural reason because of the heat of the Countrey to correct the heat of the wine with water yet it was by them used for a mystical sense to expresse the mixture whereof this Sacrament is an effectual instrument of all the people who have faith to receive it with Christs bloud water being by the holy Ghost interpreted for people and Nations The Aquarii used onely water in the Eucharist in pretence of Sobriety which Cyprian confuted onely upon this ground viz. That this practice was not warranted by the Institution of Christ wherein Christ ordained wine and not water only In the Scripture we finde the fruit of the vine but not water therefore we account not that to be of any necessity in the celebration of the Lords Supper In the Primitive Church water was used first of Sobriety then of Ceremony at length it grew to be counted of necessity Dr Fulk against Martin Of the Consecration of the Elements Christs actions in the administration of the Sacrament were four First He took bread into his hand and so likewise wine which signifies the purpose of God decreeing to give Jesus Christ in the flesh to work out our Redemption Secondly Christ blessed it and gave thanks and sanctified it to that use by his own prayer to God which as it is effective to make the elements now fit for a spiritual use so it is significative representing the action of God wherein he fitted Christs manhood in the fulnesse of his Spirit and power to work out our Redemption Thirdly He brake the bread which signifies the action of God satisfying his justice in Christs manhood for the sins of all the Elect by breaking him in the Garden and on the Crosse especially besides other sufferings throughout his life and by rending his soul and body asunder Fourthly Christ gave it to every one signifying that God doth offer particularly to every one and give to the Elect the body and bloud of Christ with the merit of it and power of the same to blot out their sins and free them more and more from the same The Text saith of the Bread He blessed it and of the Cup When he had given thanks By the which word Blessing he implieth a consecration of this Sacrament The Papists attribute it to the repetition of these words Hoc est enim corpus meum For this is my body For this is my bloud Hence they call them Verba operatoria and say there is such a power and operation in them that by them the bread is turned into the body of Christ. The Elements of which the Sacrament is composed are natural the things having nothing of themselves whereby they may be Sacraments and therefore an institution is necessary whereby they may be made what they are not Now we say this is done by reciting the institution of Christ and by prayer The Papists order that the Priest should reade all the other words with a loud voice yet when he comes to this For this is my body he speaks it secretly so that none can hear him and this is one of their reasons because Christ prayed alone what is this to the consecration did he so at the Sacrament time 2. The Minister or Priest speaks it secretly because if he speak aloud he cannot be so intent to what is said why then do they command such loud noise by their Organs in singing How can they be attentive then 3. Least that form of words should be vilified Why not then in Baptism It is most expedient 1. For the receiver to receive the Bread and Cup into his hand This custome saith Vossius was long in the ancient Church It is unseemly to have the Bread put or the Wine poured into the mouth by the Minister this custom came from a superstitious worshipping of the signs 2. The receiver must
acknowledge that in the Sacrament there is a solemn praising of God which sometimes is called a Sacrifice as likewise that the believers did offer up charitable alms which sometimes is called a Sacrifice as likewise that there is a representation and commemoration of Christ who was our Sacrifice But to hold that here by the Priest is offered up again the body and bloud of Christ though after an unbloudy manner is a falshood and many that swear by the Masse know not the horrible impiety of it They hold that the offering up of this to God is efficacious for the quick and dead and those in Purgatory The Fathers oft term the Lords Supper a Sacrifice partly in regard of the spiritual Sacrifice therein offered and partly because it is a lively representation and commemoration of Christs Sacrifice once offered on the Crosse and partly also because it succeedeth in the room of the Passeover and those other Sacrifices that in the Old Testament were offered But that they ever dreamed of any other Sacrifice distinct from the Sacrament no Papist shall ever be able to prove M. Gatak of Transub p. 113. In Sacrificiis offerimus in Sacramentis accipimus Beza A Sacrifice and a Sacrament cannot stand together for by a Sacrifice something is offered to God but by a Sacrament something is received from God Therefore the Paschal Lamb was not a Sacrifice as the offering up of Bullocks and Lambs but only a Sacrament and sign of our redemption by Christ Heb. 7. 10. there needs no other expiatory oblation Why should I offer then to expiate sin when it is expiated already The Papists say It is a Sacrifice properly so called The whole essence of a Sacrifice depends upon the institution of Christ say Suarez and Salmeron if any Sacrifice had been instituted it must have appeared by some word or act of Christ neither of which can be found 1 Cor. 11. after the words Do this Paul ver 25. immediately expounds what was meant by doing expressing the acts of doing As often as you shall eat which was spoken generally to all the faithful in Corinth not to the sacrificing Priests They prove it from Virgils Calf Cum faciam vitulâ pro frugibus ipse venito See Iansen Concord c. 13. p. 904. Rhemists on Luke 22. 20. Object Almost all things are by the Law purged with bloud and without shedding of bloud is no remission Heb. 9. 22. But in the Sacrifice of the Masse there is no effusion of bloud therefore there is no remission made for sins and by consequent it is not a propitiatory Sacrifice 1. Nothing therein is properly sacrified not the Bread and Wine for they are transubstantiated say they before the Sacrifice not Christs body for no living thing can properly be sacrificed unlesse it be slain but Christ being once dead dieth no more 2. The Papists say it is an external Sacrament yet Christ there appears to no sense but is concealed under the accidents of Bread and Wine 3. They say it is Sacrificium incruentum an unbloudy Sacrifice yet Christs bloud is there truly and really shed and drunk by the Communicants with the mouth 4. It is a perfect and allsufficient Sacrifice yet they repeat it daily Propitiatory is either that which pacifieth the wrath of God and pleaseth him by its own vertue and efficacy which is only the Sacrifice of Christ in his own self or else by Gods gracious acceptance and indulgence Rom. 12. 1. Heb. 13. 16. Phil. 4. 18. Heb. 9. 10. the Apostle from the iteration of Sacrifices doth conclude the insufficiency of them for if Christ be offered again and again he is an imperfect Sacrifice and we need something else The Apostle also in those Chapters doth often inculcate the once offering and once oblation by Christ offering up of himself once we are free from the guilt of our sins Heb. 3. 9. The entrance of Christ into the heavens is compared with the old High-priests entrance into the holiest of holies and therefore as none but the High priest might go in there so none could offer this Sacrifice but Christ himself and withall it implieth that to the perfection of Christs Sacrifice is required his continual appearing in heaven for us Malachy 1. 11. useth the word offering which was properly a part of the service used in the Church in his time to signifie the Gospel-service which succeeds in the New Testament and to expresse it more particularly he cals it a pure offering no longer carnal and grosse but wholly spiritual Irenaeus by the pure offering in Mal. 1. 11. understandeth the Eucharist now in use and many of the Ancients suppose it resembled in that action of Melchisedech Gen. 14. 18. And they call it the Christians Sacrifice succeeding in the room of the Jewish Sacrifices the Sacrifice I say of the Eucharist not their Sacrifice of the Masse M. Gatak of Transub The pure prayers and worship of God that should be in all Churches under the Gospel as Tertullian Eusebius Ierom and Augustine expound it M. Shâ—p Reply to M. Ball. Vide Grot. in loc There was a Controversie of late years fomented by some through Popish compliances That the Lords Supper might be stiled a Sacrifice the Table an Altar which produced in the discussion of it as all controversies do in the issue some further truth the discovery of this true decision of it That it was not a Sacrifice but a feast after and upon Christs sacrificing of himself Participatio Sacrificii as Tertullian cals it a sacrificial feâ—st commemorating and confirming all those ends for which the only true and proper Sacrifice of Christ was offered up Private massing or the alone communicating of the Priest is not according 1. To the institution of Christ saying in the plural to them Drink ye all of this 2. To the practice of the Apostles Act. 2. 46. The Councel of Trent saith We commend the Priests communicating alone which is as good as conferring or covenanting alone The Apostle 1 Cor. 11. 28. requires that every man first examine himself and then eat and he testifies vers 23. That what he delivered he received also of the Lord. And so we know that the Lord himself gave unto all which were present with him and suffered none only to be by and look on 2. It is against the nature of the Sacrament for it is a spiritual Feast 3. It is against the name of the Sacrament for it is commonly called a Communion which name seems to be fetched from 1 Cor. 10. 16 17. but what Communion is there when one alone receiveth and not them which are present with him 4. Against the Canon of the Masse the Priest ever speaks in the Plurall number The words of our Saviour Take Eat this is my Body Mat. 26. 26. were spoken to all future Communicants as well as to the Apostles then present for they contain in them an
institution of a Sacrament to be celebrated in all Christian Churches till the end of the world as the Apostle teacheth us from 1 Cor. 11. from vers 23. to 28. especially at the 26. vers as often as ye eat this Bread and drink this Cup. ye shew the Lords death till he come This the Apostles in their persons could not fulfill for they lived not till Christs second coming they must of necessity therefore be extended to all that in succeeding ages should be present at the Lords Supper who are as much bound by this precept of Christ to communicate with the Priest or dispenser of the Sacrament as the Apostles were to communicate with Christ himself when he first in his own person administred it otherwise if the precepts Takâ— Fat Do this in remembrance of me appertained to the Apostles only What warrant hath any Priest now to consecrate the elements or administer the Sacrament Nay what command have any faithfull at all to receive the Communion The Sacrifice of the Masse being idolatrous it is not lawful to be present at it 1 Cor. 10. 20. In their Masse-book they call the Crosse it self our only hope Those Texts are against going to Masse Psal. 26. 4. 1 Cor. 10. 7 14. 2 Cor. 6. 14 16 17. 1 Ioh 5. 21. Many will say They keep their hearts to God though they be present at a Masse This is as if a man should catch his wife in the act of adultery and she apologize that the other had her body but he her heart 1 Cor. 6. 27. Rom. 11. 4. Gods people have their knees for God as well as their hearts 1 Kings 19. Origen said he could not bend the knees of his body to God and the knees of his heart to Satan See B. Daven Determ 7. Revel 7. 3. They have a mark in the fore-head because they must not be ashamed of their profession that mark is obvious to all the world Our Saviour by this policy might have over-reacht the devil himself who required only externall bowing keeping his heart still unto God Matth. 4. 10. In some case a man may be present at Masse and not sin As 1. When he is there by violent compâ—lsion this is not his sinne but theirs 2. If in travel a man be in a fit place to see and observe their folly so as he shews no reverence at all or approbation by bending his knee uncovering his head or otherwise King Edward the 6th would not suffer the Lady Mary to have Masse in her house Foxes vol. 2. p. 653. The bowing of Naaman spoken of in 2 King 5. 8. was genuflexio obsequii not imitativa a bowing to the King not to the Idol 2. Elisha's words do not necessarily import an approbation or permission of that which was propounded but a meer form of valediction as if he had said in our language Adieu or Farewell or there may be an Enallage temporis very usual in the Hebrew and have relation to the time past Of private Receiving of the Lords Supper The Passeover was to be eaten in such a Family Exod. 12. 46. to signifie that the Church was then but a handful or houshold in respect of the fulnesse of the Gentiles which were to follow but the Lords Supper was not to be eaten in a private separated Family but the Church was to come together and to stay one for another 1 Cor. 11. 33. that in the confluence of the people and publicknesse of the action the increase and multitude of the Church might be expressed 1 Cor. 11. 22. Paul opposeth the Congregation wherein the Lords Supper should be taken unto a private house where men satisfie their hunger It is noted of a Christian Jew desperately sick of the Palsie that he was with his bed carried to the place of Baptism The purest and best reformed Churches this day in Savoy Germany France and divers others administer the Sacraments only in the ordinary meetings In my judgement saith Master Cartwright it is unmeet to administer either of the Sacraments in private houses and it is lesse tolerable in the holy Supper which hath a special mark and representation of brotherly Communion more then Baptism The Necessity of the Eucharist The administring of the Communion to Infants is a Rite as ancient as Cyprians time and a Rite that did continue in the Church above 600 years Innocentius the first and Augustine concluded a necessity of childrens receiving this Sacrament from Iohn 6. 53. it may well conclude for those which are of years and capable of that mystery for though it speaketh rather of a spiritual eating and drinking yet because the sacramental is a sign and pledge of that and whosoever doth indeed spiritually eat the flesh of Christ and drink his bloud cannot choose but also be willing and forward to do it sacramentally when opportunity is offered and there is no impediment to hinder Christ requireth in all persons about to communicate three principal acts of reason one is before and two are at the time of receiving The first is 1 Cor. 11. Let â— man examine himself The second to discern the Lords body The third is to remember the Lords death untill his coming again All which three being acts of judgement cannot agree unto Infants being persons void of judgement The Ends for which God hath instituted the Sacrament of the Lords Supper They are four First The remembrance of the death of Christ Luke 22. 19. This do in remembrance of me 1. Christs person Phil. 3. 8 9. we can have no interest in his benefits till we be united to him Cant. 5. 10. to the end 2. His actions and sufferings 1 Cor. 11. 24 26. 3. The benefits that flow from these all that Christ did and suffered was not only satisfactory but meritorious Luke 22 20. 4. With what affection Christ instituted this Sacrament his bowels were then full of compassion to his people it was the last solemn act of his life Secondly It is a strengthening Ordinance the Lord hath appointed it onely for those that are new-born the elements there are our greatest matter of nourishment Thirdly It is a sealing Ordinance The New Testament in my bloud Fourthly An Ordinance of the Communion of Saints whereby that should be renewed all are one bread and one body Iohn 6. 54. 1 Cor. 10. 16 17. The Lords Supper is 1. A badge of a Christians profession 2. A seal of the Covenant of grace 3. A map of heaven 4. A means and pledge of our Communion with Christ 1 Cor. 10. 16. The Supper promotes this Communion 1. Because it is a visible profession of our union with Christ. 2. A lively resemblance of it meat and drink are converted into our substance made a part of us there are significant rites invested with a promise and the assurance of a blessing 3. It is a pledge and seal Christ is there conveyed over to a believers use This is my
Body a pledge whereby whole Christ with all his merits and all that he is is made over to a believer 4. A means of exhibiting Christ to the soul. The Sacraments are Instrumenta quadantenus moralia they are accompanied with the power and vertue of the holy Ghost We must therefore receive the Sacrament To confirm our faith Communion with Christ and all saving graces in us to keep in remembrance the Lords death untill he come again and to testifie our love one towards another 1. Our Faith God is able and willing to save us 1. Able to save to the utmost look upon him 1. In his Natures God-man Man that he might suffer God that he might satisfie 2. In his Offices he is a Prophet Priest and King Mat. 8. 2. 2. Willing he died to save humble and penitent sinners Rom. 8. 34. Rom. 4. ult if he spared not his life for us he will spare nothing else There is merit and grace enough in him what ever my sins are or have been for pardon of them and salvation 2. Communion with Christ and all saving graces in us Gods end in instituting of Ordinances is that we might meet him there and have Communion with him Exod 20. 24. it should be our end in frequenting Ordinances Gods eye is specially on our end in all religious duties Matth. 11. 7 8. Hos. 7. 14. Zech. 7. 5. 1. He pondereth the heart 2. He judgeth of our actions by the end 3. The answer will be sutable to our end The Sacrament is the nearest and visiblest Communion with Christ on earth We come to God by Christ in prayer as our Intercessour in the Word as our Teacher in the Supper as the Master of the Feast Rom. 6. 11. 3. To keep in remembrance the Lords death until he come again 1 Cor. 11. 26. that is 1. The Doctrine of it the bread represents his body the wine his bloud we shew our belief of this Doctrine 2. The Necessity of his death we hereby testifie to God our consciences fellow-Christians the world our need of Christ as bread is necessary for our bodies 3. The Sufficiency of Christs death no two creatures are more universally sufficient for all sorts of men then bread and wine therefore God made choice of them for this purpose 4. The Application of Christs death it is the receiving of bread and wine into our stomacks that nourisheth us when the conscience beginneth to be oppressed with the hainousnesse of sinne and the fear of Gods vengeance we should consider Christ bare the curse for our sins upon his body that we might be delivered from them and made perfect satisfaction to his Fathers justice that we might be received into favour Rom. 8. 34 35. 4. To testifie our love one toward another that I shall speak of afterward Of duâ— Preparation for the Sacrament We must labour to perform all holy duties in a right manner God requires preparation to every service to the Sabbath Sacrament Some say the scope of the first Commandment is that Iehovah alone must be our God whom we must worship of the second that he must be worshipt alone with his own worship of the third that he must be worshipt after his own manner God is more delighted with Adverbs then Nouns None might approach to the holy things of God having his uncleannesse upon him Nadab and Abihu through carelesnesse or hast brought common kitchin fire whereas it should have been heavenly fire therefore God punisht them God makes admirable promises to prayer yet if we perform it not in that manner which God requires he abhors it Psal. 109. 8. The word is the power of God to convert and strengthen us 2 Cor. 2. 16. The Sacrament is a seal of the Covenant yet if it be received unworthily it is a seal to a blank Iudas took the Passeover at least and the devil entred into him See 1 Cor. 11. 18 20. so the great duty of fasting if not rightly performed is unacceptable Isa. 14. 12. See 2 Chro. 25. 2. and prayer Prov. 15. 8. Reasons 1. Because the Lord requires and orders the manner as well as the matter our obedience must have Gospel-perfection sincerity and integrity In the Passeover the Lamb must be perfect of the first year the man and the Lamb prepared and it offered in the appointed time See Exod. 12. 9. 2 Chron. 30. 18 19. There were four dayes preparation for the Passeover the Lords Supper both succeeds and exceeds it The Ark was to be carried on the Priests shoulders 1 Chron. 15. 13. God made a breach on them because they sought him not after the due order 2. The manner of performing the duty is the most spiritual part of it Non tantum considerandum est id quod agimus sed etiam quibus circumstantiis This shews the true cause why our attending upon God proves so unprofitable and uncomfortable to us because we rest in the work done Secondly We should labour to perform the Ordinances aright and that we may do so 1. The person must be accepted God had regard to Abel and his offering Cains Sacrifice for the matter was as good as Abels the person is onely accepted in Christ This is my beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased in him with us 2. Ever bring God the best thou hast in thy approaches to God bring the best devotion affection Cursed is the deceiver that hath a whole one and brings a blemished one Mal. be troubled thou canst bring no better 3. Come in faith rest upon the promise of Christ that thy services shall be accepted mingle faith with hearing prayer 4. Bring an humble Spirit Let thy soul be rightly possest with the majesty and holinesse of that God to whom the duty is tendred Revel 4. 3. The Lord is to be lookt on as a King in his Glory in his Throne we have a principle of envy in us whom we envy we undervalue 5. Bring a right estimation of the excellency and ends of the Ordinance Isa. 2. 3. Hear and thy soul shall live Take heed how you hear with what measure you mete it shall be measured to you again according to your diligence in the duty will God measure out his blessing 6. There must be a serious meditation before-hand of the spiritual manner of performing the duty Heb. 12. 28. Do not utter indigested prayers a Minister should speak as the Oracles of God 7. One should labour to stir up the graces sutable to the duty and keep down the sins opposite thereto 1 Pet. 2. 1 2. Iam. 1. 18 19. It is the duty of Christians in a special manner to examine themselves that they may come prepared to the Lords Supper 1 Cor. 11. 20. to the end the Apostle proves the necessity of preparation both from the nature of the Ordinance or the institution of it the benefit that we reap by coming prepared and the mischief that befals those that come
like Paracelsian Physick if it do not cure it will kill 4. None do lose such high services Matth. 7. 22 23. they do not the work of the Gospel with a Gospel-spirit and out of a Gospel principle 5. Satan will insult and triumph over none so much as Gospel-sinners Matth. 12. 43 44. 6. The worm of conscience will not feed so fiercely on any Mar. 9 43. when he compares his former hopes with his present irrecoverable condition because no sinners had those helps nor were raised to those hopes Ponder on your own sins what they are and what they have deserved Look on original corruption the foul sea of all wickednesse which is called a body of sinne Rom. 6. 6. A Law in our members Rom. 7. 23. Consider that thou hast a naughty nature whereby thou art averse from God and goodnesse and extreamly prone to all sin Psal. 51. 5. Isa. 48. 8. all men in every part are under the guilt and power of it Rom. 3. 16 23. 2. Humble thy self Labour to be base for this though thou hast not committed such foul sins as others yet if God should leave thee to thy self and thine own evil heart thou wouldst soon be as bad as the worst 3. Call to minde likewise the grosse actual sins thou hast committed before or since thy calling Wast not thou given to all manner of pollution before the Lord gave thee knowledge of him and since thy calling 4. Consider thy continual daily slips and infirmities thy sins of omission and commission how apt thou art to be angry impatient thy carnalnesse in good duties and distraction in the performance of them thy forgetfulnesse of God and thy later end 5. Consider also whether there be not some unknown secret fault that thou hast not yet repented of and pray to God to discover it to thee Lastly Call to minde what sins thou hast committed since the last Sacrament and bewail them Meditate also on the sufferings of Christ for these grosse sins and daily iniquities His great abasement Psal. 22. 6 7 14. to 19. v. Isa. 53. 3 4 5 6 7. to the 11. v. He was born like a beggar lived like a beggar the Devil tempted him he was falsly accused betrayed by one of his Disciples denied by another forsaken by the rest He was amazed with fear and incompassed with sorrow Mark 14. 34. Two of the most tormentful passions was in an agony and did sweat drops of cloddy bloud in such abundance as it fell to the ground was condemned mocked spit upon whipped with rods after the manner of the Romans crowned with thorns laden with the Crosse nailed on it stretched and retched in all his joynts He suffered much in his body but his chief sufferings were in his soul Isa. 53. 10 11 12. He took our soul as well as body and came to redeem it that being the chief part Quicquid induit Christus obtulit He suffered 1. As a publick person as the second Adam Rom. 5. 14. 2. For our sakes and benefit Isa. 53. he is said six times to bear our iniquities 3. Not only for our good but in our room Heb. 7. 22. not onely nostro bono but nostro loco 1 Tim. 2. 6. Mat. 20. 28. for otherwise he should have suffered no more then other men the Martyrs suffered for the good of the Church Col. 1. 24. 2 Tim. 2. 10. 4. He took upon him the burden of our sins by way of imputation 1 Pet. 2. 24. 2 Cor. 5. 21. Smite on your brests and say For my worldlinesse anger all these evils befell my Saviour Lord for thy mercy sake in Christ pardon and heal me Shall I pollute my body with uncleannesse when Christ suffered so bitter things Shall I ever be angry again O Lord by thy grace I will not Let me have thy power to kill these sins See the strictnesse of divine justice and the dreadfulnesse of Gods wrath God spared not his own Sonne and when his Fathers wrath lighted on his soul he was much troubled and the great evil of sinne it caused Christs humane nature to be â—â—raid Matth. 26. 38. The desert of sinne is seen in Christs suffering 1. In respect of the person who suffered for it Gods only Son who never provoked him Iohn 3. 16. Rom. 8. 31. 2. In respect of the penalties he underwent for sinne it made him to cry sweat and pour out strong supplications Isa. 53. 10. The Law shewed the filthinesse and evil of sinne by the many Sacrifices and aspersions of bloud which it required but they were of beasts and their bloud but the Gospel shews the demerit of sinne more fully and how odious it is to God since Christ must die to expiate it and also the abundant love both of the Father in delivering his own Sonne to death for the salvation of sinners Iohn 3. 16. 1 Iohn 4. 9 10. Rom. 8 32. and of Christ in taking upon him our nature and in exposing himself to so much misery here on earth and at last to an accursed death for us Phil. 2. 7 8. We are to remember Christ in the Sacrament 1. Because the Lord will have in the Sacrament of the New Testament the great end of the Passeover to be accomplisht Exod. 12. 14. 2. That we may answer the goodnesse of Christ to us he hath us alwayes actually in remembrance Exod. 28. 21 29. 3. Because if we have any benefit by this Sacram nt God must remember Christ for us 4. Upon our actual and affectionate remembrance of Christ depends all our benefit by this Sacrament We have dispatched the examination of our sins in the next place our graces are to be examined The graces that must be tried and examined are our Knowledge Faith Re 〈…〉 Love and hungring after Christ the truth growth or wants of them 〈…〉 examined The truth of them 1. Knowledge The words examine shew forth discern and judge all betoken knowledge We must get Knowledge 1. Of the Law of God 2. Of the Doctrine of Redemption by Jesus Christ. 3. Of the Nature Necessity and Use of the Lords Supper We must know our estate by nature and by grace 1. Because otherwise we cannot be thankful to God for his benefits as we ought 2. In the Sacrament Christ is offered and the Covenant sealed By nature we are dead in sin and bondslaves of Satan by grace we come to be children of God and heirs of salvation We must know what the elements and actions in the Sacrament signifie That the bread signifies the body of Christ and the wine his bloud that the breaking of bread betokens the crucifying of Christ that the giving of the bread and wine notes the action of God the Father offering Christ to all and bestowing him effectually upon every worthy receiver the receiving of the bread and wine signifies our receiving and feeding upon Christ by faith 2. Faith is required in those that come worthily to the
nor warrant from the Scripture and against the second Commandment M. Ball. The Heathens did object to the Christians in time past in reproach That the God which they beleeved in was hanged upon a Crosse. They thought good to testifie therefore that they were not ashamed of the Sonne of God by the often using of the sign of the Crosse. But we now live not among Turks that contemn the Crosse of Christ but Papists which esteem more of a wooden Crosse then of the true Crosse of Christ that is his suffering We ought therefore to take away the use of it to take away the superstitious estimation of it Cartwrights Reply to D. Whitgift in Defence of the Admonit pag. 136. See Parker of the Crosse per totum and part 1. cap. 3. pag. 106. against symbolical sacramental signifying signs in the worship of God he urgeth that of the Civil Law Nemo est signandus in fronte quia non debet facies hominis ad similitudinem Dei formata foedari CHAP. IX The Lords Supper THere are divers names and appellations of it of which Casaubone speaks Ex. 16. ad Annal. Eccles. Baron This Sacrament is called The Supper from the time of its institution because it was instituted by Christ after a common Supper and the eating of the Paschal Lamb in the night in which he was betrayed 1 Cor. 11. 23. This word Coena is not liked of the Roman Church because it signifies a common Supper and by consequent cannot be applied to private Masses nay nor to publick Masses neither in which oftentimes the Priest eats all alone Scena est planè non Coena Dominici corporis sanguinis id quod agitur Sacerdos ad altare assistit theatrali veste magnificè indutus Post multas gesticulationes manuum multas corporis gyrationes tandem crustulum manibus supra caput elatis elatum à populo aversus ostendunt Audiunt qui ad sunt quod non intelligunt vident quae non percipâ—unt adorant quod nesciunt Simplicii Varini Epist. de libro postumo Grot. p. 263. The Lords Supper 1 Cor. 11. 20. because instituted by Christ our Lord. The Fathers often call it so Cyprian hath written a Tractate De Coena Domini The breaking of Bread Acts 2. 42. 20. 7. The breaking of the Eucharist so the Syriack in both places Vide De Dieu because it representeth the crucifying of Christ. The Eucharist so it was called not long after the Apostles because the Evangelist Luke and the Apostle rehearsing the institution of this Sacrament do write that Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did give thanks Luke 22. 19. 1 Cor. 11. 24. and it is also still celebrated in the Church with thanksgiving This title is used by the Fathers and Reformed Churches The Table of the Lord 1 Cor. 10. 21. because our Lord Christ instituted this Sacrament and celebrated it at a Table and the Apostles received it there See Mat. 26. 20. Mark 14. 18. Luke 22. 14. Iohn 13. 12. A Communion 1 Cor. 10. 16. because it is a bond of that mutual charity and symbole of the brotherly unity which is among all the faithful 1 Cor. 10. 17. The Papists acknowledge no Communion in participating of this Sacrament no marvel therefore if they dislike the name It is called by the Ancients Synâ—xis which is a Greek word and signifies the same with Congregation or a meeting together 1 Cor. 11. 20. it is a collection gathering together or assembling of the faithful The Papists call it A Masse The Sacrament of the Altar and The Sacrifice Some things are necessary in their nature as love and fear of God Some only by a Law are necessary to our life so all institutions of Christ. Paul cals it the Lords Supper which imports Christ the Author as indeed he was as the Evangelists do witnesse See 1 Cor. 11. 23. It is a standing Ordinance he enjoyns the use of it Till the Lord come ver 26. which cannot be meant of coming in the Spirit for so he was already come according to his promise made before he departed from the world The Lords Supper is thus described by one It is an Institution of Christ or second Sacrament of the New Testament consisting of bread and wine wherein by performance of divers acts about it the Covenant of Grace is confirmed to every worthy receiver This is too obscure and confused Others thus It is the second Sacrament of the New Testament instituted by Christ himself wherein by taking and eating of bread and by taking and drinking of wine the Covenant of Grace is confirmed to every worthy receiver It is the eating and drinking of consecrated bread and wine given to seal up our feeding and nourishment in Christ Jesus Doctor Featley in his Grand Sacriledge of the Church of Rome c. 15. thus defines it It is a Sacrament of the New Testament sealing unto us the perfect nourishment of our souls by the participation of the sacred elements of bread and wine Doctor Goâ—ge in his Catechism thus defines it It is a Sacrament of our spiritual nourishment wherein by receiving of bread and wine according to Christs institution our Communion with Christ is represented and sealed up unto us It is a Sacrament of our nourishment and our growing up in the Lord Jesus and therefore it is appointed by him to be frequently used as being one of the standing dishes which the Lord Christ hath provided for the daily diet and the houshold provision of his faithful ones who are of his family 1 Cor. 11. 26 34. Bread sustains the hungry Wine refreshes the thirsty both satisfie to the full Christ saves perfectly all that come unto him Hookers Survey of the Summe of Church-Discipline part 3. c. 2. Here we have more immediately to do with the person of Christ we draw high to God in prayer but we become one with him in the Supper 1 Cor. 10. 16. here are the sweetest refreshings that ever we receive other duties seem rather to be our work this is our meal all other duties are to fit us for the Supper Examination the Word Prayer This is a duty of the highest and most mysterious signification Epitome Evangelii here are the benefits of the Covenant in one rite 1 Cor. 11. 25. the whole contrivance of salvation is represented in a bit of bread and drop of wine it is a duty wherein God seals up to his people the assurance oâ— his love and special favour Iohn 6. 33. The Lords Supper is 1. A spiritual medicine to cure the remainder of corruption 2. Spiritual food to strengthen our weak graces 3. A spiritual cordial to comfort our distressed consciences 4. A strong obligation to all acts of thankfulnesse and obedience unto Jesus Christ. What are the special and spiritual ends for which the body and bloud of Christ is exhibited and applied in the Lords Supper 1. In the transacting of the services there done the whole
Covenant of grace is sealed and personally applied the body and bloud of Christ may be held forth in a Sermon God renews unto them all that he hath promised Matth. 26. 22 This Cup is the New Testament in my bloud as the New Testament is founded in the bloud of Christ so it is exhibited and sealed therein 2. It serves for the nourishing and building up of his people in all graces it is called eating and drinking He that eats my flesh and drinks my bloud Two things are comprehended under nourishment 1. The maintenance and preservation of the stock of spiritual life which we have got already as by our meat and drink we are preserved and continued in our life 2. In children it serves to augment their parts make them larger stronger the Lords Supper was appointed by Christ to be one of the great means of our spiritual augmentation The Sacraments are not properly Seals unto our faith but of the Covenant They may be said to be seals of our faith consecutivè by a consequence of speech because as seals confirm a thing so faith is confirmed and strengthened by receiving but they are not formaliter in a true proper sense seals unto any thing but the Covenant All graces are nourished and increased by the Lords Supper because the new Covenant is sealed but three cardinal Graces especially as in the body nourish the stomack liver brain heart lungs nourish them and you nourish all the rest 1. The in-dwelling vertue of the Spirit of God they receive an increase of the Spirit 2. Faith nourish that and you nourish all it is called the life of faith Faith is the condition of the Covenant and we seal to our condition 3. Love to God and his people it doth enflame thy love to God and his people it is a communion we are all made one Spirit This Sacrament doth not beget but increase and strengthen Grace where it is already wrought Christ is conveyed in this Sacrament by way of food The Word was appointed to work conversion Faith cometh by hearing This ordinance is not appointed for conversion but it supposeth conversion it seals mens conversion therefore in the Primitive times they let all come to the hearing of the Word and then when the Sermon was done there was an Officer stept up and cried Sancta Sanctis Holy things for holy men and then all others were to go out and therefore it was called missa though the Papists did corrupt it and so called it the Masse afterwards by mixing their own inventions in stead of the Supper of the Lord but it had that name at first because all others were sent away and only such as were of the Church and accounted godly stayed Reasons 1. The nature of it being the seal of the Covenant of Grace requires it it must be supposed that all which come hither must be in Covenant with God The condition of the Covenant of Grace is Believe and be saved therefore it is appointed for believers Secondly It is the Ordinance of spiritual nourishment there must be first life before there can be any nourishment received in If it be appointed to nourish and increase grace then surely there must be grace before Thirdly We are required to examine our selves 1 Cor. 11. and of our godliness examine what work of God hath been upon the soul. Fourthly It is a Sacrament of Communion with God and with the Saints and What Communion hath light with darknesse Or What fellowship hath Christ with Belial All ignorant prophane scandalous persons and such as are meerly civil are hence excluded Conversion is sometimes and that improperly in Scripture as Matth. 18. 3. taken for the renewed exercise of faith and repentance in one that is already converted but the Question is Whether the first work of Regeneration the infusing of the first habits principles and seed of grace be effected by the Lords Supper received It is one thing to be converted at a Sacrament another to be converted by the Sacrament There is some expounding praying It is one thing intentionally to convert as an Institution and another accidentally to convert as an occasion Philip Goodwins Evangelical Communicant The Assembly upon these grounds thought it fit that scandalous sinners though not yet cast out of the Church should be suspended from the Sacrament 1. Because the Ordinance it self must not be prophaned 2. Because we are charged to withdraw from those who walk disorderly 3. Because of the great sinne and danger both to him that comes unworthily and also to the whole Church The Scriptures from which they did prove all this were Matth. 7. 6. 2 Thess. 3. 6 14 15. 1 Cor. 11. 27. to the end of the Chapter compared with Iude v. 23. 1 Tim. 5. 22. Another proof added by the Assembly was this There was power and authority under the Old Testament to keep unclean persons from holy things Levit. 13. 5. Numb 9. 7. 2 Chron. 23. 19. And the like power and authority by way of Analogy continues under the New Testament for the authoritative Suspension from the Lords Table of a person not yet cast out of the Church Wicked men saith Master Hildersam should not be admitted to the Table of the Lord Ezra 6. 21. holy things are prophaned thereby Ezek. 22. 26. 1 Cor. 5. 6. There should be a publick confession for scandalous sins David was more honoured for this Psal. 51. then dishonoured for his sinne Salomon left his Ecclesiastes as a monument of his Repentance Paul frequently mentions his faults Tertul. de poenit and others speak of it Ebrius infantes erroneus atque furentes Cum pueris Domini non debent sumere corpus It was their great sinne in the Church of Corinth that they did not cast out the incestuous person and it was a commendation to that Church Revel 2. that they could not endure the Nicolaitans A prophane person in Augustines Chrysostoms time Tertullians and Cyprians time in Pauls in Iohns time could not come to the Sacrament They are called Tremenda mysteria mysteries which the soul is to tremble at the Fathers call it the most terrible day and hour as if it were a day of Judgement This Suspension is called by the Schoolmen Excommunicatio minor The power of suspending one from the Sacrament is given not uni but unitati to the Eldership not to any one either Minister or Elder M. Gillesp. Aarons Rod bloss l. 3. c. 1. Church-officers should not admit all promiscuously but be careful whom they admit to the Supper That they be not cruel to the souls of them they admit and to the Nation and their own souls by being guilty of other mens sinnes Pareus said to those of Heidelberg When I see your Sacrament prophanation I wonder not at the warre Of receiving with the wicked It is lawful to joyn with a known unsanctified man in the service of God 1 Sam. 15. 30 31 Christ knew Iudas