high mystery is wrought But my design being to satisfie Unbelievers as to the substance of the mystery and not to puzle the Faith of Believers by making them glare too wistly upon the manner how this divine secret is wrought it being more safely admired together with the mystery of the Incarnation and ever blessed Trinity then curiously pried into I resolved to draw a Veyl before it by a profound silence of the several explications of Divines and to content my self with letting you know in general how different Doctors of different Philosophical Principles according to their several Philosophies differently explicate the mystery of the H. Eucharist and defend it differently against Calvinists as they do the mystery of the B. Trinity against the Antitrinitarians and of the Incarnation of the Eternal Word against the Arrians some by virtual distinction others by real formal and others otherwise And yet all hold that after Consecration the bread is no longer bread but is changed into the body of our Lord but how it is done some say one way some another according to their different Tenets in Philosophy still all agreeing that this change is fitly called Transubstantiation and that with good reason for the same remaining the same must needs be the same and cannot possibly be made what it was not without some change The bread then that it may become our Savious body must have some change wrought in it but in its accidents its evident there is none they remaining the same as before therefore the change must be in the substance And can now the change of the substance of bread into the substance of our B. Lords body be called by a fitter name than a substantial change or Transubstantiation And this some of the Learnedst of the Church of England would do well to reflect on who urged by the clearness of our Saviviours own words This is my Body and the multitude of Testimonies of the Fathers of the first six hundred years and the impossibility of such a Doctrins over spreading the whole Christian world without any appearance of its beginning and the opposition it must needs have found by reason of its strangeness both to sence and reason and its engaging the whole Church in a material at least Idolatry unless it had been taught the world at first by our B. Lord and his Apostles I say some of the Learnedst of the Engglish Glergy being urged by such considerations as these confess the Holy Eucharist as they begin to call it after Consecration to be really and truly our B. Saviours body and therefore fall down before it and adore it and for this cause disown the new Rubrick of the Common-prayer-book which saies our Lords body is in Heaven and not upon the Altar These Doctors will tell you they acknowledge the thing only they dare not be so bold as the Romanists to determine the manner And one of the Learnedst of them Mr. Thorndike asks why cannot our B. Saviour appear to us in what shape he pleases in the shape of a Gardiner or if it so please him in the shape of bread and wine These Doctors I say would do well to reflect the Church of Rome has not determin'd the manner of our B. Saviours bodies being in the Sacrament and therefore her Divines some explicate it one way some another but only the thing it self the manner how being left to the dispute of her Doctors 2. Assertion If our B. Saviour would have left us his sacred body and blood instead of all the Sacrifices of Sheep and Oxen under the Mosaical dispensation to be offered up by Christian Priests and to be fed upon by the Christian people it would have been a favour worthy of his excessive love to Mankind by reason of the innumerable benefits which would have accrued to us by the continual oblition and presence of so worthy a sacrifice What an incentive would this have been to Christian piety How would such a Sacrifice as this have compell'd High and Low Rich and Poor Learned and Unlearned with a strange reverence to have flocked about our Christian Altars where not a Lamb or a Beast but the body of God and the blood of God and by concomitancy whole God and Man Christ Jesus should have been offered up by choice Persons to the Almighty for the good of the World How would the presence of such an Oblation have kept them attentive and encreased their servor in their Prayers when they should have been able to have said This before me which I see with my eyes is my dear Redeemer and God that was Crucified for me and is to be my Judge How earnestly should we have made all our Petitions to him and how heartily should we have thanked him for all his Love To understand this Imagin our B. Saviour should appear to you in your Chamber every Morning in that very body and shape He is now in Heaven were you assured it was he and not an illusion with what humility would you prostrate your self before him How heartily would you cry him mercy for all your sins and earnestly recommend all the desires of your soul unto him And how would this high favour melt your soul into a mòst tender affection towards him But these would have been the happy circumstances of the whole Christan world would our Omnipotent Lord out of his abundant goodness have left us his sacred self under the disguise of the Accidents of bread and wine The same Petitions with a like fervour would every Christian have made every Holy Mass which you would have made every Morning upon such an Apparition as was supposed My dear Jesus true God and Man the very same who art in Heaven in all splendor and glory art here upon the holy Altar before me Veiled under the vile appearances of common bread and ordinary wine and all this for my sake that to my souls health thou mightest be seen handled and tasted by me Nor couldst thou be hindred from this excess of Love to me unworthy Sinner although thou didst foresee the Revilings thou wert to endure for it from ungrateful Calvinists Who for this would call thee a Breadden God and reproach thy devout Adorers as more stupid Idolaters than the very Pagan Worshippers of Sun and Moon Rather then I should want the delicious comfort of thy continual presence the happy pledge of eternally seeing thee face to face all this and yet greater indignities wouldst thou subject thy self unto by one to to be reviled by his impious tongue by another to be trampled under his foul feet by a third to be cast into some Sink or Jaques O Impiety O Ingratitude of finful men O unheard of goodness of our dearest Lord thus to abject himself for our sakes But what wonder if when he was in a passible mortal body he would permit himself by wicked Miscreants to be torn with cruel Whips to be bespatterd with filthy Spittle and to be made black
years labour neither eloquence of false Teachers nor force of civil powers has been able so wholly to pervert our Nation as to the belief of that high mystery of the real presence but even still there remain a considerable number retainers of the antient belief And can you think that not in a much greater space of time to wit betwixt the sixth and nineth Century all the Christian world could be perswaded to admit so strange a doctrin to nature and reason and yet no man by vertue of History or Tradition should be able to give any account what Orators prevailed with the world to relinquish the belief of their Ancestors or what power of civil Magistrates forced them to it Especially seeing there have not wanted Ecclesiastical Historigraphers who have made mention of matters of far less note than such a change of Faith must needs have made But what place will there remain for doubting that this high mystery was always believed if not only all writers be silent as to any change but also the seventh and eighth Age yea the most Primitive times do positively attest this very mystery by the pens of the chiefest Champions of the Christian Church who have left us any memorials of their learning and piety in their deservedly admired works I shall faithfully recount their words be your own judge what their sentiment was In the first place then glorious Saint and great Doctor S. Augustin tell us your Faith concerning the Holy Eucharist Is it Bakers bread or the body of our Lord and God I remember saies the holy Doctor in his 28. Ser. de verbis Domini when I treated of the Sacraments I told you that before the words of Christ that which is offered up is called Bread but when the words of Christ shall have been pronounced now it is no longer called bread but the body of Christ. And explicating those words of the Royal Prophet Psal. 98. v. 5. Exalt ye our Lord God and adore his foot-stool for it is holy Now what is this Foot-stool of God why saies this great Doctor The Earth is his Foot-stool But how is the Earth holy and to be adored by us The Saint goes on and tells us how Our Lord took Earth of the Earth because Flesh is of the Earth and he took Flesh of the Flesh of Mary And because he walked here in Flesh and gave to us that very Flesh to be eaten by us to our Salvation but no body eats that Flesh unless he shall first have adored it And indeed what could we expect that S. Austin should teach and believe concerning this divine Sacrament but what he had been taught by his Father and Instructor in Christ the glorious St. Ambrose And what was that Hear his words lib. 4. De Sacramentis Thou wilt perhaps say nnto me my Bread is ordinary Bread but that bread is bread before the Sacramental words but when Consecration has been made of bread it is made the Flesh of Christ. But how can bread be the body of Christ By Consecration Consecration by what and whose words is it perfected By the words of our Lord Jesus For all other things which are said Praise is given to God By prayer supplication is made for the people for Kings for the rest When the time is come that the Venerable Sacrament is to be made now the Priest does not use his own words but the words of Christ therefore the word of Christ makes this Sacrament But what word of Christ That word by which all things were made Our Lord commanded and Heaven was made our Lord commanded and the Earth was made Our Lord commanded and the Seas were made Our Lord commanded and every Creature was produced Doest thou see then how operative the word of Christ is If then there be so great force in the word of our Lord Jesus that it could make things which were not begin to be how much rather is it operative that those things which were should be and be charged into another thing Heaven was not the Sea was not the Earth was not but hear him saying He said the word and they were made he commanded and they were Created That therefore I may Answer thee the body of Christ was not before Consecration bâ— after Consecration I say unto thee that now the Body of Christ is He said it and it was made He commanded and it was Created And in chap. 5. of the same Book Before the words of Christ the Chalice is full of Wine and Water but when the words of Christ have bad their operation then it is made the blood which Redeemed the people See then in how many kinds of things the word of Christ is able to change all things Moreover our Lord Jesus himself testifies unto us that we receive his body and blood ought we then to doubt of his testification Add to S. Austin and S. Ambrose the Learned S. Hierom in his Epistle ad Heliodorum Far be it from me saies the Saint that I should speak amiss of those who succeeding the Apostles do make the body of Christ with their sacred mouth And in his 85. Epistle to Enagrius By whose prayers the body and blood of Christ is made Take notice that these three Holy Fathers lived not four hundred years after our B. Saviours death S. Cyprian yet nearer the Apostles age does no less clearly nor fully attest the same verity in his Serm. de Caena Domini That bread which our Lord gave to his Disciples being changed not in shape but in its nature by the Omnipotency of the Word was made Flesh. And in his Book de Lapsis reprehending such as were angry with the Priests of God who refused to admit them to the holy Communion of the B. Sacrament after they had polluted themselves with the profane Sacrifices of Heathen Idolaters expresses their sin in these words He that has fall'n from his Faith threatens them that have stood firm Sacrilegious wâ—etch he is angry with the Priests of God that he is not prosently admitted with defiled hands to receive the Body of our Lord or to drink his blood with his defiled mouth And this was the very doctrin of his learned Master Tertullian who yet nearer approached the holy Apostles lib. de Resur cur The Flesh is fed with the body and blood of Christ that the soul may be made fat with God And in his Book de Idololatria he complains of the prosaneness of some Christians who made no scruple to day to be working in their Shops making Idolatrous Statues for the Heathens and yet to morrow would presume to come into the Christian Congregations and receive the Sacred mysteries of our Lords body and blood and communicate them to others His words are these To touch the body of our Lord with those hands which give bodies to Devils Nor is this all their Crime would be less did they only receive from the hands of others what they contaminate and pollute
but moreover they deliver to others what they have polluted Makers of Idols are admitted into the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy O Impiety Once the Jews laid profane hands on Christ these daily violate his body O hands deserving to be cut off But shall we desire a Greek Father or two to give us their sense concerning our present Controversie S. Crysost ho. 60. ad pop Antioch Because the Word saies This is my Body let us assent and believe And a little after How many are there now adaies that say O that I could see his Figure his Garments his Shooes Lo thou seest himself thou touchest him thou eatest him Thou desirest to see his Garments but he give thee not only to see but also to eat and touch and take himself into thee And a little after Consider what an indignation thou hast against the Traytor Judas and against those that Crucified him Therefore consider lest thou also beest not guilty of the body and blood of Christ. They killed his most holy body and thou receivest it with a polluted soul after so many benefits For he was not satisfied to be made man to be Buffetted and Crucified but moreover he does mix himself with us and makes us his body not only by Faith but in very deed And ho. 24. in Ep. 1. ad Corin. Christ has given us his body both that we might have it and might eat it which is the greatest sign of love Wherefore Job chap. 31. that he might show the love of his Servants to him said they oftentimes of their execeeding great love to him would say concerning him Who will give us of his Flesh that we might be filled with it Even so Christ has given us his Flesh that we might feed upon it thereby to allure us to love him very much This body the Sages adored in the Manger Thou seest it not in the Manger but npon the Altar not a Woman holding it in her arms but a Priest present Nor do I show thee Angels nor Arch-angels nor Heaven nor the Heaven of Heavens but the very Lord of all these things Nor doest thou only see him but touch him not only touch him but eat him and having received him returns to thy home And Hom. 60 ad pop Antioch and 83. in Math. Let us every where believe God and not oppose him although that which he saies seem absurd to our sense and thoughts let his speech overcome both our sense and our reason which let us do in all things and especially in the Mysteries not only regarding those things which lie before us but also holding fast to his words For we cannot be deceived by his words but our sense is most easily deceived those cannot be false this is deceived very often Because therefore he has said this is my body let us make no doubt but believe and see it with the yes of our understanding And in his 3. ho. in Ep. ad Ephes Let us think that him that sits above who is adored by the Angels 't is him that we tast that we feed upon And ho. 2. ad pop Antioc Elias left his Disciple his Mantle but the Son of God ascending left us his Flesh. But Elias indeed put off his Mantle but Christ both left us his Flesh and retaining it ascended with it Let us not therefore be dishartened nor lament nor fear the difficulty of the times For he that has not refused to shed his blood for us and has communicated to us both his flesh and blood will not refuse to do any thing for our Salvation Hear another Greek Doctor S. Cyril of Jerusalem in his Catechistical discourses which are the plainest declarations of the mysteries of our holy Faith Catech. 4. Mys. Seeing then Christ himself so affirms and says concerning the bread This is my body who after this can dare to doubt of it and the same also affirming and saying This is my blood who I say can doubt of it and say it is not his blood He changed water into wine in Cana of Galilee by his sole Will and shall he not be worthy whom we may believe that he changed wine into his blood For if being invited to a corporeal Wedding he wrought a stupendious miracle shall we not confess him much rather to have given his body and blood to the Children of the Bridegroom Wherefore with all assurance let us take the body and blood of Christ for under the appearance of bread is given to thee his body and under the appearance of wine is given his blood that having received the body and blood of Christ thou maiest be made partaker together with him of his body and Blood So shall we be Christophers such as carry Christ in them when we shall have received his body and blood into our Members and so as S. Peter saies shall be made partakers of the divine Nature Do not therefore look upon it as bare bread and bare wine for it is the body and blood of Christ according to the words of our Lord himself For although thy sense suggest this to thee yet let Faith confirm thee do not judge of the thing by thy tast but rather from Faith hold for certain so that thou hast no doubt that the body and blood are given to thee Knowing and accounting for most certain that this bread which is seen by us is not bread although our tast judge it to be bread but that it is the body of Christ. And the wine which is seen by us although it may seem wine to our sense of tasting that yet it is not wine but the blood of Christ. Can the holy Council of Trent have plainer words than these or fuller to our present purpose Add the testimony of S. Justin Martyr who lived yet nearer the Age of the Apostles in his Apology for the Christians to Antoninus the Emperor in which he gives him an account of the Christian Faith and where certainly he would not make it more mysterious than it was nor more hard to be believed according to any part of it then the truth and common belief of Christians forced him but rather would moderate the mysteriousness of it than encrease it Hear him then giving an account of the Holy Eucharist This meat is called by us the Eucharist because no body may partake of it but he who believes those things to be true which we say and lives so as Christ has taught us For we do not take these things as common and ordinary bread but as by the word of God our Saviour Jesus Christ was made man and had flesh and blood for our Salvation so we have been taught that this meat which is Consecrated by the Prayers of that speech we received from him is the flesh and blood of Jesus Christ who was made man For the Apostles in their Commentaries which are called Gospels have delivered that Christ so commanded and that having taken bread when he had given thanks he said Do this
A RATIONAL DISCOURSE CONCERNING TRANSUBSTANTIATION IN A Letter to a Person of Honor from a Master of Arts of the University of CAMBRIDGE Printed in the Year MDCLXXVI A RATIONAL DISCOURSE CONCERNING TRANSUBSTANTIATION SIR HAving lately had the honor of your Company you were pleased to signifie a particular difficulty which you had to believe the great mystery of Love and grand stumbling block of more ingenious Protestants the mystery of Transubstantiation in which if I could give you satisfaction to my best remembrance you promised me to reconcile your self to the Church of Rome Non ignara mali miseris succurrere disco My own sad misfortune to have been Educated in the misbelief of this sublime Article of our Christian Faith till the five and twentieth year of my Age makes me very tenderly compassionate both to your self and all others whom I see to be involved in the same misery The all good and all powerful God who has so firmly made me to believe this strange miracle of Love that had I a thousand Lives I would most willingly through God's assistance lay them all down to Seal it with my blood give your Honor and all Mis-believers the like satisfaction to your and their Eternal comfort What satisfies me I shall in the best manner I am able Candidly propose to your mature and impartial consideration Sir My sentiment concerning the adorable Eucharist is that it is neither less nor more than the Sacred Body and Blood of God neither less nor more than whole Christ. God and Man Soul Body and Divinity though for the love and service of us Sinners veiled under the vile accidents and appearances of common Bread and ordinary Wine Concerning which mystery my first Assertion shall be Assertion 1. It is possible to the Omnipotent power of God to change the substance of Bread and Wine into the substance of our blessed Saviours Body and Blood And this our Adversaries generally grant Whence by the way take notice that all such Arguments and most of them are such as pretend to prove Transubstantiation impossible even in the judgment of our Adversaries are Sophisms and do not prove their Proposers inintent Else they must confess that two Contradictories may be true and that they can and do believe them both To wit that Transubstantiation is both possible and impossible and they can and do believe as much 'T is possible that they grant and 't is also impossible for that their Arguments attempt to prove Further. I prove Transubstantiation possible thus What you and I can do and every day actually do in four and twenty hours surely God Almighty can do in a moment But you and I in four and twenty hours turn Bread and Wine into the substance of our bodies by eating drinking and digesting of them Therefore our B. Saviour in a moment without eating and drinking by a mere Fiat or will that the substance of bread and wine be turned into the substance of his Body and Blood can effect it But then you will say the substance of the bread and wine must be transferred into Heaven that it may be changed into the substance of our Lord's body there But why so Is it not sufficient that the substance of our-Lord's body in Heaven be made to be under the accidents of bread and wine here But how can the substance of our Saviours body be in Heaven under such a measure of quantity and such accidents there and at the same time be here on Earth under a different quantity and accidents Why how is the substance of the same Air condens'd under a lesser quantity to day which rarified yesterday was under a greater quantity For the antient and commonly received definition of Rarefaction is a little matter under a great quantity and of Condensation is a great deal of matter under a little quantity For example In a Weather-glass the same air rarified fills twice as much space as did the same air condens'd as is evident to your eye So that the same substance of air when it is rarified fills the spaces A. and B. which when it was condens'd fill'd only the space A. and this without any addition of any new substance of air only the same substance by vertue of Rarefaction is under a greater quantity than it was before And will you pawn your soul the Omnipotent God cannot by Consecration make his own body be present to the spaces A and B which before Consecration was only present to the space A. Now who would ever have imagin'd such Doctrin as this concerning Rarefaction and Condensation should have been taught by an Aristotle to explicate Nature and not rather have been invented by some Christian Philosopher to declare the supernaturality of Transubstantiation so aptly does it agree with that hidden and holy mystery 2. None make difficulty of a spirits being in different places at once The soul is generally acknowledged to be all in the head and all in the foot as Almighty God is all in France and all in England not one part of him here and another there not one God in France and another in England We indeed because we never saw the same thing in two places but always different things in different places are apt to imagine it impossible for the same thing at the same time to be in two different places Hence it follows whatsoever involves not a contradiction being possible to God Almighty let our phansie say what it will we must follow our reason and acknowledge Almighty God can make not only a spiritual substance but even a material one be in two places at once unless we can shew it includes a contradiction To be here and not to be here is indeed a contradiction but to be here and there at the same time is no contradiction else neither our soul nor God Almighty himself could be all here and all in another place at the same time Now will any one who is forced by his Faith and Reason to acknowledge a spiritual substance is actually in two places at once pawn his eternal salvation as he does who purely for this difficulty continues Protestant that God Almighty cannot by all his Omnipotency make a corporeal substance be here and in Heaven at the same time Now that the bread and wine in the Holy Eucharist should affect our senses in the same manner as they did before their change into our B. Saviours body and blood this ought to seem no impossible wonder to a Christian who believes so many miracles in our Lords Incarnation Conception and Nativity of a Virgin Such a Miracle as this our Lord wrought when he appeared to S. Mary Magdalen in the shape of a Gardner His face no doubt was his own true face but it wrought upon S. Mary Magdalens eyes as if it had been the face of the Gardiner And here I had thought to have inserted the different ways which different Schools of Catholick Divines take to explicate how this
and blew with ignominious buffets what wonder now when he is become immortal and impassible and can suffer no more defilement from the basest ordures than do the bright Sun beams from the foulest mud when they shine upon it that he should permit himself to be eaten by Mice or Doggs or suffer other viler indignities if Sacrilegious Sinners will permit or cause them Moreover such a presence of our great Lord what an Incitement would it have been to pious Munificence in adorning our Christian Churches with the richest Gold and most precious Stones or what ever else that 's rare and splendid which Nature or Art does afford making them little Heavens for lustre and glory and thereby exciting in the hearts of all that should enter them a due reverence to the Almighty whom we worship If Solomon so adorned his Temple where only a Sheep or a Calf or a little Incense was offered to the Creator of all things what glory could have been thought too rich for our Christian Churches where an Oblation worthy of the great God should every day have been Sacrificed unto him the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world the God-Man Christ Jesus In fine what vertue should not our dear Saviour have given us example of by such a charitable humiliation of himself Obedience to come down from Heaven to Earth at the voice of every Christian Priest though never so simple for his understanding or never so wicked for his life and manners Charity Humility Patience Contempt of the Judgments or sayings of men c. 3. Assertion The bread and wine in the Holy Eucharist are by the Omnipotent power of God actually and in deed changed into the body and blood of our B. Saviour Jesus Christ which I prove thus This was the universal belief of the Christian world in the nineth Century after our B. Saviour as is evident by the testimony of all the writings of that Age and by the universal testimony of the tenth Age who profess in all Christian Countrys to have received this Faith from their immediate Ancestors Nor do our Adversaries deny it and therefore appeal to the first six hundred years in which they say the Christian doctrine remained incorrupt But if the doctrine of the real mutation of bread and wine in the Holy Eucharist into our B. Saviours body and blood was generally believed in the nineth Age it must necessarily be taught in the first Age by the Apostles to their first Converts over all the world and consequently be most certainly true For it cannot be doubted but that the first Converts of the H. Apostles did not only understand what the Apostles taught them concerning this great mystery but also did throughly believe it and highly esteem it as they did all other doctrines and practices taught them by the same their first Maffers as not only of exceeding profit above all the things of this life but also as highly necessary to them and their Children to bring them to eternal bliss Which being so none can doubt but that the same first Disciples both could and would and actually did teach the very same doctrine which they so highly esteemed as to embrace it with the bazard of their lives to their Children and Successors And this they taught them not as an invention of their own but as a doctrine taught them by the Apostles of Jesus Christ who confirmed their Mission from the infallible God by evident miracles In like manner it cannot be doubted but these taught their Children also concerning this mystery what they had been taught by their Fathers and not as the invention of their Fathers but as a doctrine taught their Fathers by the undoubted Messengers of Heaven the Holy Apostles The like may be said of all the intervening Generations for the first six hundred years which our Adversaries do not deny though it be all one to the force of this Argument to grant so much only for the first four hundred years Now if Transubstantiation was not taught for the first six hundred years but the contrary whatsoever age be it the seventh eighth or nineth would begin to teach the doctrine of the real presence of our Lordâ— body in the Sacrament they could not possibly have the impudence to tell their Children the bread and wine in the Eucharist were turned into the true body and blood of our Saviour and thus they had been taught by their Fathers and Grandfathers uninterruptedly from the Apostles This I say it is impossible they could have the Impudence to assert when every one must needs know his Father and Grand-father had believed and taught him otherwise What must they pretend then to impose upon their Children this new and strange mysterious Doctrine They must tell them their Fathers and Grand-fathers and other Ancesters for some hundreds of years had been in an Error and had forsaken the Doctrine taught by the Apostles and their first Converts as to this mystery and confirm their Assertion by the clear words of Holy Scripture Take and Eat this is my Body c. and by other testimonies out of the Writers of the first or second Century But no History makes mention of any such manner of bringing in the Doctrine of Transubstantiation in the seventh eighth or other Century Therefore it was never so brought in but was always believed nor indeed could it ever in any Century be brought in by the Church of Christ whose custom has ever been not only in the seventh and eighth but in every other Century before after alwaies to teach and to pretend to teach her Children not Doctrins devised or found out by herself by reading the Holy Scriptures or other means but what was taught her by her Fore Elders uninterruptedly from the Apostles and still when Hereticks or beginners of any new Doctrin in any age pretended Scriptures for them she opposed we have been taught otherwise by our Ancesters and to understand those Scriptures in another sense than you understand them Which way of Teaching a bringer in of a new Doctrine its evident could not use For if he did not begin to teach his Child otherwise than he was taught by his Father he should teach no new or other Doctrine But if he did begin to teach his Child otherwise than his Father taught him he could not at the same time tell his Child thus he was taught by his Father and so upward from the Apostles when both his own Conscience and all his Neighbours would testifie the contrary Calvin for example could not tell his Child that he was taught by his Father to deny Transubstantiation No more could the first Teacher of Transubstantiation in the seventh or other Century had it been a Novelty tell his Child he was so taught to believe by his Father but must have pretended to have more light than his Father and Ancesters as our Adversaries did when they began to deny it Hence it is evident Transubstantiation
was not begun in the seventh or other Century but was alwaies believed since the Apostles seeing that in the nineth Century Christians universally believed that in the holy Eucharist the bread and wine were changed into the body and blood of our Saviour and as such adored them and embraced this doctrine of the real presence not as a doctrine newly found out by themselves or their immediate Fore-fathers by reading the holy Scriptures or other means but as taught them by their Fore-fathers uninterruptedly from the Apostles and seeing likewise this has ever been the way of the Catholick Church to teach and pretend to teach Posterity not new Doctrines of her own but what she had learnt from her Ancestors Hence S. Vincent Lerinensis twelve hundred years ago in his Golden Treatise against the profane Innovations of Heresies upon those words of S. Paul Siquis c. If any one Evangelize to you besides what you have received let him be Anathema Sed forsitan c. But perhaps those things were commanded the Galatians only Then those things also which follow in the same Epistle were commanded the Galatians only Be not desirous of vain-glory provoking one another envying one another Or perhaps was it then commanded if anyone announce besides what has been announced let him be Anathemaâ—ized but now it is not commanded Therefore and that also which he there saies But I say walk in the Spirit and do not perfect the desires of the Flesh was then only commanded but is not now commanded But if it be impious and pernicious to believe so it necessarily follows that as these things are to be observed by all Ages so those things also which are established concerning not changing the Faith are commanded to all Ages Wherefore it was never lawful it is not now lawful nor ever shall be lawful to Christian Catholicks to announce any thing besides what they have received Let him cry and cry again and to all and alwaies and every where let him cry by his Epistle that Vessel of Election that Master of the Gentils that Trumpet of the Apostles that Preacher of the World Conscious to the secrets of Heaven let him cry if any one preach a new Doctrine let him be Anathematiz'd And on the contrary side let certain Froggs and Cynifes and Flies that are to perish such as are the Pelagians reclame and this to Gatholiks We say they being Authors we being Heads we being Expositors Condemn what ye did hold hold what ye did Condemn reject the ancient Faith the institutions of your Fathers the depositions of your Ancestors and receive but what I have a horror to mention them for they are such proud things c. But may not general Councils at least presume to reach new Doctrines Hear the same S. Vincent chap. 32. Hoc semper neque quicquam praeterea c. The Catholick Church excited by the Novelties of Hereticks by the decrees of her Councils even did this and not thing more than this what she had received by Tradition only this she consigned to Posterity by writing comprehending a great sum of things in a few letters and for the most part for the light of understanding signing the not new sense of Faith with the propriety of a new name Take notice that the Christian Church using this means to preserve the Faith first received its impossible she should ever lose or change it For if Fathers from the beginning had resolved to teach their Children what they had learnt or even thought they had learnt from their Parents as to the point of the Real prefence or other doctrine its impossible they should teach another doctrine For should they teach another doctrine it must happen either because they were ignorant what was taught them by their Parents which is impossible not only to whole Nations but even to the Inhabitants of one small Town or else because though they knew what was taught by their Parents yet they would teach otherwise than they had been taught but then they must forsake their first resolution of teaching their Children what they thought they had learnt from their Fathers contrary to the Supposition But on the other side let us suppose a book fully written as to all points to be believed by Christians by the first teachers of Christianity Let them together with this Book give charge to their 〈◊〉 Converts neither to add to it nor to diminish it and to believe as in their Consciences they shall think that Book shall teach them Though Generation after Generation be never so faithful to such a charge yet they may in after Ages come to lose or change their Faith because the Book may seem to one Generation to bear one sense and to another Generation to bear another Especially if the mysteries to be believed be very sublime and the Book obscure in many places and admit of divers senses when it speaks of those mysterieâ— For example these words This is my Body may seem to one Age to bear this sense This is a sign of my body and â—o another This is really and truly my body But no ten Families who have been taught by their Parents either to believe our Saviours body is in the Euecharist or that it is not there can possibly mistake what their immediate Fathers taught them and frequently inculcated to them as to this point both by themselves and choice persons ordained on purpose for this end to teach what they learnt from their immediate Masters and Fathers Nothing can make a change here but a resolution to go contrary to what they know was taught them by their Parents Wherefore seeing God Almighty is resolved not to teach every Age by immediate infallible Missionants from himself but to send inspired Ambassadors to one particular Generation only and to leave that Generation to teach their Children successively till the day of Judgment what they learnt from the immediate infallible Messengers of Heaven And seeing also a Book with a charge not to change or alter it and with a charge also to follow what should seem to every Generation to be the sense of it and supposing every Generation faithful to such a charge would not have been a sufficient means to keep the first divine Faith from Corruption we may safely conclude the Almighty has not taken that way to teach the world But seeing Oral teaching by inspired Pastors at first with a charge to every Generation to follow what they thought was taught them by their immediate Parents and Teachers provided every Generation were true to this charge would have kept the first Faith inviolate we may also conclude the Almighty has taken this way Especially finding a Congregation of so vast a spread in being who pretends to have made use of this means to preserve her first Faith taught her Ancestors many hundred years ago nor can she be evinced by any History or Tradition or any thing but mere sayings and ungrouâ—â—â—d surmises to have lost
they were almost all able to dispute of Dogms To whom when their gathering together in one seemed to add a confidence of daring and decreeing something from themselves yet notwithstanding they would presume nothing arrogate nothing at all to themselves but took all possible heed lest they should deliver to their Posterity what themselves had not received from their Fathers and not only well disposed the matter for the present but also gave example to them that were to come after them to wit that they should reverence the dogms of sacred Antiquity and condemn Adinventa the additional inventions of profane Novelty This then was not an Age wherein to introduce new doctrins into the Church nor any other before S. Vincent For he tells us chap. 9. Mos iste c. That custome has always flourished in the Church and by how much any one hath been more Religious the more readily has he opposed new inventions We have hereof plenty of examples every where The same S. Vincent witnesses that in the third Age the Assertors of Rebaptization wanted neither wit nor eloquence nor number nor verisimilitude of Truth nor Oracles of the divine Law but understood in a bad and new manner chap. 9 and 10. How came they then to lose their cause S. Stephen and his Collegues reclamed Nihil novandum c. Nothing is to be innovated besides what has been delivered to us Agrippinus Bishop of Carthage holding Rebaptization against the rule of the Universal Church against the sense of all his fellow Priests against the custom and institutions of his Ancestors and hereby as S. Vincent observes giving a form of Sacriledge to all Hereticks this overthrew him Had now the doctrin of the Real presence been an Idolatrous Novelty its manifest no Introducer of it could have perswaded it to a Christian Church thus principled as the Doctors of these times were They would all unanimously have reclamed Nothing must be innovated besides what has been delivered to us by our Ancestors Moreover that the Christian doctrin remained pure and incorrupt for some Centuries of years after its first planting is further evinced by considering the state of the Christian Church for the first 300. years to wit that it was severely persecuted all the world over Now can any reasonable man imagin that they who were continually exposing their lives for their Religion would if they could agree together so notoriously to change it as to make themselves most gross Idolaters by adoring bread and wine as the true body and blood of their Creator and God Nor can it be imagin'd when the Centuries of the persecuted state of the Church were ended that the Christians now in a full liberty of professing and practising their Faith would all on the sudden so notoriously change that Faith which had been delivered them by their Fore-fathers who had seal'd it with their blood And this none can doubt of who reflects how tenacious all man kind is of that Religion they were bred up in In so much as let any one consult the whole world and he shall never find so much as one Nation or Country to have changed their Religion without a great deal of â—oise and difficulty and a considerable length of time and so as Posterity could for many Ages give an account of such a change how and by what means it happened so as to satisfie any rational demander of an account of such a change without flying to imperceptible mutations by little and little but when or by whom no account is to be given The usual refuge of our Adversaries when we demand of them how not one Country but all the Christian Countrys in the world came to believe so universally this strange doctrin of the change of Bread and Wine into our B. Saviours body and blood The whole world formerly in a manner Pagan except a handful of Jews is now become Christians we give an account of it Twelve men dividing the world amongst them by stupendious Miracles a holy life and glorious death converted great numbers of several Nations to the Christian Faith and these taught it their Children under sharp persecutions for some three hundred years and after that through the favour of Emperors and Kings Converted to be Christians it made that spread we now see Arrianism over-ran a great part of the Christian world and we are able to give an account how and by what means without recurring to imperceptible growing by little and little Arrius first broach'd that Heresie and by the favour of Emperors it got a great footing in Christendom In like manner had the strange doctrin of Transubstantiation been a Novel Invention 't is not possible but at first teaching it must needs have been opposed and could not have so over-spread the Christian world in the nineth Century as its evident to any one versed in Ecclesiastical History it did without great preaching of its first Abettors and strange favour of Christian Princes That the whole Christian world for the first six hundred years should be wholly ignorant of this strange mysterious doctrin and so hard to be believed and that in the nineth Century it should be generally believed and not as a new doctrin neither which was pretended by that Age to have been found out by vertue of greater light by reading the Holy Scriptures c. but as a doctrin they had been taught from their Fore-fathers by an immemorable Tradition is harder to believe than the mystery it self to any judicious considerer how difficultly as I hinted above we are perswaded to leave the doctrins we have been taught by our Parents from our Child-hood In confirmation of this let but any one consider the state of our own Country About the year 1500 we generally believed and adored the bread and wine in the H. Eucharist as our B. Saviours true body and blood Now 't is confess'd we a hundred for one believe the contrary But how was this new Faith bred in us By stopping the mouthes of all the Preachers of the antient mysterious doctrin and by persecuting with severe Laws all Professors of that antient Faith And yet you see even all this diligence has not been able to root out the antient belief universally neither Much-less was what has been done been effected so without noise but all our Chronicles mention how our new belief was wrought And can any one think that not one Kingdom but all the Kingdoms of the Christian world could be brought so universally to change their Faith without any mention in any History how and by whom this strange change was wrought Especially if he reflect how hardly human nature does believe strange things which neither sense nor reason can give any evidence of And on the contrary how easily and gladly we relinquish Beliefs which have been imposed upon us when we have as we think the evidence both of sense and reason for our change All which notwithstanding you see how that after a 150
in memory of me This is my Body and having taken the Cup when we had given thanks he said also This is my blood and gave it to them only Mark how this holy Father saies that what we have received concerning the holy Eucharist is that it is both the flesh and blood of Jesus Christ who was made man Now would any man in his wits have given such an account of the Christian Faith to an unbelieving Heathen with a desire to Convert him and to recommend our holy Faith to him had the blessed Eucharist been a mere sign of the flesh and blood of Christ. This he would easily have understood to be very feasable whereas the other strangely shocks both his sense and reason For other Testimonies out of these and other Holy Fathers I refer you to our Books of Controversie on this Subject which are full of them And who now that has the least grain of Humility and Modesty would not blush to accuse so many and so grave Doctors of Christ's Church of Idolatry and damnable Error And here Sir you must give me leave to bespeak our Adversaries in the words of S. Augustin directed by him to Julâ—an the Pelagian after a like Citation about another matter of these very Holy Fathers by me now cited as to a good part of them Tu qui tam crebro c. Thou sadly deluded Calvinist that doest so often object to us Catholick Christians the crime of Idolatry for adoring the Holy Eucharist if thou beest awake see what and what kind of men and how glorious Defenders of the Christian Faith thou darest to be spatter under our names with so execrable a Crimination Go now and object to us the crime of Idolatry dissemble and feign thy self not to know what they say in this point over-look them as it were and attack us only as not knowing that under our name they are reviled and confidently insult over so many and so great Doctors of the Church of Christ who after a most Saintly life and having beaten down the Errors of their times most gloriously went out of this life before you and your Camerades bubled up Doest thou see with what kind of men we sustain thy reproaches doest thou see with whom we have the same common cause which without any sober consideration thou Calumniates and endeavours to expugn Doest thou see proud Calvinist how pernicious it is unto thy self to object so horrible a crime of Idolatry to such men as these and how glorious it is to us to sustain the charge of any crime together with such Doctors Or if thou doest see see and hold thy peace and let so many Catholick tongues silence thy Calvinistical tongue and submit thy brazen forehead to the venerable mines of so many grave Fathers The Russian Polemus to compleat his wilde ramble would needs early in the morning half Drunk with his Night-Revels go to the School of the Grave Sophist Xenocrates to affront him and his Scholars But he was no sooner entred the School of that sober Platonist but the very fight of the modest and grave Comportment of the Philosopher and his Scholars did so strike my young gallant that he was quite out of Countenance and asham'd of himself he pull'd off his drunken bayes and compos'd himself to modesty and became his Convert whom he came on purpose to deride and scoff at Such force had the grave Countenances of a sober Platonist and his School to compâ—â—at a rude Russian Finding my presuptuous Calvinist drunk with pride and self-conceit I could think of no better means to reduce him to Sobriety then to bring him not into the School of a sober Ethnick Philosopher but into a grave Assembly of the most memorable Bishops and Doctors of the School of Christ. To whom certainly so much a greater Reverence and respect is due by how much their Doctor and Master Christ is greater then Xenocrates 's Master and Doctor Plato I desire now my conceited Calvinist that thou wouldst think it worth thy while to eye to look upon so many and so grave Prelates of the Catholick Church and imagin them to look as it were upon thee and mildly and gently to say unto thee Itanè nos fili Juliane c. Is it so indeed Son Stilling fleet are we 〈◊〉 Idolaters What answer wouldst thou give them With what face wouldst thou look upon them What arguments would occur to thee Wouldst thou dare wouldst thou have the face to produce such wodden Daggers as thou art ever and anon drawing upon us Or rather would not such pittiful Weapons fall out of thy hand at the presence of so great Doctors and such grave Prelates of Gods Church Wouldst thou have the forehead to tell the great S. Augustin our B. Lord said Do this in remembrance of me the words which I speak unto you are spirit and life I am a Door I am a true Vine c. As if that great Doctor and his venerable Fellows could be ignorant of such petty Cavils as those Tautumne apud te c. Can a Calvin or a Stillingfleet have so much Authority with any person of sobriety that he should for their regards not only for sake so many and so great Doctors and defenders of the Christian Faith from the rising of the Sun to the going down thereof but also dare to call them I dolaters and Abertors of damnable Errors I desire my conceited Calvinist would but consider into what an Assembly I have brought him 'T is an Assembly of Saintly Doctors not of the popular multitude Such as were not only Children but Fathers of the Church famous in their Generations for Learning and Sanctity who well furnished with spiritual Weapons strenuously warred against the Hereticks of their days and having happily finished the labours of their dispensation holily went to rest in peace Nor was the doctrin we are now disputing any new devised Opinion of theirs but what they learnt in the Church of Christ in the time of their Rudiments that they taught the Church of Christ in time of their Honors That which they found in the Church that they held That which they received from their Fathers they delivered to their Children And if my Calvinist will perhaps say he does not charge S. Augustin or S. Chrysostom with the crime of Idolatry he must give me leave to tell him nor then does he justly charge us whom he sees in the same cause to have followed their steps But if he will only reproach us with such a Calumny nor for any other reason but because we think concerning the holy Eucharist what they thought hold what they held preach what they preacht who does not see that he openly reviles us only but secretly has the like judgement of them For what they believe we believe what they teach we teach yield to them and you yield to us acquiesâ— in their sentiments and you 'l cease to condemn ours Moreover this grave Assembly of antient
perswade Unbelievers to acknowledge the true Faith but only professes that by these her members are sanctified For example we say by Baptism as an outward and visible sign is wrought an invisible grace in the soul of the person Baptized Though view the Child as much as you please you can by none of your senses perceive any mutation to be wrought In like manner the Church professes to believe the mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God that our Lord Jesus though to outward appearance a mere man was also true God and yet by no sense was the Hypostatical Union of his soul and body to the Second person of the blessed Trinity discernable This was no doubt a great Miracle yea the miracle of miracles wrought amongst us but the end of its working being not by it as a motive to draw the world to Christianity but to constitute a fit person for the working of the salvation of the world it was not necessary it should be the object of our senses The same Lord and Saviour telling us that he was God though we could discern no Characters of Divinity in him by any of our senses he saying that he was God proving by other Miracles to our senses that he was sent from God to teach us nothing but Truth this was sufficient to secure our belief of his Deity In like manner in the mystery of the holy Eucharist this miraculous change being not wrought to allure Strangers to the Christian Faith but to sanctifie Believers and to work all those spiritual effects in them above-mentioned by being received by them and offered up in their presence for them c. it was not requisite this change should be the object of our senses Nay it was necessary it should not be the object of our senses For it being wrought to the intent we should eat and drink our dear Lord his body and blood it was necessary only the substance of bread and wine should be turned into the substance of our Lords flesh and blood the accidents of bread and wine remaining for that otherwise we should have a horror to eat raw flesh and drink true appearing blood As to the confirmation of the Argument that hence it would follow we cannot trust our senses and consequently not be certain of any miracle wrought by our Saviour To this I Answer We may alwaies trust our senses about their own objects and in due circumstances and when we have not positive grounds to think either God Almighty by himself or by an Angel or permissively by a Devil represents things otherwise then they are The three Children in the fiery Furnace might really think themselves in the midst of scorching Flames though they felt them not because they had reason to surmise God Almighty wrought a miracle out of those circumstances they had no reason to believe any thing to be ordinary fire which should not burn as fire Nor must they for this for ever after be in doubt whether they were not environed with Flames of fire or no. Nor must Abram because once in a particular circumstance he mistook three Angels for three men therefore never after believe his eyes whether he saw a man or no unless he first pinched him by the arm and felt that he had flesh and blood as himself Nor must one who in the presence of a Conjurer had taken pibble stones for grapes for ever after be doubtful whether he saw grapes or no till he tasted them Nor does it follow S. Mary Magdalen could not be certain she ever saw our B. Saviour because once her senses were mistaken concerning him taking him for the Gardener And in our present case our B. Saviour telling us that the Holy Eucharist is his body we have all reason to think that by miracle he makes it to be so whatsoever it seems to our senses Nor do Catholicks therefore out of such a circumstance doubt of all the bread they see whether it be not their Lords body or no Though I must tell you even here your senses are not mistaken for they do perceive what they seem to perceive that is the Accidents of bread and wine which remain and affect them in the same manner as when the substance under them was the substance of bread and wine but now is the substance of our Lords body and blood Substances are not discernable by any sense only we conclude by a Physical certitude such a substance is under such a complex of Accidents when we have nor positive grounds that God Almighty works a miracle as here we have he saying expresly of this object before us 'T is his body and 't is his blood But if there be so much to be said for this great mystery how comes it to pass so many have so great difficulty to believe it It is not because the mystery is not highly credible but it is partly from Nature and partly from Education and partly from want of a serious and frequent consideration of those Arguments which strongly evince the credibility of it and partly for want of strange desires of the happiness of the other life and of a heart void of inordinate affections to the things of this life Pleasures Riches and Honors 'T is partly from Nature I say For 't is not more difficult to our senses to practice Sobriety Temperance Chastity and Fasting then it is to our understanding to assent to Truths which seem to shock our reason and senses though proposed by never so great Authority Should you have seen our B. Saviour sucking his Mothers Breast in the Stable of Bethlehem whosoever should have told you the little Infant there was God Almighty the maker of Heaven and Earth Nature would have found a great difficulty to believe so strange an assertion and no less then it does now to believe that a little Wafer in the hands of a Priest is the same Christ both God and man veiled under the appearance of the common accidents of bread But had it been moreover from your infancy continually noysed in your ears by such as you reverenced for their learning and skill in divine matters that it was impossible for God to become man this would strangely have encreased your difficulty to believe a little Infant in nothing different as to outward appearance from other Children should be God But if to all this you should add never or very seldom and slightly to consider the positive Arguments for the belief of that mystery of the Incarnation but were ever still poring upon the difficulty and unlikeliness and seeming impossibility of any such thing 't is not possible you should ever come to the belief of it though the mystery be never so true in it self nor the Arguments to prove it never so evident and cogent But this is the case of us generally in England as to the mystery of the B. Sacrament and therefore no vvonder if generally it be not believed by us but we