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A44394
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Four tracts by the ever memorable Mr. John Hales of Eaton College. Viz. I. Of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. II. Of the power of the keyes. III. Of schism and schismaticks. IV. Missellanies.
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Hales, John, 1584-1656.
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1677
(1677)
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Wing H268A; ESTC R223741
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37,038
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64
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particular whether it were because of their own interests or that they saw not the Truth or for what other cause God only doth know their Judgments many times to speak most gently are justly to be suspected Which that you may see we will range all Schism into two ranks For there is a Schism in which only one Party is the Schismatick for where cause of Schism is necessary there not he that separates but he that occasions the separation is the Schismatick Secondly There is a Schism wherein both Parties are the Schismaticks For where the occasion of separation is unnecessary neither side can be excused from the guilt of Schism But you will ask Who shall be the Judge what is necessary Indeed that is a Question which hath been often made but I think scarcely ever truly answered not because it is a Point of great depth or difficulty truly to assoil it but because the true solution carries fire in the tail of it For it bringeth with it a piece of Doctrine which is seldom pleasing to Superiours To you for the present this shall suffice If so be you be Animo defoecato if you have cleared your self from froath and grounds if neither sloth nor fears nor ambition nor any tempting Spirits of that nature abuse you for these and such as these are the true Impediments why both that and other Questions of the like danger are not truly answered if all this be and yet you see not how to frame your resolution and settle your self for that doubt I will say no more of you than was said of Papias St. John's own Scholar you are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 your abilities are not so good as I presumed But to go on with what I intended and from which that interloping Question diverted me that you may the better judge of the nature of Schisms by their occasions you shall find that all Schisms have crept into the Church by one of these three ways either upon matter of Fact or matter of Opinion or point of Ambition For the first I call that matter of Fact when something is required to be done by us which either we know or strongly suspect to be unlawful So the first notable Schism of which we read in the Church contained in it matter of fact for it being upon Error taken for necessary that an Easter must be kept and upon worse than Error if I may so speak for it was no less than a point of Judaism forced upon the Church upon worse than Error I say thought further necessary that the ground for the time of our keeping that Feast must be the rule left by Moses to the Jews there arose a stout Question Whether we were to celebrate with the Jews on the 14th Moon or the Sunday following This matter though most unnecessary most vain yet caused as great a Combustion as ever was in the Church the West separating and refusing Communion with the East for many years together In this fantastical Hurry I cannot see but all the World were Schismaticks neither can any thing excuse them from that imputation excepting only this that we charitably suppose that all Parties out of Conscience did what they did A thing which befel them through the ignorance of their Guides for I will not say their malice and that through the just judgment of God because through sloth and blind obedience Men examined not the things which they were taught but like Beasts of Burden patiently couched down and indifferently underwent whatsoever their Superiours laid upon them By the way by this you may plainly see the danger of our appeal unto Antiquity for resolution in controverted points of Faith and how small relief we are to expect from thence For if the discretion of the chiefest Guides and Directors of the Church did in a Point so trivial so inconsiderable so mainly fail them as not to see the Truth in a Subject wherein it is the greatest Marvel how they could avoid the sight of it can we without imputation of extreme grosness and folly think so poor-spirited Persons competent Judges of the Questions now on foot betwixt the Churches Pardon me I know not what Temptation drew that Note from me The next Schism which had in it matter of fact is that of the Donatist who was perswaded at least so he pretended that it was unlawful to converse or communicate in holy Duties with Men stained with any notorious Sin For howsoever Austin and others do specify only the Thurificati Traditores and Libellatici and the like as if he separated only from those whom he found to be such yet by necessary proportion he must refer to all notorious Sinners Upon this he taught that in all places where good and bad were mixt together there could be no Church by reason of Pollution evaporating as it were from Sinners which blasted righteous Persons who conversed with them and made all unclean On this ground separating himself from all whom he list to suspect he gave out that the Church was no where to be found but in him and his Associates as being the only Men among whom wicked Persons found no shelter and by consequence the only clean and unpolluted Company and therefore the only Church Against this Saint Augustine laid down this Conclusion Unitatem Ecclesiae per totum orbem dispersae propter nonnullorum peccata non esse deserendam which is indeed the whole sum of that Father's Disputation against the Donatist Now in one part of this Controversie betwixt St. Augustine and the Donatist there is one thing is very remarkable The Truth was there where it was by meer chance and might have been on either side any Reasons brought by either Party notwithstanding For though it were de facto false that pars Donati shut up in Africk was the only Orthodox Party yet it might have been true notwithstanding any thing St. Augustine brings to confute it and on the contrary though it were de facto true that the part of Christians dispersed over the Earth were Orthodox yet it might have been false notwithstanding any thing St. Augustine brings to confirm it For where or amongst whom or amongst how many the Church shall be or is is a thing indifferent it may be in any Number more or less it may be in any Place Country or Nation it may be in All and for ought I know it may be in none without any prejudice to the definition of the Church or the Truth of the Gospel North or South many or few dispersed in many places or confined to one none of these either prove or disprove a Church Now this Schism and likewise the former to a wise Man that well understands the matter in Controversie may afford perchance matter of pity to see Men so strangely distracted upon fancy but of doubt or trouble what to do it can yield none For though in this Schism the Donatist be the Schismatick and in the former both Parties
upon the receiving of the Sacrament I would it were so we should not have so many doubting Christians who yet receive the Sacrament oft enough We teach it to be Viaticum morientium whereby we abuse many distressed Consciences and sick Bodies who seek for comfort there and finding it not conclude from thence I speak what I know some defect in their Faith The participation of the Sacrament to sick and weak Persons what unseemly events hath it occasioned the vomiting up of the Elements anon upon the receipt of them the resurging the Wine into the Cup before the Minister could remove his hand to the interruption of the action Now all these Mistakes and Errors have risen upon some ungrounded and fond practices crept long since God knows how into the Church and as yet not sufficiently purged out I will be bold to inform you what it is which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the main fundamental fallacy whence all these abuses have sprung There hath been a fancy of long subsistance in the Churches That in the Communion there is something given besides Bread and Wine of which the Numerality given Men have not yet agreed Some say it is the Body of God into which the Bread is transubstantiated Some say it is the same Body with which the Bread is consubstantiated Some that the Bread remaining what it was there passes with it to the Soul the real Body of God in a secret unknown manner Some that a further degree of Faith is supplied us Others that some degree of God's grace whatsoever it be is exhibited which otherwise would be wanting All which variety of conceits must needs fall out as having no other ground but conjecture weakly founded To settle you therefore in your Judgment both of the thing it self and of the true use of it I will commend to your consideration these few Propositions First In the Communion there is nothing given but Bread and Wine Secondly The Bread and Wine are signs indeed but not of any thing there exhibited but of somewhat given long since even of Christ given for us upon the Cross sixteen hundred years ago and more Thirdly Jesus Christ is eaten at the Communion-Table in no sense neither Spiritually by virtue of any thing done there nor really neither Metaphorically nor Literally Indeed that which is eaten I mean the Bread is called Christ by a Metaphor but it is eaten truly and properly Fourthly The Spiritual eating of Christ is common to all places as well as the Lord's Table Last of all The Uses and Ends of the Lord's Supper can be no more than such as are mentioned in the Scriptures and they are but two First The commemoration of the Death and Passion of the Son of God specified by himself at the Institution of the Ceremony Secondly To testify our Union with Christ and Communion one with another which end St. Paul hath taught us In these few Conclusions the whole Doctrine and Use of the Lord's Supper is fully set down and whoso leadeth you beyond this doth but abuse you Quicquid ultra quaeritur non intelligitur The proof of these Propositions would require more than the Limits of a Letter will admit of and I see my self already to have exceeded these Bounds I will therefore pass away to consider the second part of your Letter In this second Part I would you had pleased to have done as in the first you did That is not only set down the Proposition of the Catholick but some Answer of the Protestant by which we might have discovered his Judgment I might perchance have used the same Liberty as I have done before namely discovered the mistakes of both Parties for I suspect that as there they did so here they would have given me cause enough Now I content my self barely to speak to the Question The Question is Whether the Church may Err in Fundamentals By the Church I will not trifle as your Catholick doth and mean only the Protestant Party as he professeth he doth only the Roman Faction But I shall understand all Factions in Christianity All that entitle themselves to Christ wheresoever dispersed all the World over First I Answer That every Christian may err that will for if Men might not err wilfully then there could be no Heresie Heresie being nothing else but wilful Error For if we account mistakes befallen us through humane Frailties to be Heresies then it will follow That every Man since the Apostles time was an Heretick for never yet was there any Christian the Apostles only excepted who did not in something concerning the Christian Faith mistake himself either by addition or omission or misinterpretation of something An evident sign of this Truth you may see in this by the Providence of God the Writings of many learned Christians from the Spring of Christianity have been left unto posterity and amongst all those scarcely any is to be found who is not confess'd on all hands to have mistaken some things and those mistakes for the most part stand upon Record by some who purposely observed them Neither let this I beseech you beget in you a conceit as if I meant to disgrace those whose Labours have been and are of infinite benefit in the Church For if Aristotle and Aphrodiseus and Galen and the rest of those Excellent Men whom God had indued with extraordinary portions of natural Knowledge have with all thankful and ingenuous Men throughout all Generations retained their Credit entire notwithstanding it is acknowledged that they have all of them in many things swerved from the Truth Then why should not Christians express the same ingenuity to those who have laboured before us in the Exposition of the Christian Faith and highly esteem them for their Works sake their many infirmities notwithstanding You will say that for private Persons it is confess'd they may and daily do err but can Christians err by whole Shoals by Armies meeting for the defence of the Truth in Synods and Councils especially General which are countenanced by the great Fable of all the World the Bishop of Rome I answer To say that Councils may not err though private Persons may at first sight is a merry speech as if a Man should say That every single Soldier indeed may run away but a whole Army cannot especially having Hannibal for their Captain and since it is confess'd That all single Persons not only may but do err it will prove a very hard matter to gather out of these a multitude of whom being gathered together we may be secured they cannot err I must for mine own part confess That Councils and Synods not only may and have erred but considering the means how they are managed it were a great marvel if they did not err For what Men are they of whom those great Meetings do consist are they the best the most learned the most vertuous the most likely to walk uprightly No the greatest the most ambitious and many times