esteeme this Iohn was with king Alfred may be seene in William of Malmesbury Roger Hoveden Matthew of Westminster and other writers of the English history The king himselfe in the Preface before his Saxon translation of St. Gregories Pastorall professeth that he was holpen in that worke by Iohn his Masse-priest By whom if he did meane this Iohn of ours you may see how in those dayes a man might be held a Masse-priest who was far enough from thinking that he offered up the very body and bloud of Christ really present under the formes of bread and wine which is the onely Masse that our Romanists take knowledge of Of which wonderfull point how ignorant our elders were even this also may be one argument that the author of the booke of the wonderfull things of the holy Scripture before alledged passeth this quite over which is now esteemed to be the wonder of all wonders And yet doth he professe that he purposed to passe over nothing of the wonders of the Scripture wherein they might seeme notably to swerve from the ordinary administration in other things CHAP. V. Of Chrisme Sacramentall Confession Penance Absolution Marriage Divorces and single life in the Clergie THat the Irish did baptize their infants without any consecrated Chrisme Lanfranc maketh complaint in his letters to Terdeluacus or Tirlagh the chiefe King of that country And Bernard reporteth that Malachias in his time which was after the daies of Lanfranc and Pope Hildebrand did of the new institute the most wholesome use of Confession the sacrament of Confirmation and the contract of marriages all which he saith the Irish before were either ignorant of or did neglect Which for the matter of Confession may receive some further confirmation from the testimonie of Alcuinus who writing unto the Scottish or as other copies read the Gothish and commending the religious conversation of their laity who in the midst of their worldly imployments were said to leade a most chaste life condemneth notwithstanding another custome which was said to have continued in that country For it is said quot he that no man of the laity will make his confession to the Priests whom we beleeve to have received from the Lord Christ the power of binding and loosing together with the holy Apostles They had no reason indeed to hold as Alcuinus did that they ought to confesse unto a Priest all the sinnes they could remember but upon speciall occasions they did no doubt both publikely and privately make confession of their faults aswell that they might receive counsaile and direction for their recovery as that they might bee made partakers of the benefit of the keyes for the quieting of their troubled consciences Whatsoever the Gothish did herein by whom wee are to understand the inhabitants of Languedok in France where Alcuinus lived sure wee are that this was the practice of the ancient Scottish and Irish. So wee reade of one Fiachna or Fechnaus that being touched with remorse for some offence committed by him he fell at St. Colmes feet lamented bitterly and confessed his sinnes before all that were there present Whereupon the holy man weeping together with him is said to have returned this answer Rise up Sonne and bee comforted thy sinnes which thou hast committed are forgiven because as it is written a contrite and an humbled heart God doth not despise We reade also of Adamanus that being very much terrified with the remembrance of a grievous sinne committed by him in his youth he resorted unto a Priest by whom hee hoped the way of salvation might bee shewed unto him hee confessed his guilt and intreated that hee would give him counsell whereby hee might flee from the wrath of God that was to come Now the counsell commonly given unto the Penitent after Confession was that hee should wipe away his sinnes by meet fruits of repentance which course Bede observeth to have beene usually prescribed by our Cuthbert For penances were then exacted as testimonies of the sincerity of that inward repentance which was necessarily required for obtaining remission of the sinne and so had reference to the taking away of the guilt and not of the temporall punishment remaining after the forgivenesse of the guilt which is the new found use of penances invented by our later Romanists One old Penitentiall Canon wee finde laid downe in a Synod held in this country about the yeere our Lord CCCCL by S. Patrick Auxilius and Isserninus which is as followeth A Christian who hath kild a man or committed fornication or gone unto a Southsayer after the manner of the Gentiles for every of those crimes shall doe a yeere of Penance when his yeere of penance is accomplished he shall come with witnesses and afterward hee shall be absolved by the Priest These Bishops did take order we see according to the discipline generally used in those times that the penance should first be performed and when long good proofe had bin given by that means of the truth of the parties repentance they wished the Priest to impart unto him the benefit of Absolution wheras by the new device of sacramentall penance the matter is now far more easily transacted by vertue of the keyes the sinner is instantly of attrite made contrite and thereupon as soon as hee hath made his Confession hee presently receiveth his Absolution after this some sorry penance is imposed which upon better consideration may bee converted into pence and so a quicke end is made of many a foule businesse But for the right use of the keyes we fully accord with Claudius that the office of remitting and retaining sinnes which was given unto the Apostles is now in the Bishops and Priests committed unto every Church namely that having taken knowledge of the causes of such as have sinned as many as they shall behold humble and truly penitent those they may now with compassion absolve from the feare of everlasting death but such as they shall discerne to persist in the sins which they have committed those they may declare to be bound over unto never ending punishments And in thus absolving such as be truly penitent we willingly yeeld that the Pastors of Gods Church doe remit sinnes after their manner that is to say ministerially and improperly so that the priviledge of forgiving sinnes properly and absolutely bee still reserved unto God alone Which is at large set out by the same Claudius where hee expoundeth the historie of the man sicke of the palsey that was cured by our Saviour in the ninth of S. Matthew For following Bede upon that place he writeth thus The Scribes say true that none can forgive sinnes but God alone also forgiveth by them to whom hee hath given the power of forgiving And therefore is Christ proved to bee truely God because he forgiveth sinnes as God They render a true testimony unto God but in denying the person of Christ they
our beneficence and communicating unto the necessities of the poore which are sacrifices wherewith God is well pleased wee are taught to give both our selves and our almes first unto the Lord and after unto our brethren by the will of God so is it in this ministery of the blessed Sacrament the service is first presented unto God from which as from a most principall part of the dutie the sacrament it selfe is called the Eucharist because therein wee offer a speciall sacrifice of praise and thankesgiving alwaies unto God and then communicated unto the use of Gods people in the performance of which part of the service both the minister was said to give and the communicant to receive the sacrifice as well as in respect of the former part they were said to offer the same unto the Lord. For they did not distinguish the Sacrifice from the Sacrament as the Romanists doe now adayes but used the name of Sacrifice indifferently both of that which was offered unto God and of that which was given to and received by the communicant Therefore wee read of offring the sacrifice to God as in that speech of Gallus to his scholler Magnoaldus My master Columbanus is accustomed to offer unto the Lord the sacrifice of salvation in brasen vessels Of giving the sacrifice to man as when it is said in one of the ancient Synods of Ireland that a Bishop by his Testament may bequeath a certaine proportion of his goods for a legacie to the Priest that giveth him the sacrifice and of receiving the sacrifice from the hands of the minister as in that sentence of the Synod attributed unto S. Patrick He who deserveth not to receive the sacrifice in his life how can it helpe him after his death and in that glosse of Sedulius upon 1. Cor. 11. 33. Tarry one for another that is saith he untill you doe receive the sacrifice and in the Brittish antiquities where we reade of Amon a noble man in Wales father to Samson the Saint of Dole in little Brittain that being taken with a grievous sicknesse hee was admonished by his neighbours that according to the usuall manner he should receive the sacrifice of the communion Whereby it doth appeare that the sacrifice of the elder times was not like unto the new Masse of the Romanists wherein the Priest alone doth all but unto our Communion where others also have free libertie given unto them to eat of the Altar as well as they that serve that Altar Again they that are communicants in the Romish sacrament receive the Eucharist in one kinde onely the Priest in offering of the sacrifice receiveth the same distinctly both by way of meat and by way of drinke which they tell us is chiefly done for the integritie of the Sacrifice and not of the Sacrament For in the Sacrifice they say the severall elements be consecrated not into Christs whole person as it was borne of the Virgin or now is in heaven but the bread into his body apart as betrayed broken and given for us the wine into his bloud apart as shed out of his bodie for remission of sinnes and dedication fo the new Testament which bee conditions of his person as hee was in sacrifice and oblation But our ancestours in the use of their Sacrament received the Eucharist in both kinds not being so acute as to discerne betwixt the things that belonged unto the integritie of the sacrifice and of the sacrament because in very truth they tooke the one to be the other Thus Bede relateth that one Hildmer an officer of Egfrid King of Northumberland intreated our Cuthbert to send a Priest that might minister the sacraments of the Lords body and bloud unto his wife that then lay a dying and Cuthbert himselfe immediately before his owne departure out of this life received the communion of the Lords body and bloud as Herefride Abbat of the monsterie of Lindisfarne who was the man that at that time ministred the sacrament unto him made report unto the same Bede who elsewhere also particularly noteth that he then tasted of the cup. Pocula degustat vitae Christique supinum Sanguine munit iter lest any man should thinke that under the formes of bread alone he might be said to have been partaker of the body and bloud of the Lord by way of Concomitance which is a toy that was not once dreamed of in those daies So that we need not to doubt what is meant by that which wee reade in the booke of the life of Furseus which was written before the time of Bede that he received the communion of the holy body and bloud and that hee was wished to admonish the Pastors of the Church that they should strengthen the soules of the faithfull with the spirituall food of doctrine and the participation of the holy body and bloud or of that which Cogitosus writeth in the life of Saint Brigid touching the place in the Church of Kildare whereunto the Abbatesse with her maidens and widowes used to resort that they might enioy the banquet of the body and bloud of Iesus Christ. which was agreeable to the practice not only of the Nunneries founded beyond the seas according to the rule of Columbanus where the Virgins received the body of the Lord and sipped his bloud as appeareth by that which Ionas relateth of Domnae in the life of Burgundofora but also of S. Brigid her selfe who was the foundresse of the monasterie of Kildare one of whose miracles is reported even in the later Legends to have happened when shee was about to drinke out of the Chalice at the time of her receiving of the Eucharist which they that list to looke after may finde in the collections of Capgrave Surius and such like But you will say these testimonies that have beene alledged make not so much for us in proving the use of the communion under both kindes as they make against us in confirming the opinion of Transubstantiation seeing they all specifie the receiving not of bread and wine but of the body and bloud of Christ. I answer that forasmuch as Christ himselfe at the first institution of his holy Supper did say expresly This is my body and This is my bloud hee deserveth not the name of a Christian that will question the truth of that saying or refuse to speake in that language which hee hath heard his Lord and Master use before him The question onely is in what sense and after what manner these things must bee conceived to bee his body and bloud Of which there needed to be little question if men would bee pleased to take into their consideration these two things which were never doubted of by the ancient and have most evident ground in the context of the Gospel First that the subject of those sacramentall propositions delivered by our Saviour that is to say the demonstrative particle THIS
can have reference to no other substance but that which hee then held in his sacred hands namely bread wines which are of so different a nature from the body and bloud of Christ that the one cannot possibly in proper sense be said to be the other as the light of common reason doth force the Romanists themselves to confesse Secondly that in the Predicate or latter part of the same propositions there is not mention made only of Christs body and bloud but of his body broken and his bloud shed to shew that his body is to be considered here apart not as it was borne of the Virgin or now is in heaven but as it was broken and crucified for us and his bloud likewise apart not as running in his veines but as shed out of his body which the Rhemists have told us to be conditions of his person as hee was in sacrifice and oblation And lest wee should imagine that his body were otherwise to bee considered in the sacrament than in the sacrifice in the one alive as it is now in heaven in the other dead as it was offered upon the Crosse the Apostle putteth the matter out of doubt that not onely the minister in offering but also the people in receiving even as often as they eate this bread and drinke this cup doe shew the Lords death untill hee come Our elders surely that held the sacrifice to bee given and received for so we have heard themselves speak as well as offered did not consider otherwise of Christ in the sacrament than as hee was in sacrifice and oblation If here therefore Christs body be presented as broken and livelesse and his bloud as shed forth and severed from his body and it be most certaine that there are no such things now really existent any where as is confessed on all hands then must it follow necessarily that the bread and wine are not converted into these things really The Rhemists indeede tell us that when the Church doth offer and sacrifice Christ daily hee in mysterie and sacrament dyeth Further than this they durst not goe for if they had said hee dyed really they should thereby not only make themselves daily killers of Christ but also directly crosse that principle of the Apostle Rom. 6. 9. Christ being raised from the dead dyeth no more If then the body of Christ in the administration of the Eucharist be propounded as dead as hath been shewed and dye it cannot really but onely in mysterie and sacrament how can it be thought to bee contained under the outward elements otherwise than in sacrament and mysterie and such as in times past were said to have received the sacrifice from the hand of the Priest what other body and bloud could they expect to receive therein but such as was sutable to the nature of that sacrifice to wit mysticall and sacramentall Coelius Sedulius to whom Gelasius Bishop of Rome with his Synod of LXX Bishops giveth the title of venerable Sedulius as Venantius Fortunatus of conspicuous Sedulius and Hildephonsus Toletanus of the good Sedulius the Evangelicall Poet the eloquent Orator and the Catholicke Writer is by Trithemius and others supposed to be the same with our Sedulius of Scotland or Ireland whose Collections are extant upon St. Pauls Epistles although I have forborne hitherto to use any of his testimonies because I have some reason to doubt whether hee were the same with our Sedulius or no. But Coelius Sedulius whatsoever countryman hee was intimateth plainly that the things offered in the Christian sacrifice are the fruit of the corne and of the vine Denique Pontificum princeps summusque Sacerdos Quis nisi Christus adest gemini libaminis author Ordine Melchisedech cui dantur munera semper Quae sua sunt segetis fructus gaudia vitis or as hee expresseth it in his prose the sweete meate of the seede of wheate and the lovely drinke of the pleasant vine Of Melchâ—sedek according to whose order Christ and he onely was Priest our owne Sedulius writeth thus Melchisedek offered wine bread to Abraham for a figure of Christ offering his body and bloud unto God his Father upon the Crosse. Where note that first hee saith Melch sedek offered bread and wine to Abraham not to God and secondly that hee was a figure of Christ offering his body and bloud upon the crosse not in the Eucharist But we saith he doe offer daily for a commemoration of the Lords passion once performed and our owne salvation and elsewhere expounding those words of our Saviour Doe this in remembrance of me hee bringeth in this similitude used before and after him by others He left a memory of himselfe unto us even as if one that were going a farre journey should leave some token with him whom hee loved that as oft as hee beheld it hee might call to remembrance his benefits and friendship Claudius noteth that our Saviours pleasure was first to deliver unto his Disciples the sacrament of his bodie and bloud and afterwards to offer up the body it selfe upon the altar of the crosse Where at the first sight I did verily thinke that in the words fractione corporis an error had beene committed in my transcript corporis being miswritten for panis but afterwards comparing it with the originall whence I tooke my copie I found that the author retained the manner of speaking used both before and after his time in giving the name of the thing signified unto the signe even there where the direct intention of the speech was to distinguish the one from the other For hee doth expresly here distinguish the sacrament of the bodie which was delivered unto the Disciples from the body it selfe which was afterwards offered upon the Crosse and for the sacramentall relation betwixt them both hee rendreth this reason Because bread doth confirme the body and wine doth worke bloud in the flesh therefore the one is mystically referred to the body of Christ the other to his bloud Which doctrine of his that the sacrament is in it owne nature bread and wine but the body and bloud of Christ by mysticall relation was in effect the same with that which long afterwards was here in Ireland delivered by Henry Crumpe the Monke of Baltinglas that the bodie of Christ in the sacrament of the altar was onely a looking glasse to the body of Christ in heaven yea and within fifty or threescore yeeres of the time of Claudius Scotus himselfe was so fully maintained by Iohannes Scotus in a booke that hee purposely wrote of that argument that when it was alledged and extolled by Berengarius Pope Leo the ninth with his Bishops assembled in Synodo Vercellensi anâ— Domini 1050 which was 235. yeeres after the time that Claudius wrote his commentaries upon St. Matthew had no other meanes to avoide it but by flat condemning of it Of what great