he had with his Apostles the night before his death at which time as Mathew sayth When they were eating Iesus tooke bread and when he had geuen thankes he brake it and gaue it to his disciples and sayd Take eate this is my body And he tooke the cup and when hee had geuen thankes he gaue it to them saying Drinke ye all of this for this is my bloud of the new testament that is shed for many for the remission of sinnes But I say vnto you I will not drinke hence forth of this fruite of the vine vntill that day whē I shall drinke it new with you in my fathers kingdome This thing is rehearsed also of S. Marke in these wordes As they did eate Iesus tooke bread and when he had blessed he brake it and gaue it to them and sayd Take eate this is my body and taking the cup when he had geuen thankes he gaue it to them and they all dranke of it and he sayd to them This is my bloud of the new testament which is shed for many verely I say vnto you I will drinke no more of the fruit of the vine vntill that daye that I drinke it new in the kingdome of God The Euangelist S. Luke vttereth this matter on this wise When the houre was come he sate down and the twelue Apostles with hym And he said vnto them I haue greatly desired to eate this Pascha with you before I suffer For I say vnto you hēceforth I will not eat of it any more vntil it be fulfilled in the kingdome of God And he toke the cuppe and gaue thankes and sayd Take this and deuide it among you For I say vnto you I will not drinke of the fruit of the vine vntill the kingdome of God come And he toke bread and when hee had geuen thankes he brake it and gaue it vnto them saying This is my body which is geeuen for you This doe in remembrance of me Likewise also when he had supped he toke the cup saying This cup is the new testament in my bloud which is shedde for you Hitherto you haue herd all that the euangelistes declare that Christ spake or did at his last supper concerning thinstitutiō of the communion and sacramēt of his body and bloud Now you shall here what S. Paul sayth concerning the same in the tenth chapter of the first to the Corinthians where he writeth thus Is not the cuppe of blessing which we blesse a communion of the bloud of Christ Is not the bread which we breake a communion of the body of Christ We being many are one bread one body For we al are partakers of one bread and one cuppe And in the eleuenth he speaketh on this manner That which I deliuered vnto you I receaued of the Lord. For the Lord Iesus the same night in the which he was betrayed toke bread and when he had geuen thankes he brake it and sayd Take eate this is my body which is broaken for you doe this in remembrance of me Likewise also he tooke the cuppe when Supper was done saying This cup is the new testament in my bloud Doe this as often as ye drinke it in remembrance of me for as oft as you shal eate this bread and drinke this cup you shew forth the Lords death til he come Wherfore who soeuer shall eat of this bread or drinke of this cuppe vnworthely shal be gilty of the body bloud of the Lord. But let a man examine him selfe and so eat of the bread and drinke of the cuppe For he that eateth and drinketh vnworthely eateth and drinketh his own damnation because he maketh no difference of the Lordes body For this cause many are weake and sicke among you many doe sleepe By these wordes of Christ rehearsed of the Euangelistes and by the doctrine also of Saint Paule which he confesseth that he receaued of Christ two thinges specially are to be noted First that our Sauiour Christ called the materiall bread which he brake his body the wine which was the fruit of the vine his bloud And yet he spake not this to the intent that men should thinke that the material bread is his very body or that his very body is materiall bread Neither that wine made of grapes is his very bloud or that his very bloud is wine made of grapes But to signifie vnto vs as S. Paul sayth that the cuppe is a communion of Christes bloud that was shed for vs and the bread is a communion of his flesh that was crucified for vs. So that although in the truth of his humain nature Christ be in heauen and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father yet whosoeuer eateth of the bread in the Supper of the Lord according to Christes institution and ordinaunce is assured of Christes own promise and testament that he is a member of his body and receaueth the benefites of his passion which he suffered for vs vpon the crosse And likewise he that drinketh of that holy cuppe in the Supper of the Lord according to Christes institution is certified by Christes legacy and testament that he is made partaker of the bloud of Christ which was shed for vs. And this ment S. Paule when he sayth is not the cup of blessing which we blesse a communion of the bloud of Christ Is not the can bread which we breake a cōmunion of the body of Christ so that no man contēne or lightly esteeme this holy cōmuniō except he contēne also Christs body and bloud and passe not whether he haue any felowship with him or no. And of those men S. Paule saith that they eate and drink their own damnation because they esteme not the body of Christ. The second thing which may be learned of the forsaid wordes of Christe and S. Paule is this that although none eateth the body of Christ and drinketh hys bloud but they haue eternall life as apereth by the wordes before recited of S. Iohn yet both the good and the bad doe eate and drynke the bread and wine which be the Sacramentes of the same But beside the Sacramentes the good eate euerlasting life the euill euerlasting death Therfore S. Paule sayth Who soeuer shall eate of the bread or drinke of the cup of the Lord vnworthely he shal be gilty of the body and bloud of the Lord. Here S. paul saith not that he that eateth the bread or drinketh the cup of the Lord vn worthely eateth drinketh the body bloud of the Lord but is gilty of the body bloud of the Lord. But what he eateth drynketh S. Paul declareth saying he that eateth drinketh vnworthely eateth drinketh his own dānatiō thus is declared the sum of al that scripture speketh of the eating drinking both of the body bloud of Christ also of the sacramēt of the same And as these thinges be most certaynly true
because they be spoken by Christ hym selfe the auctor of all truth and by hys holy Apostle S. Paule as he receaued them of Christ so all doctrines contrary to the same be moste certaynly false and vntrue and of al Christen men to be eschued because they be contrary to Gods word And all doctrine concerning this matter that is more then this which is not grounded vpon Gods word is of no necessity neither ought the peoples heads to be busied or their consciences troubled with the same So that thinges spoken and done by Christ and written by the holy Euangelists and S Paule ought to suffice the fayth of Christian people as touching the doctrine of the Lordes Supper and holy communion or sacrament of his body and bloud Which thing being well considered and wayed shall be a iust occasion to pacifie and agree both parties as well them that hetherto haue contemned or lightly esteemed it as also them which haue hetherto for lacke of knowledge or otherwise vngodly abused it Christ ordeyned the Sacrament to moue and stirre all men to frendshippe loue and concord and to put away all hatred variance and discord and to testifie a brotherly and vnfained loue between all them that be the members of Christ But the deuil the enemy of Christ and of all his members hath so craftely iugled herein that of nothing riseth so much contention as of this holy Sacrament God graunt that al contention set aside both the parties may come to this holy communiō with such a liuely faith in Christ and such an vnfained loue to all Christes members that as they carnallye eate with their mouthes this Sacramentall bread and drink the wine so spiritually they may eate and drink the very flesh and bloud of Christ which is in heauen and sitteth on the right hand of his father And that finally by his meanes they may enioy with him the glory and kingdome of heauen Amen Winchester Now let vs consider the tertes of the Euangelistes and S. Paul which be brought in by the Author as followeth When they were eating Iesus tooke bread and when he had geuen thankes he brake it gaue it to his disciples and sayd Take eate this is my body And he tooke the cuppe and when he had geuen thanks he gaue it to them saying Drinke ye all of this for this is my bloud of the new testament that is shed for many for the remission of sinnes But I say vnto you I will not drinke henceforth of this fruite of the vine vntill that day when I shall drinke it new with you in my fathers kingdome As they did eate Iesus tooke bread and when he had blessed he brake it and gaue it to them and said Take eate this is my body And taking the cup when he had geuen thankes he gaue it to them and they all dranke of it and he said vnto them This is my bloud of the new testament which is shed for many Uerely I say vnto you I wil drink no more of the fruite of the vine vntill that day that I drinke it new in the kingedome of God When the houre was come he sate downe and the twelue Apostles with him and he sayd vnto them I haue greatly desired to eate this Pascha with you before I suffer for I say vnto you henceforth I wil not eate of it any more vntill it be fulfilled in the kingdome of God And he tooke the cup and gaue thankes and sayd Take this and deuide it among you for I say vnto you I wil not drinke of the fruit of the vine vntil the kingdome of God come And he tooke bread and when he had geuen thankes he brake it and gaue it vnto them saying This is my body whith is geuen for you this doe in remembrance of me Likewise also when he had supped he tooke the cup saying This cuppe is the new testament in my bloud which is shed for you Is not the cup of blessing which we blesse a communion of the bloud of Christ Is not the bread which we break a communion of the body of Christ We being many are one bread and one body for we are all partakers of one bread and of one cup. That which I deliuered vnto you I receaued of the Lord. For the Lord Iesus the same night in the which he was betrayed tooke bread and when he had geuen thanks he brake it and sayd Take eate this is my body which is broaken for you doe this in remembrance of me Likewise also he tooke the cup when supper was done saying This cup is the new testament in my bloud Doe this as often as ye drink it in remembrance of me for as often as you shall eate this bread and drinke of this cup ye shew forth the Lordes death till he come wherefore who soeuer shall eat of this bread or drinke of this cup vnworthely shall be gilty of the body and bloud of the Lord. But let a man examine himselfe and so eate of the bread and drink of the cup. For he that eateth and drinketh vnworthely eateth and drinketh his own damnation because he maketh no difference of the Lordes body For this cause many are weake and sicke among you and many doe sléepe After these tertes brought in the author doth in the 4. chap. begin to trauers Christes intent that he intended not by these wordes this is my body to make the bread his body but to signifie that such as receaue that worthely be members of Christes body The catholick church acknowledging Christ to be very God and very man hath from the beginning of these textes of scripture confessed truely Christes intent and effectuall miraculous worke to make the bread his body and the wine his bloud to be verely meate and verely drinke vsing therin his humanitie wherewith to féede vs as he vsed the same wherewith to redéeme vs and as he doth sanctifie vs by his holy spirite so to sanctifie vs by his holy diuine flesh and bloud and as life is renued in vs by the gift of Christes holy spirite so life to be increased in vs by the gift of his holy flesh So as he that beléeueth in Christ and receaueth the Sacrament of beliefe which is Baptisme receaueth really Christes spirite And likewise he that hauing Christes spirite receaueth also the Sacrament of Christes body and bloud Doth really receaue in the same and also effectually Christes very body and bloud And therfore Christ in the institution of this Sacrament sayd deliuering that he consecrated This is my body c. And likewise of the cuppe This is my bloud c. And although to mannes reason it séemeth straunge that Christ standing or sitting at the table should deliuer them his body to be eaten Yet when we remember Christ to be very God we must graunt him omnipotent and by reason therof represse in our thoughtes all imaginations how it might be and consider Christes
neighboures and cause him to put out of his hart all enuy hatred and malice and to graue in the same all amity frendshippe and concord he deceaueth him selfe if he thinke that he hath the spirite of Christ dwelling within him But all these foresayd godly admonitions exhortations and comforts doe the Papistes as much as lyeth in them take away from all christen people by their transubstantiation For if we receaue no bread nor wine in the holy Communion then all these lessons and comfortes be gone which we should learne and receaue by eating of the bread and drinking of the wine and that fantasticall imagination geueth an occasion vtterly to subuert our wholl faith in Christ. For seeing that this Sacrament was ordeyned in bread and wine which be foodes for the body to signifie and declare vnto vs our spirituall foode by Christ then if our corporal feeding vpon the bread and wine be but fantasticall so that there is no bread nor wine there in deede to feede vpon although they appeare there to be then it doth vs to vnderstand that our spirituall feeding in Christ is also fantastical and that in deede we feede not of him which sophistry is so deuilish and wicked and so much iniurious to Christ that it could not come from any other person but only from the Deuill himselfe and from his specyall minister Antichrist The eight thing that is to be noted is that this spiritual meat of Christs body and bloud is not receaued in the mouth and digested in the stomack as corporall meates and drinkes commonly be but it is receaued with a pure hart and a sincere fayth And the true eating and drinking of the said body and bloud of Christ is with a constant and liuely faith to beleeue that Christ gaue his body and shed his bloud vpon the crosse for vs and that he doth so ioyne and incorporate him selfe to vs that he is our head and we his members and flesh of his flesh and bone of his bones hauing him dwelling in vs we in him And herein standeth the wholl effecte and strength of this Sacrament And this faith God worketh inwardly in our hartes by his holy Spirit confirmeth the same outwardly to our eares by hearing of his worde and to our other sences by eating and drinking of the Sacramentall bread and wine in his holy Supper What thing then can be more comfortable to vs then to eate this meate drinke this drinke whereby Christ certifieth vs that we be spiritually truely fed and nourished by him and that we dwell in him and he in vs. Can this be shewed vnto vs more plainly then when he sayth him selfe He that eateth me shall liue by me Wherefore who so euer doth not contemne the euerlasting life how can he but highly esteeme this Sacrament how can he but imbrace it as a sure pledge of his saluation And when he seeth godly people deuoutly receaue the same how can he but be desirous oftentimes to receaue it with them Surely no man that well vnderstandeth and diligently wayeth these thinges can be without a great desire to come to this holy Supper All men desire to haue Gods fauour and when they know the contrary that they be in his indignation and cast out of his fauour what thing can comfort them how be their minds vexed what trouble is in their consciences all Gods creatures seeme to be against them and doe make them afrayd as thinges being ministers of Gods wrath and indignation towardes them and rest or comforte can they finde none neither within them nor without them And in this case they doe hate as well God as the Deuill God as an vnmercifull and extreeme Iudge and the Deuill as a most malicious and cruell tormentor And in this sorrowfull heauines holy Scripture teacheth them that our heauenly Father can by no meanes be pleased with thē again but by the Sacrifice and death of his only begotten Sonne whereby God hath made a perpetuall amity and peace with vs doth pardon the sinnes of them that beleue in him maketh them his children and geueth them to his first begotten Sonne Christ to be incorporate into him to be saued by him and to be made heires of heauen with him And in the receauing of the holy Supper of our Lord we be put in remembrance of this his death and of the wholl mistery of our redemption In the which Supper is made mention of his testament and of the aforesaid communion of vs with Christ and of the remission of our sinnes by his Sacrifice vpon the Crosse. Wherfore in this Sacrament if it be rightly receaued with a true faith we be assured that our sinnes be forgiuen and the league of peace and the Testament of God is confirmed betwene him and vs so that who so euer by a true fayth doth eate Christs flesh and drink his bloud hath euerlasting life by him Which thing whē we feele in our hartes at the receauing of the Lords supper what thing can be more ioyfull more pleasaunt or more comfortable vnto vs. All this to be true is most certayne by the wordes of Christ him selfe whē he did first institute his holy Supper the night before hys death as it appeareth as well by the wordes of the Euangelistes as of S. Paule Do this sayth Christ as often as you drinke it in remembraunce of me And S. Paule sayth As often as you eate this bread and drinke this cup you shall shew the Lordes death vntill he come And agayne Christ sayd This cup is a newe testament in myne own bloud which shall be shed for the remission of sinnes This doctrine here recyted may suffice for all that be humble and Godlye and seeke nothing that is superfluous but that is necessary and profitable And therfore vnto such persons may be made here an ende of this booke But vnto them that be contentious Papistes and Idolaters nothing is inough And yet because they shall not glory in their subtill inuentions and deceiuable doctrine as though no man were able to aunswere them I shall desire the readers of patience to suffer me a litle while to spende some time in vayne to confute their most vaine vanities And yet the time shal not be al together spent in vain for thereby shall more clearely appeare the light from the darcknes the truth from false sophisticall subtilties and the certaine worde of God from mens dreames and phantasticall inuentions ALthough I neede make no further aunswere but the rehearsall of my wordes yet thus much will I aunswere that where you say that I speake some wordes by the way not tollerable if there had bene any suche they should not haue fayled to be expressed and named to their reproche as other haue bene Wherfore the reader may take a day with you before he beleue you when you reproue me for vsing some intollerable wordes and in conclusion name not one of them And as
he is but beleeue them not And S. Peter saith in the Actes that heauen must receaue Christ vntill the time that all thinges shall be restored And S. Paule writing to the Colossians agreeth hereto saying Seeke for thinges that be a-aboue where Christ is sitting at the right hand of the Father And Saint Paul speaking of the very Sacrament saith As often as you shall eate this bread and drinke this cuppe shew forth the Lordes death vntill he come Till he come saith Saint Paule signifying that he is not there corporally present For what speech were this or who vseth of him that is already present to say vntill he come For vntill he come signifieth that he is not yet present This is the catholicke faith which we learne from our youth in our common Creede and which Christ taught the Apostles followed and the Martirs confirmed with their bloud And although Christ in his humain nature substantially really corporally naturally and sensibly be present with his Father in heaueÌ„ yet Sacramentally and Spiritually he is here present For in water bread and wine he is present as in signes and Sacramentes but he is in deede Spiritually in those faithfull christian people which according to Christes ordinaunce be baptized or receaue the holy communion or vnfainedlye beleeue in him Thus haue you heard the second principall article wherein the Papistes vary from the truth of Gods word and from the Catholick faith Now the third thing wherein they vary is this The Papistes say that euill and vngodly men receaue in this Sacrament tâ—â— very body and bloud of Christ and eate and drinke the self same thing that the good and godly men doe But the truth of Gods word is contrary that all those that be godly members of Christ as they corporally eate the bread and drinke the wine so spiritually they eate and drinke Christes very flesh and bloud And as for the wicked members of the Deuill they eate the Sacramental bread and drinke the SacrameÌ„tall wine but they doe not spiritually eate Christs flesh nor drinke his bloud but they eate and drinke their own damnation The fourth thing wherein the Popish priestes dissent froÌ„ the manifest word of God is this They say that they offer Christ euery day for remission of sinne and distribute by their Masses the merits of Christs passion But the Prophets Apostles and Euangelists doe say that Christ himselfe in his own person made a sacrifice for our sinnes vpon the Crosse by whose woundes all our diseases were healed and our sinnes pardoned and so did neuer no priest man nor creature but he nor he dyd the same neuer more then once And the benefit hereof is in no mannes power to gyue vnto any other but euery man must receaue it at Christes handes himselfe by his own fayth and beliefe as the Prophet saieth Here Smith findeth him selfe much greeued at two false reports wherwith he saith that I vntruely charge the Papists One when I write that some say that the very naturall body of Christ is in the Sacrament naturally and sensibly which thing Smith vtterly denieth any of them to say and that I falsely lay this vnto their charge And moreouer it is very false saith he that you lay vnto our charges that we say that Christes body is in the Sacrament as it was borne of the virgin and that it is broken and torne in peeces with our teeth This also Smith saith is a false report of me But whether I haue made any vntrue report or no let the bookes be iudges As touching the first the Bishop writeth thus in his booke of the Deuils sophistry the 14. leafe Good men were neuer offended with breaking of the hoost which they daily saw being also perswaded Christes body to be present in the Sacrament naturally and really And in the 18. leafe he saith these words Christ God and man is naturally present in the Sacrament And in ten or twelue places of this his last booke he saith that Christ is present in the SacrameÌ„t naturally corporally sensibly and carnally as shall appeare euidently in the reading therof So that I make no false reporte herein who report no otherwise then the â—apistes haue written and published openly in their bookes And it is not to be passed ouer but worthy to be noted how manifest falshoode is vsed in the printing of this Bishoppes booke in the 136. leafe For where the Bishoppe wrote as I haue two coppies to shew one of his own hand and another exhibited by him in open court before the Kinges Commissioners that Christes body in the Sacrament is truely present therfore really present corporally also and naturally The printed booke now set abroad hath changed this word naturally and in the stede therof hath put these wordes but yet supernaturally corrupting and manifestly falsefying the Bishops booke Who was the Author of this vntrue acte I cannot certainly define but if coniectures may haue place I think the Bishop himselfe would not commaund to altar the booke in the printing and then set it forth with this title that it was the same booke that was exhibited by his own hand for his defence to the kinges maiesties commissioners at Lamhith And I thinke the Printer being a French man would not haue enterprised so false a deed of his own head for that which he should haue no thanks at all but be accused of the Author as a falsifier of his booke Now for as much as it is not like that either the Bishop or the Printer would play any such pranks it must then be some other that was of counsell in the printing of the booke which being printed in Fraunce whether you be now fled from your own natiue countrey what person is more like to haue done such a noble acte then you who being so full of craft and vntruth in your own countrey shew your selfe to be no changeling where soeuer you become And the rather it seemeth to me to be you then any other person because that the booke is altred in this word naturally vpoÌ„ which word standeth the reproofe of your saying For he saith that Christ is in the Sacrament naturally and you deny that any man so saith but that Christ is there supernaturally Who is more like therefore to change in his booke naturally into supernaturall then you whom the matter toucheth and no maÌ„ els but whether my coniectures be good in this matter I will not determine but referre it to the iudgement of the indifferent Reader Now as concerning the second vntrue report which I should make of the Papistes I haue alleadged the wordes of Berengarius recantation appointed by Pope Nicholas the 2. and written De consecrat dist 2. which be these that not only the Sacraments of bread and wine but also the very flesh and bloud of our Lord Iesu Christ are sensibly handeled of the Priest in the Altar broaken and torne with the teeth of
from place to place he spake of him selfe that thing which was to be vnderstand of the arke And Christ him selfe often tymes spake in similitudes parables and figures as whan he sayd The field is the world the enemy is the diuell the seed is the word of God Iohn is Helias I am a vyne and you be the branches I am bread of lyfe My father is an husband man and he hath his fan in his hand and will make cleane his flower and gather the wheate into his barne but the chaffe he will cast into euerlasting fyre I haue a meat to eat which you know not Woorke not meat that perisheth but that indureth vnto euerlasting life I am a good shepherd The sonne of man will set the shepe at his right hād and the goates at his left hād I am a dore one of you is the deuyll Whosoeuer doeth my fathers will he is my brother sister and mother And when he sayd to his mother and to Iohn This is thy sonne this is thy mother These with an infinite number of lyke sentences Christ spake in Parables Metaphores tropes and figures But chiefly when he spake of the sacramētes he vsed figuratiue speaches As whan in Baptisme he sayd that we must be baptised with the holy ghost meaning of spirituall baptisme And like speach vsed S. Iohn the Baptiste saying of Christ that he should baptise with the holy ghost and fier And Christ sayd that we must be borne agayn or else we can not see the kingdom of God And sayd also Whosoeuer shall drincke of that water which I shall geue him he shall neuer be drye agayn But the water which I shall geue him shall be made with in him a well which shall spring into euerlasting life And S. Paule sayth that in baptisme we cloth vs with Christ and be buried with him This baptisme and washing by the fyre and the holy ghost this new birth this water that springeth in a man and floweth into euerlasting life and this clothing and buriall can not be vnderstand of any materiall baptisme materiall washing materiall birth clothing and buriall but by translation of thinges visible into thinges inuisible they must be vnderstand spiritually and figuratiuely After the same sort the mistery of our redemption and the passion of our sauiour Christ vpon the crosse as well in the new as in the ould testament is expressed and declared by many figures and figuratiue speaches As the pure Paschall lambe without spot signified Christ. The effusion of the lambes bloud signified the effusion of Christes bloud And the saluation of the Children of Israell from temporall death by the lambes bloud signified our saluation from eternall death by Christes bloud And as almightie God passing through Egypt killed all the Egiptians heires in euery house and left not one aliue and neuerthelesse he passed by the children of Israels houses where he sawe the Lambes bloud vpon the dores and hurted none of them but saued them all by the meanes of the Lambes bloud so likewise at the last iudgement of the whole world none shall be passed ouer and saued but that shall be found marked with the bloud of the most pure and immaculat lambe Iesus Christ. And for as much as the shedding of that lambes bloud was a token and figure of the shedding of Christes bloud than to come and for as much also as all the sacramentes and figures of the olde testament ceased and had an end in Christ least by our great vnkindnes we should peraduenture be forgetfull of the great benefite of Christ therfore at his last supper when he toke his leaue of his Apostles to depart out of the world he did make a new will and testament wherin he bequethed vnto vs cleane remission of all our sinnes and the euerlasting inheritaunce of heauen And the same he confirmed the next day with his owne bloud and death And least we should forget the same he ordayned not a yearly memory as the Pascall lambe was eaten but once euery year but a dayly remembrance he ordeined therof in bread and wine sanctified and dedicated to that purpose saying This is my body This cuppe is my bloud which is shed for the remission of sinnes Do this in remembrance of me Admonishing vs by these wordes spoken at the making of his last will and testament and at his departing out of the world bicause they should be the better remembred that whensoeuer we do eat the bread in his holy supper and drinke of that cuppe we should remember how much Christ hath done for vs and how he dyed for our sakes Therfore sayth S. Paule As often as ye shall eat this bread and drinke the cuppe you shall shewe forth the Lordes death vntill he come And forasmuch as this holy bread broken and the wine deuided do represent vnto vs the death of Christ now passed as the killing of the Pascall Lambe did represent the same yet to come therfore our sauiour Christ vsed the same manner of speach of bread and wine as God before vsed the Paschall Lambe For as in the old testament God sayd this is the Lordes passeby or passouer euen so sayth Christ in the new Testament This is my body This is my bloud But in the old mistery and sacrament the Lambe was not the Lordes very Passeouer or passing by but it was a figure which represented his passing by So likewise in the new Testament the bread and wine be not Christes very body and bloud but they be figures which by Christes institution be vnto the godly receauers therof Sacramentes tokens significations and representations of his very flesh and bloud instructing their fayth that as the bread and wine fede them corporally and continue this temporall lyfe so the very flesh and bloud of Christ feedeth them spiritually and giueth euerlasting lyfe And why should any man think it strange to admit a figure in these speches This is my body This is my bloud seing that the communication the same night by the Papistes owne confessions was so full of figuratiue speaches For the Apostles spake figuratiuely when they asked Christ where he would eat his passeouer or passeby And Christ him selfe vsed the same figure when he sayd I haue much desired to eate this passeouer with you Also to eat Christes body and to drink his bloud I am sure they will not say that it is taken properly to eate and drink as we doe eate other meates and drinkes And when Christ sayd This cup is a new testament in my bloud here in one sentence be two figures one in this word cup which is not taken for the cup it selfe but for the thing conteined in the cup an other is in this word testament for neither the cup nor the wine contayned in the cup is Christes testament but is a token signe and figure wherby is
following of the diuersitie of them that eate and not of that is eaten which is alway one According hereunto S. Augustine agaynst the donatists geueth for a rule the sacramentes to be one in all although they be not one that receaue vse them And therfore to knitte vp this matter for the purpose I intend and write it for we must consider the substance of the visible sacrament of Christes body and bloud to be alwayes as of it selfe it is by Christes ordinaunce in the vnderstanding wherof this author maketh variaunce and would haue it by Christes ordinaunce but a figure which he hath not proued but and he had proued it then is it in substaunce but a figure and but a figure to good men For it must be in substaunce one to good and bad and so neyther to good nor bad this sacrament is otherwise dispensed then it is truely taught to be by preaching Wherefore if it be more then a figure as it is in deed and if by Christes ordinance it hath present vnder the forme of those visible signes of bread and wine the very body and bloud of Christ as both bene truly taught hitherto then is the substance of the Sacrament one alwayes as the oyntment was whether doues eate of it or beteles And this Issue I ioyne with this author that he shall not be able by any learning to make any diuersitie in the substance of this sacrament what soeuer diuersite follow in the effect For the diuersitie of the effect is occasioned in them that receaue as before is proued And then to answere this author I say that onely good men eate and drinck the body and bloud of Christ spiritually as I haue declared but all good and euill receiue the visible Sacrament of that substaunce God hath ordeyned it which in it hath no variance but is all one to good and euill Caunterbury IN this booke because you agre with me almost in the whole I shall not need much to trauaile in the aunswer but leauing all your prety taūtes agaynst me and glorious bosting of your selfe which neyther beseemeth our persones nor hindreth the truth nor furthereth your part but by pompouse wordes to winne a vayne glory and fame of them that be vnlearned and haue more regarde to words then iudgement of the matter I shall onely touch here and there such thinges as we vary in or that be necessary for the defence of the truth First after the sūme of my fourth booke collected as pleaseth you at the first dash you beginne with an vntrue report ioyned to a subtell deceyte or falax saying that my chief purpose is to proue that euill men receaue not the body and bloud of Christ in the Sacrament And hereupon you conclude that my fourth booke is superfluouse But of a false antecedent all that be learned do know that nothing can be rightly concluded Now mine intent and purpose in my fourth boooke is not to proue that euill men receaue not the body and bloud of Christ in the sacrament although that be true but my chief purpose is to proue that euell men eate not Christes flesh nor drincke not his bloud neither in the sacrament nor out of the sacrament as on the other side good men eat and drincke them both in the sacrament and out of the Sacrament And in the word Sacrament which is of your addition is a subtill falax called double vnderstanding For when the Sacrament is called onely a figure as you reherse wherin the body and bloud of Christ be onely figuratiuely there the word Sacrament is taken for the outwarde signes of bread and wine And after when you reherse that the Sacrament is a visible preaching by the tokens and signes of bread and wine in beleuing and remembring Christes benefites there the word Sacrament is taken for the whole ceremony and ministration of the Sacrament And so when you goe about by equiuocation of the word to deceaue other men you fall into your owne snare and be deceaued your selfe in that you think you conuey the matter so craftely that no man can espy you But to vtter the matter playnly without fallax or cauilation I teach that no man can eat Christes flesh and drincke his bloud but spiritually which forasmuch as euill men do not although they eat the sacramentall bread vntill theyr bellyes be full and drincke the wine vntill they be dronken yet eat they neither Christes flesh nor drincke his bloud neither in the sacrament nor without the sacrament because they cannot be eaten and dronken but by spirite and fayth wherof vngodly men be destitute being nothing but world and flesh This therfore is the summe of my teaching in this fourth booke that in the true ministration of the Sacrament Christ is present spiritually and so spiritually eaten of them that be godly and spirituall And as for the vngodly and carnall they may eate the bread and drincke the wine but with Christ him selfe they haue no communion or company and therfore they neyther eate his flesh nor drincke his bloud which who soeuer eateth hath as Christ sayth him selfe life by him as Christ hath life by his father And to eate Christes body or drincke his bloud sayth S. Augustine is to haue life For whether Christ be in the Sacrament corporally as you say or spiritually in them that rightly beleue in him and duely receaue the Sacrament as I say yet certayne it is that there he is not eaten corporally but spiritually For corporal eating with the mouth is to chaw teare in peces with the teeth after which maner Christes body is of no man eaten although Nicholas the second made such an article of the fayth and compelled Berengatius so to professe And therfore although Christ were corporally in the Sacrament yet seeing that he cannot be corporally eaten this booke commeth in good place and is very necessary to know that Christes body can not be eaten but spiritually by beleuing and remembring Christes benefites and reuoluing them in our mynd beleeuing that as the bread and wine feed and nourish our bodyes so Christ feedeth and nourisheth our soules And ought this to come out of a christian mannes mouth That these be good wordes but such as the wordes of christes supper do not learne vs Do not the wordes of Christes supper learne vs to eate the breade and drinke the wine in the remembraunce of his death Is not the breakyng and eating of the bread after such sort as Christ ordayned a communication of Christes body vnto vs Is not the cuppe likewise a communication of his bloud vnto vs Should not then christian people according hereunto in fayth feed vpon Christ spiritually beleuing that as the bread wine feed and nourish theyr bodyes so both Christ their soules with his owne flesh and bloud And shall any Christian man now say that these be good wordes but such as the wordes in Christes supper do not
if the very flesh of Christ were not in the sacrament truely present which is as much to say as in substaunce present if it were not in deede present that is to say really present if it were not corporally present that is to say the very body of Christ there present God and man If these truthes consenting in one were not there S. Augustine would neuer haue spoken of adoration there No more he doth sayth this author there but in heauen let S. Augustines wordes quoth I be iudge which be these No man eateth that flesh but he first worshippeth it It is found out how such a footestoole of the Lordes foot should be worshipped and not onely that we do not sinne in worshipping but we do sinne in not worshipping it These be S. Augustines wordes which I sayd before can not be drawen to an vnderstanding of the worshipping of Christes flesh in heauen where it remayneth continually glorified and is of all men christened continually worshipped For as S. Paule sayth Christ is so exalted that euery tongue should confesse that our sauiour Christ is in the glory of his father So as the worshipping of Christ there in the estate of his glory where he reigneth hath neither afore ne after but an euer continuall worshipping in glory Wherfore S. Augustine speaking of a before must be vnderstanded of the worshipping of Christes flesh present in the Sacrament as in the dispensation of his humility which Christ ceaseth not to do reigning in glory for although he hath finished his humble pafible conuersation yet he continueth his humble dispensation in the perfection of his misticall body and as he is our inuisible priest for euer and our aduocate with his father and so for vs to him a mediator to whom he is equall so doth he vouchsafe in his supper which he continueth to make an effectuall remembraunce of his offering for vs of the new Testament confirmed in his bloud and by his power maketh him selfe present in this visible Sacrament to be therein of vs truely eaten and his bloud truely drunken not onely in fayth but with the truth and ministery of our bodely mouth as God hath willed and commaunded vs to do which presence of Christ in this humility of dispensation to releaue vs and feed vs spiritually we must adore as S. Augustine sayth before we eate and we do not sinne in adoring but we sinne in not adoring remembring the diuine nature vnite vnto Christes flesh and therfore of flesh not seuered from the godhead Which admonishment of S. Augustine declareth he ment not of the worshipping of Christes flesh in heauen where can be no danger of such a thought where all tōgues confesse Christ to be in the glory of his father of which Christ as he is there in glory continually to be worshipped it were a colde saying of S. Augustine to say wee doe not sinne in worshipping Christ in heauen but sinne in not worshipping him as though any coulde haue doubted whether Christe shoulde bee worshipped in his humanitye in heauen being inseparably vnite to the diuinity And when I say in his humanity I speake not properly as that mistery requireth for as Christes person is but one of two perfite natures so the adoration is but one as Cirill declareth it and therfore abhorreth the addition of a sillable to speake of coadoration And will this author attribute to S. Augustine such a grossenes to haue written and giuen for a lesson that no man sinneth to worship Christes flesh in heauen reigning in glory wherfore taking this to be so farre from al probabilitie I sayd before these words of S. Augustine can not be drawen with any tenters to stretch so farre as to reach to heauen where euery christian man knoweth and professeth the worshipping of Christ in glory as they be taught also to worship him in his dispensation of his humility when he maketh present him selfe in this Sacrament whome we should not receaue into our mouth before we adore him And by S. Augustines rule we not onely not sinne in adoring but also sinne in not adoring him Caunterbury WHere you speake of the adoration of Christe in the Sacrament saying that if he were not there present substancially really and corporally S. Augustine would neuer haue spoken of adoration there in this word there you vse a great doublenes and fallax for it may be referred indiferently eyther to the adoration or to the presence If it be referred to the presence than it is neyther trew nor S. Augustine sayth no such thing that Christ is really substancially and corporally present there If it be referred to the worshipping than it is trew according to S. Augustines mynd that there in the receauing of the sacrament in spirite and truth we glorify and honor Christ sitting in heauen at his fathers right hand But to this adoration is required no reall substanciall and corporall presence as before I haue declared for so did Iacob worship Christ before he was borne and all faythfull christen people do worship him in all places where soeuer they be although he carnally and corporally be farre distant from them As they dayly honor the father and pray vnto him and yet say Qui es in coelis confessing him to be in heauen And therfore to auoyd all the ambiguitie and fallax of your speach I say that we being here do worship here Christ being not corporally here but with his father in heauen And although all christen men ought of duety continually to worship Christ being in heauen yet bicause we be negligent to doe our duties therin his word and sacramēts be ordeined to prouoke vs therunto So that although otherwise we forgat our dutyes yet when we come to any of his sacraments we should be put in remembrance thereof And therfore sayd Christ as S. Paule writeth As often as you shall eate this bread and drincke this cup shew forth the lordes death vntill he come And do this sayd Christ in remembraunce of me And the worshipping of Christ in his glory should be euer continuall without eyther before or after Neuertheles forasmuch as by reason of our infirmity ingratitude malice and wickednes we go farre from our offices and dueties herein the sacraments call vs home agayne to do that thing which before we did omit that at the least we may do at some tyme that which we should doe at all tymes And where you speake of the humiliatiō of Christ in the sacrament you speake without the booke For the scripture termeth not the matter in that sort but calleth his humiliation only his incarnation and conuersation with vs here in earth being obedient euen vnto death and for that humiliation he is now from that tyme forward exalted for euer in glory And you would plucke him downe from his glory to humiliation agayne And thus is Christ intreated when he commeth to the handling of ignoraunt lawyers blynd sophisters and
condemnatiō only And the learned mē in Christes church say that the ignoraunce and want of obseruation of these thrée maner of eatinges causeth the errour in the vnderstanding of the scriptures and such fathers sayinges as haue written of the sacrament And when the Church speaketh of these thrée maner of eatinges what an impudency is it to say that the church teacheth good men only to eat the body of Christ and drink his bloud when they receaue the Sacrament being the truth otherwise yet a diuersity ther is of eatyng spiritually only eating spiritually and sacramētally because in that supper they receue his very flesh bloud in deed with the effects of al graces gifts to such as receue it spiritually worthely wher as out of the supper when we eat only spiritually by fayth God that worketh without his sacramentes as semeth to him doth releaue those that beleue and trust in him and suffereth them not to be destitute of that is necessary for them whereof we may not presume contemning the sacrament but ordenaryly seke God where he hath ordred himself to be sought and there to assure our selfe of his couenaunts and promyses which be most certaynly annexed to his sacramentes whereunto we ought to geue most certayne trust and confidence wherfore to teach the spirituall manducation to be equall with the spirituall manducation and sacramentall also that is to diminish the effect of the institutiō of the Sacrament which no Christen man ought to doe Caunterbury WHo is so ignoraunt that hath red any thing at all but he knoweth that distinction of thre eatinges But no man that is of learning and iudgement vnderstandeth the 3. diuerse eatings in such sort as you doe but after this manner That some eat only the sacrament of Christs body but not the very body it selfe some eat his body and not the Sacrament and some eat the Sacrament and body both togither The Sacramēt that is to say the bread is corporally eaten and chawed with the teth in the mouth The very body is eaten and chawed with faith in the spirite Ungodly men whē they receaue the Sacramēt they chaw in their mouthes like vnto Iudas the Sacramētal bread but they eat not the celestial bread which is Christ. Faithful Christian people such as be Christs true disciples continually frō tyme to tyme record in theyr myndes the beneficiall death of our Sauiour Christ chawing it by fayth in the cud of their spirit and digesting it in their harts feding and comforting themselues with that heauēly meat although they dayly receaue not the Sacrament thereof and so they eat Christs body spiritually although not the sacrament thereof But when such men for their more comfort and confirmation of eternall lyfe geuen vnto them by Christes death come vnto the Lords holy Table then as before ehey fed spiritually vpon Christ so now they feed corporally also vpon the sacramental bread By which sacramētal feeding in Christes promises their former spirituall feding is increased and they grow and wax continually more strōg in Christ vntill at the last they shall come to the full measure and perfection in Christ. This is the teaching of the true Catholick Church as it is taught by Gods word And therefore S. Paule speaking of them that vnworthely eat sayth that they eat the bread but not that they eat the body of Christ but their own damnation And where you set out with your accustomed rethorical colours a great impudencie in me that would report of the Papistes that good men eat the body of Christ and drink his bloud only when they receaue the Sacramēt seyng that I know that the Papistes make a distinction of 3. maner of eatinges of Christes body whereof one is without the sacrament I am not ignoraunt in deed that the Papists graunt a spiritual eating of Christs body without the sacrament but I mean of such an eating of his body as his presēce is in the Sacrament and as you say he is there eatē that is to say corporally Therefore to expresse my mind more plainely to you that list not vnderstand let this be the comparison They say that after such a sort as Christ is in the sacramēt and there eaten so good men eat his body and bloud only when they receaue the sacrament so doe they eat drink and feed vpon him continually so long as they be members of his body Now the Papists say that Christ is corporally present in the sacrament and is so eaten only when men receaue the sacrament But we say that the presence of Christ in his holy supper is a spirituall presence and as he is spiritually present so is he spiritually eaten of all faythfull christian men not only when they receaue the sacrament but continually so long as they be members spirituall of Christes misticall body And yet this is really also as you haue expounded the word that is to say in deed and effectually And as the holy ghost doth not only come to vs in Baptisme and Christ doth there eloth vs but they doe the same to vs continually so long as we dwell in Christ so likewise doth Christ feed vs so lōg as we dwell in him and he in vs and not only when we receaue the sacrament So that as touching Christ himself the presence is all one the clothing all one the feeding al one although the one for the more comfort and consolation haue the sacramēt added to it and the other be without the sacrament The rest that is here spoken is contentious wrangling to no purpose But now commeth in Smith with his 5. egs saying that I haue made hete 5. lyes in these comparisons The first lie is saith he that the Papists doe say that good men do eat and drink Christs body and bloud only when they receaue the sacrament which thing Smyth saith the Papists do not say but that they then onely do eat Christs body and drinke his bloud corporally which sufficeth for my purpose For I mean no other thing but that the Papistes teach such a corporall eating of Christes body as indureth not but vanisheth away and ceaseth at the furthest within few houres after the Sacramēt is receaued But for as much as Smith agreeth here with you the answere made before to you wil serue for him also And yet Smith here shall serue me in good stede against you who haue imputed vnto me so many impudent lyes made against the Papistes in the comparisons before rehearsed and Smith saith that this is the first lye which is in the 8. comparison And so shal Smith being mine aduersary and your frend be such a witnes for me as you cannot except against to prooue that those thinges which before you said were impudent lies be no lies at all For this is the first lye saith Smith and then my sayinges before must be all true and not impudent lies Now to the ninth
them by Manna was geuen the same thing that now is geuen to vs in the sacramentall bread And if I would graunt for your pleasure that in theyr sacrameÌ„ts Christ was promised and that in ours he is really geuen doth it not then followe aswell that Christ is geuen in the sacrament of Baptisme as that he is geuen in the Sacrament of his flesh and bloud And S. Augustin contra Faustum esteemeth them madde that think diuersity betweene the things signified in the old and new testament because the signes be diuers And expressing the matter playnely sayth that the flesh and bloud of our sacryfice before Christs comming was promised â— y sacryfices of similitudes in his passion was geuen indeed after his asâ—â—ntion is solemnly put in our memory by the Sacrament And the thing which you say S. Augustine noteth to be geuen in the sacraments of the new testament and to be promised in the sacramentes of the olde S. Augustine expresseth the thing which he ment that is to say saluation and eternall lyfe by Christ. And yet in thys mortall lyfe we haue not eternall lyfe in possession but in promise as the prophets had But S. Augustine sayth that we haue the promise because we haue Christ all ready come which by the Prophets was promised before that he should come therefore S. Iohn the Baptist was called more then a Prophet because he said Here is the lamb of God already preset which the Prophets taught vs to looke for vntill he came The effect therfore of S. Augustins words plainly to be expressed was this that the prophets in the old testament Promised a sauiour to come redeem the world which the sacraments of that tyme testified vntill hys comming but now he is already come and hath by his death performed that was promised which our sacramentes testifie vnto vs as S. Augustine declareth more playnely in his booke De fide ad Petrum the xix chapter So that S. Augustine speaketh of the geuing of Christ to death which the sacraments of the old testament testified to come and ours testify to be done and not of the geuing of him in the sacraments And forasmuch as S. Augustine spake generally of all the sacraments therefore if you will by his words proue that Christ is corporally in the sacrament of the holy communion you may aswell proue that he is corporally in baptisme For saint Augustine speaketh no more of the one then of the other But where saint Augustin speaketh generally of al the sacraments you restrayne the matter particularly to the sacrament of the Lords supper onely that the ignoraunt reader should thinke that saynt Augustine spake of the corporall presence of Christ in the sacramentes and that onely in the sacraments of bread and wine where as saynt Augustine himself speaketh onely of our saluation by Christ and of the sacraments in generall And neuerthelesse as the fathers had the same Christ and mediator that we haue as you here confesse so did they spiritually eat his fâ—esh and drinke his bloud as we doe and spiritually feed of him and by faith he was present with theÌ„ as he is with vs although carnally and corporally he was yet to come vnto theÌ„ and from vs is gon vp to his father into heauen This besides saynt Augustine is plainely set out by Bertrame aboue 6. hundreth yeares passed whose iudgement in this matter of the sacrament although you allow not because it vtterly coÌ„demneth your doctrine therein yet forasmuch as hytherto his teaching was neuer reproued by none but by you alone and that he is commeÌ„ded of other as an excellent learned man in holy scripture and a notable famous man aswell in liuing as learning and that among his excellent works this one is specially praised which he wrot of the matter of the SacrameÌ„t of the body and bloud of our Lord therfore I shall reherse his teaching in this point how the holy fathers and Prophets before the comming of Christ did eat Christes flesh and drink his bloud So that although Bertrams saying be not estemed with you yet the indifferent reader may see what was written in this matter before your doctrine was inuented And although his authority be not receiued of you yet his words may serue against Smyth who herein more learnedly and with more iudgement then you approueth this author This is Bertrams doctrine S. Paule saith that all the old fathers did eat the same spirituall meat and drinke the same spiritual drink But peraduenture thou wilt ask Which the same Euen the very same that christen people do daily eat and drinke in the church For we may not vnderstand diuers things when it is one and the self same Christ which in times past did feed with his flesh and made to drink of his bloud the people that were baptised in the cloude and sea in the wildernes and which doth now in the church feed christen people with the bread of his body and giueth theÌ„ to drink the floud of his bloud When he had not yet taken mans nature vpon him wheÌ„ he had not yet tasted death for the saluation of the world not redemed vs with his bloud neuertheles euen then our forefathers by spiritual meat and inuisible drink did eat his body in the wildernes and drink his bloud as the Apostle beareth witnesse saying The same spiritual meat the same spiritual drink For he that now in the church by his omnipotent power doth spiritually conuert bread wine into the flesh of his body and into the floud of his owne bloud he did theÌ„ inuisibly so worke that Manna which came from heauen was his body and the water his bloud Now by the thinges here by me alledged it euidently appereth that this is no nouelty of speech to say that the holy fathers and Prophets did eat Christes flesh and drink his bloud For both the scripture and old authors vse so to speake how much soeuer the spech mislike them that like no fashion but their own And what doth this further the pestilent heresy of Ione of Kent Is this a good argument The fathers did eat Christes flesh and drinke his bloud spiritually before he was borne ergo after he was not corporally borne of his mother Or because he was corporally borne is he not therefore dayly eaten spiritually of his faithfull people Because he dwelt in the world corporally from his incarnation vnto his ascention did he not therfore spiritually dwell in his holy members before that tyme and hath so done euer sithens and will do to the worldes end Or if he be eaten in a figure can you induce thereof that he was not borne without a figure Do not such kynde of argumentes fauour the errour of Ione of Kent Yea do they not manifestly approue her pestiferous heresy if they were to be alowed What man that meaneth the trueth would bring in such manner of resoning to deface the truth
all his misticall conuersation here in his flesh and his doctrine consisting of his whole life pertayning both to his humanitie and diuinitie wherby the soule is nourished and brought to the contemplation of thinges eternall Thus teacheth Basilius how we eate Christes flesh and drincke his bloud which pertayneth only to the true and faythfull members of Christ. S. Hierom also sayth All that love pleasure more then God eate not the flesh of Iesu nor drincke his bloud Of the which himselfe sayth He that eateth my flesh and drincketh my bloud hath euerlasting lyfe And in an other place S. Hierom sayth that heritikes do not eate and drincke the body and bloud of the Lord. And more ouer he sayth that heretiks eat not the flesh of Iesu whose flesh is the meat of faythfull men Thus agreeth S. Hierom with the other before rehersed that heretikes and such as follow worldly pleasures eate not Christes flesh nor drincke his bloud bicause that Christ sayd He that eateth my flesh and drincketh my bloud hath euerlasting life And S. Ambrose sayth that Iesus is the bread which is the meat of sainctes and that he that taketh this bread dyeth not a sinners death For this bread is the remission of sinnes And in other booke to him intituled he writeth thus This bread of life which came downe from heauen doth minister euerlasting life and who soeuer eateth this bread shall not dye for euer and is the body of Christ. And yet in an other booke set forth in his name he sayth on this wise He that did eate Manne dyed but he that eateth this body shall haue remission of his sinnes and shall not dye for euer And agayne he sayth As often as thou drinckest thou hast remission of thy sinnes These sentences of S. Ambrose be so playne in this matter that there nedeth no more but onely the rehersall of them But S. Augustine in many places playnly discussing this matter sayth He that agreeth not with Christ doth neither eate his body nor drinke his bloud although to the condemnation of his presumption he receaue euery day the sacramēt of so hygh a matter And moreouer S. Augustine most playnly resolueth this matter in his booke De ciuitate Dei disputing agaynst two kindes of heretikes Wherof the one sayd that as many as were Christned and receaued the sacramēt of Christes body and bloud should be saued how so euer they liued or beleeued bycause that Christ sayd This is the bread that came from heauen that who so euer shall eate therof shall not dye I am the bread of lyfe which came from heauen who so euer shall eate of this bread shall liue for euer Therfore sayd these heretikes all such men must nedes be deliuered from eternall death and at length be brought to eternall life The other sayd that heretikes and scismatikes myght eate the sacrament of Christes body but not his very body bycause they be no members of his body And therfore they promised not euerlasting life to all that receaued Christes baptisme and the sacrament of his body but to all such as professed a true fayth although they liued neuer so vngodly For such sayd they do eate the body of Christ not onely in a sacrament but also in deede bycause they be members of Christes body But S. Augustine answering to both these heresies sayth That neither heretikes nor such as professe a true fayth in theyr mouthes and in theyr liuing shew the contrary haue eyther a true fayth which worketh by charitie and doth none euil or are to be counted among the members of Christ. For they can not be both members of Christ and members of the deuill Therfore sayth he it may not be sayd that any of them eate the body of Christ. For when Christ sayth he that eateth my flesh and drincketh my bloud dwelleth in me and I in him He sheweth what it is not sacramentally but indeed to eate his body and drincke his bloud which is when a man dwelleth so in Christ that Christ dwelleth in him For Christ spake those wordes as if he should say He that dwelleth not in me and in whom I dwell not let him not say or thincke that he eateth my body or drincketh my bloud These be the playne wordes of S. Augustine that such as liue vngodly although they may seme to eate Christes body bicause they eate the sacrament of his body yet in deed they neyther be members of his body nor do eate his body Also vpon the gospell of S. Iohn he sayth that he that doth not eate his flesh and drincke his bloud hath not in him euerlasting lyfe And he that eateth his flesh and drincketh his bloud hath euerlasting lyfe But it is not so in those meates which we take to sustayne our bodyes For although without them we cannot liue yet it is not necessary that who so euer receaueth them shall liue for they may dye by age sicknes or other chaunces But in this meat and drincke of the body and bloud of our Lord it is otherwise For both they that eate and drincke them not haue not euerlasting lyfe And contrariwyse who so euer eate and drincke them haue euerlasting life Note and ponder well these wordes of S. Augustine that the bread and wine and other meates drinckes which nourish the body a man may eate and neuerthelesse dye but the very body and bloud of Christ no man eateth but that hath euerlasting life So that wicked men can not eate nor drincke them for then they must nedes haue by them euerlasting life And in the same place S. Augustine sayth further The sacramēt of the vnitie of Christes body bloud is takē in the Lordes table of some men to lyfe of some mē to death but the thing it selfe wherof it is a sacramēt is takē of all men to lyfe of no man to death And more ouer he sayth This is to eate that meate and drincke that drincke to dwell in Christ and to haue Christ dwelling in him And for that cause he that dwelleth not in Christ in whome Christ dwelleth not without doubt he eateth not spiritually his flesh nor drincketh his bloud although carnally and visibly with his teeth he byte the Sacrament of his body and bloud Thus writeth S. Augustine in the xxvj homely of S. Iohn And in the next homely following he sayth thus This day our sermon is of the body of the Lord which he sayd he would geue to eat for eternall life And he declared the maner of his gift and distribution how he would geue his flesh to eate saying He that eateth my flesh and drincketh my bloud dwelleth in me and I in him This therfore is a token or knowledge that a man hath eaten and drunken that is to say if he dwell in Christ and haue Christ dwelling in him If he cleaue so to Christ that he is not seuered from him This therfore Christ
taught and admonished by these misticall or figuratiue wordes that we should be in his body vnder him our head among his members eating his flesh nor forsaking his vnitie And in his booke De doctrina Christiana S. Augustine sayth as before is at length declared that to eate Christes flesh and to drincke his bloud is a figuratiue speach signifying the participation of his passion and the delectable remembraunce to our benefite and profite that his flesh was crucified and wounded for vs. And in an other sermon also De verbis Apostoli he expoundeth what is the eating of Christes body and the drincking of his bloud saying The eating is to be refreshed and the drincking what is but to liue Eate life drincke life And that shall be when that which is taken visibly in the sacrament is in very deed eaten spiritually and dronken spiritually By all these sentences of S. Augustine it is euident and manifest that all men good and euill may with theyr mouthes visibly and sensibly eate the sacrament of Christes body and bloud but the very body bloud them selues be not eaten but spiritually that of the spiritual members of Christ which dwell in Christ haue Christ dwelling in them by whome they be refreshed and haue euerlasting lyfe And therfore sayth S. Augustine that when the other Apostles did eate bread that was the Lord yet Iudas did eate but the bread of the Lord and not the bread that was the Lord. So that the other Apostles with the sacramentall bread did eate also Christ him selfe whome Iudas did not eate And a great number of places moe hath S. Augustine for this purpose which for eschewing of tediousnes I let pas for this tyme and will speake some thing of S. Cirill ¶ Cyrill vpon S. Iohn in his Gospell sayth that those which eate Manna dyed bycause they receaued therby no strength to liue euer for it gaue no lyfe but onely put away bodily hunger but they that receaue the bread of life shall be made immortall and shall eschewe all the euils that pertayne to death liuing with Christ for euer And in an other place he sayth◠For as much as the flesh of Christ doth naturally geue life therfore it maketh them to liue that be partakers of it For it putteth death away from them vtterly driueth destructiō out of them And he concludeth the matter shortly in an other place in fewe wordes saying that when we eate the flesh of our sauiour than haue we life in vs. For if thinges that were corrupt were restored by onely touching of his clothes how can it be that we shall not liue that eate his flesh And further he sayth that as two waxes that be molten together do run euery part into other so he that receaueth Christes flesh and bloud must nedes be ioyned so with him that Christ must be in him and he in Christ. Here S. Cyrill declareth the dignitie of Christes flesh being inseparably annexed vnto his diuinitie saying that it is of such force and power that it geueth euerlasting life And what soeuer occasion of death it findeth or let of eternall life it putteth out and driueth cleane away all the same from them that eate that meate and receaue that medicine Other medicins or playsters sometyme heale and sometyme heale not but this medicine is of that effect and strength that it eateth away all rotten and dead flesh and perfectly healeth all woundes and sores that it is layd vnto This is the dignitie and excellēcy of Christes flesh and bloud ioyned to his diuinite of the which dignite Christes aduersaries the Papistes depriue and robbe him when they affirme that such men do eate his flesh and receaue this playster as remayne still sicke and sore and be not holpen therby Thus hast thou heard gentle reader the groundes and profes which moued me to write the mater of this iiii booke that good men onely eate Christes flesh and drincke his bloud Now shalt thou here the late byshopes confutation of the same Winchester And as for the Scriptures and doctours which this author alleadgeth to proue that only good men receaue the body and bloud of Christ I graunt it without contention speaking of spirituall manducation and with liuely fayth without the Sacrament But in the visible sacrament euell men receaue the same that good men do for the substance of the sacrament is by godes ordinauce all one And if this author would vse for a profe that in the sacrament Christes very body is not present bicause euill men receaue it that shal be no argument for the good seed when it was sowen did fall in the euill ground and although Christ dwelleth not in the euill man yet he may be receaued of the euill man to his condemnation bycause he receaueth him not to glorifie him as God as S. Paule sayth Non dijudicans corpus domini not esteming our Lordes body And to all that euer this author bringeth to proue that euell men eate not the body of Christ may be sayd shortly that spiritually they eat it not besides the sacrament and in the sacrament they eate it not effectually to life but condemnation And that is and may be called a not eating As they be sayd not to heare the word of God that here it not profitably And bycause the body of Christ of it selfe is ordeyned to be eaten for life those that vnworthely eate to condemnation although they eate in dede may be sayd not to eate because they eate vnworthely as a thing not well done may be in speach called not done in respect of the good effect wherfore it was chiefly ordered to be done And by this rule thou reader mayst discusse all that this author bringeth forth for this purpose eyther out of Scriptures or doctors For euill men eate not the body of Christ to haue any fruite by it as euil men be sayd not to heare gods word to haue any frute by it and yet as they heare the worde of spirite life and neuerthelesse perish so euill men eate in the visible sacrament the body of Christ and yet perish And as I sayd this aunswereth the Scripture with the particuler sayinges of Ciprian Athanase Basyl Hierome and Ambrose As for S. Augustine which this author alleageth De ciuitate dei the same S. Augustine doth playnly say there in this place alledged how the good and euill receaue the same sacrament and addeth but not with like profite which wordes this author suppresseth and therfore dealeth not sincerely As for S. Augustine shall be hereafter more playnly declared Finally he that receaueth worthely the body bloud of Christ hath euerlasting life dwelleth in Christ and Christ in him he that receaueth vnworthely which can be onely in the sacrament receaueth not lyfe but condemnation Caunterbury IF you graunt without contention that which I do proue then you must graunt absolutely and franckly without any addition that onely good
our Lordes body to proue the presence of Christes body there who compareth such an offender to the Iewes that did shed Christes bloud maliciously as those do prophane it vnprofitably in which sense the Grke commentaries do also expound it And where this author bringeth in the wordes of S. Paule as it were to poynt out the matter Let a man examine him selfe and so eate of the bread and drincke of the cup for he that eateth vnworthely c. these wordes of examining and so eatyng declare the thing to be ordered to be eaten and all the care to be vsed on our side to eate worthely or els S. Paule had not sayd and so eat And when S. Paule sayth Eate iudgement and this Author well remember him selfe he must call Iudgement the effect of that is eaten and not the thing eaten for iudgment is neyther spirituall meat nor corporall but the effect of the eating of Christ in euyll men who is saluation to good and iudgement to euell And therfore as good men eating Christ haue saluation so euill men eating Christ haue condemnation and so for the diuersite of the eaters of Christes body followeth as they be worthy and vnworthy the effect of condemnation or lyfe Christes sacrament and his worke also in the substance of that sacrament bring alwayes one And what so euer this author talketh otherwise in this matter is mere trifles Caunterbury AS touching myne aunswere here to the wordes of S. Paule you would fayne haue them hid with darkenesse of speach that no man should see what I meane For as Christ sayd Qui male agit odit lucem and therfore that which I haue spoken in playne speach you darken so with your obscure termes that my meaning can not be vnderstand For I speake in such playne termes as all men vnderstand that when S. Paule sayd he that eateth and drinketh vnworthely eateth drinketh his owne damnation in that place he spake of the eating of the bread and drincking of the cup and not of the corporall eating and drincking of Christes flesh and bloud These my playne wordes you do wrape vp in these darke termes that I would distinct the vnworthy eating in the substaunce of the Sacrament receaued Which your wordes vary so farre from myne that no man can vnderstand by them my meaning except you put a large comment therto For I distinct the vnworthy eating none otherwise then that I say that when S. Paule speaketh of vnworthy eating he maketh mencion of the vnworthy eating of the bread and not of the body of Christ. And where you aske me this question why it should be a fault in the vnworthy not to esteme the Lordes body when it is not there at all There is in my booke a full and playne answere vnto your question alredy made as there is also to your whole booke So that in making of my booke I did foresee all things that you could obiect agaynst it In so much that here is not one thing in all your book but I can shew you a sufficient answer therto in one place or other of my former booke And in this your question here moued I referre the reader to the wordes of my booke in the same place And where you say that if the bread be but a figure it is lyke Manna as concerning the materiall bread truely it is like Manna but as concerning Christ him selfe he sayd of him selfe Not as your fathers did eate Manna and are dead He that eateth this bread shall liue for euer And as concerning Erasmus and the greke commentaries neyther of them sayth vppon the place of S. Paule as you alleage them to say And what soeuer it pleaseth you to gather of these wordes examining and so eating yet S. Paules wordes be very playne that he spake not of the eating of the very body of Christ but of the eating of the materiall bread in the sacrament which is all one whether the good or euyll eate of it And all the care is on our syde to take heede that we eate not that bread vnworthely For as the eating of the bread vnworthely not of Christ him selfe who can not be eaten vnworthely hath the effect of iudgemēt and damnacion so eating of the same bread worthely hath the effect of Christes death and saluation And as he that eateth the bread worthely may be well sayd to eate Christ and life So he that eateth it vnworthely may be sayd to eate the diuell and death as Iudas did into whom with the bread entred Satan For vnto such it may be called mensa daemoni orum non mensa Domini not Gods bourd but the diuels And so in the eaters of the bread worthely or vnworthely followeth the effect of euerlasting lyfe or euerlasting death But in the eating of Christ himselfe is no diuersite but whosoeuer eateth him hath euerlasting lyfe For asmuch as the eating of him can be to none dampnation but saluation because he is lyfe it selfe And what so euer you bable to the contrary is but meare fables deuised without goddes word or any sufficient ground Now foloweth myne aunswer vnto such authors as the Papistes wrast to theyr purpose But here may not be passed ouer the answer vnto certayne places of auncient authors which at the first shew seeme to make for the Papistes purpose that euill men do eate and drincke the very flesh and bloud of Christ. But if those places be truely and throughely wayed it shall appeare that not one of them maketh for theyr errour that euill men do eat Christes very body The first place is of S. Augustine Contra Cresconium Grammaticum where he sayth that although Christ him selfe say He that eateth not my flesh and drinketh not my bloud shall not haue life in him yet doth not his Apostels teach that the same is pernicious to them which vse it not well for he sayth Whosoeuer eateth the bread and drincketh the cup of the Lord vnworthely shal be gilty of the body and bloud of the Lord. In which wordes S. Augustine semeth to conclude that aswel the euill as the good doe eate the body and bloud of Christ although the euill haue no benefite but hurt therby But consider the place of S. Augustine diligently and then it shall euidently appeare that he ment not of the eating of Christes body but of the Sacrament therof For the intēt of S. Augustine there is to proue that good thinges auayle not to such persons as do euill vse them and that many thinges which of them selues be good and be good to some yet to other some they be not good As that light is good for whole eyes and hurteth sore eyes that meate which is good for some is euill for other some One medecine healeth some and maketh other sicke One harnes doth arme one and combreth another one coate is meete for one and to straight for an other And after other examples
all is one thing and one reason For in vs they be done by little and little but God worketh the same sodenly in one moment And yet if you had well considered the matter you should not haue found the sacraments of God likesoppes wherin licour is poured but you should haue found pouring an apt word to expresse the abundance of gods working by his grace in the ministration of his holy sacraments For when there cometh a small rayne then we say it droppeth or there is a few droppes but when there cometh a great multitude of rayne togither for the great abundance of it we vse in common speach to say it poureth downe So that this word pouring is a very apt word to expresse the multitude of Gods mercies and the plentifulnes of his grace poured into them whome he loued declared and exhibited by his wordes and sacraments And howsoeuer you be disposed by iesting and scoffing to mocke out all thinges as your disposition hath bene euer giuen to reprehend thinges that were well yet the indifferent reader may iudge by this one place among many other that you seeke rather an occasion to brable without cause and with idle wordes to draw your booke out at length then to seeke or teach any truth And if I should play and scoffe in such a matter as you doe I might dally with the word of Infusion as you do with the word powring For as you reiect my word of powring bicause some fond reader might fantasy that bread in the sacrament to be like a soppe wherin licour were powred by like reason may I reiect your English Latin of infuding bicause such a reader might fantasy therby the bread to be like water wherin the diuinity is stieped or infuded As infused rubarbe is called when it is stieped certayne houres in stilled water or wine without seething and so be roses and violets likewise infused when they be stieped in warme water to make inlep therof But as poticaries phisitions surgions and Alcumists vse wordes of Greeke Arabike and other strange langwages purposely therby to hide their sciences from the knowledge of others so farre as they can so do you in many partes of your booke deuise many strange termes and strange phrases of speach to obscure and darken therby the matter of the sacrament and to make the same meete for the capacities of very few which Christ ordayned to be vnderstanded and exercised of all men At the last as you say you come to your purpose not to open the truth but to hide it as much as you may and to gather of Ciprians wordes your owne faining and not his meaning who ment nothing lesse then eyther of any Transubstantiation or of the corporall presence of Christ in the bread and wine And to set out Ciprians mynde in few wordes he speaketh of the eating and not of the keeping of the bread which when it is vsed in the Lordes holy supper it is not onely a corporall meate to norish the body but an heauenly meate to nourish the soules of the worthy receauors the diuine maiesty inuisibly being present and by a spirituall transition and change vniting vs vnto Christ feeding vs spiritually with his flesh and bloud vnto eternall life as the bread being conuerted into the nature of our bodies fedeth the same in this mortall life And that this is the mynd of S. Ciprian is euident aswell by the wordes that go before as by the wordes following the sentence by you alleadged For a little before Ciprian writeth thus There is geuen to vs the foode of immortall life differing from common meates which reteineth the forme of corporall substance and yet proueth Gods power to be present by inuisible effect And agayne after he sayth This common bread after it is changed into flesh and bloud procureth life and increase to our bodyes And therfore the weakenes of our fayth being holped by the customable effect of thinges is taught by a sensible argument that in the invisible sacraments is the effect of euerlasting life and that we be made one by a Transition or change not so much corporall as spirituall For he is made both bread flesh and bloud meate substance and life to his church which he calleth his body making it to be partaker of him Note well these wordes good reader and thou shalt well perceaue that Ciprian speaketh not of the bread kept and reserued but as it is a spirituall nourishment receaued in the Lordes supper and as it is frutefully broken and eaten in the remembrance of Christes death and to them that so eate it Ciprian calleth it the foode of immortall life And therfore when he sayth that in the inuisible sacrament is the effect of euerlasting life he vnderstandeth of them that worthely receaue the sacrament for to the bread and wine pertayneth not eternall life Neuertheles the visible sacrament teacheth vs that by a spirituall change we be vnited to Christes flesh and bloud who is the meate and sustenance of his church and that we be made partakers of the life euerlasting by the power of God who by his effectuall working is present with vs and worketh with his Sacraments And here is agayn to be noted that Ciprian in this place speaketh of no reall presence of Christes humanitie but of an effectuall presence of his diuine maiestie and yet the breade sayth he is a foode and nourishment of the body And thus Ciprian proueth nothing agaynst my sayinges neither of the reall presence of Christes flesh and bloud nor of Transubstantiation of bread and wine And where you be offended with this word spirituall it is not my deuise but vsed of S. Ciprian him selfe not past .vi. or vii lines before the wordes by you cited where he declareth the spirituall mutation or transition in the Sacraments And of the change in the sacrament of baptisme as well as in the sacrament of the body and bloud of Christ speaketh not onely this author but also Nazianzen Emissene Chrisostome Ambrose with all the famous auncient ecclesiasticall authors And this water doth well to delay your hotte wine wherof you haue drunken so much out of the cuppe of the great whore of Babilon that the true wine representing to vs our whole redemption by the true bloud of Christ you haue clearly transubstantiate and taken away Now followeth my answere vnto Chrisostome An other authority they haue of S. Ihon Chrisostome which they boast also to be inuincible Chrisostome say they writeth thus in a certayne homily De Eucharistia Doest thou see bread Doest thou see wine Do they auoyde beneth as other meates do God forbid thinke not so For as waxe if it be put into the fire it is made like the fire no substāce remayneth nothing is lefte here so also thinke thou that the misteries be consumed by the substance of the body At these wordes of Chrisostome the Papists do triumph as though they had won the field Loe
fayth to snare them rather thē to saue them But what skilleth that to the Papistes how many men perish which seeke nothing elles but the aduaūcement of their Pope whom they say no man can finde fault withall For though he neither care for his own soules health nor of his christen brother but draw innumerable people captiue with him into hell yet say the Papistes no man may reprehēd him nor aske the question why he so doth And where you speake of the sobernesse and deuotion of the schoole authors whom before you noted for boasters what sobernesse and deuotion was in them being all in manner monkes and fryers they that be exercised in them do know wherof you be none For the deuotion that they had was to their God that created them which was their Pope by contention sophistication and all subtle meanes they could deuise by their witte or learning to confirme and establish whatsoeuer oracle came out of theyr Gods mouth They set vp their Antichrist directly agaynst Christ and yet vnder pretence of Christ made him his vicar generall giuing him power in heauen earth and in hell And is not then the doctrine of Transubstantiation and of the reall and sensuall presence of Christ in the sacrament to be beleued trow you seing that it came out of such a gods mouth was set abroad by so many of his Aungels And is not this a simple and playne doctrine I pray you that visible formes and substances be transubstantiated and yet accidents remayn A playne doctrine be you assured which you confesse your selfe that the simple and playne people vnderstand not nor your selfe with the helpe of all the Papistes is not able to defend it where the true doctrine of the first catholick christian fayth is most playne cleare and comfortable without any difficulty scruple or doubt that is to say that our Sauiour Christ although he be sitting in heauē in equality with his father is our life strēgth◠food and sustenaunce who by his death deliuered vs from death and daily nourisheth and increaseth vs to eternall life And in tokē hereof he hath prepared bread to be eaten and wine to be drunken of vs in his holy supper to put vs in remembrance of his sayd death and of the celestiall feeding nourishing increasing and of all the benefites which wee haue thereby which benefites through fayth and the holy ghost are exhibited and geuen vnto all that worthely receiue the sayd holy supper This the husbandman at his plough the weauer at his loume and the wife at her rocke can remember and geue thankes vnto God for the same This is the very doctrine of the Gospel with the consent wholly of al the old ecclesiastial doctors howsoeuer the Papistes for their pastime put vysers vpon the sayd doctors and disguise them in other coates making a play and mocking of them Now followeth the second absurdity Secondly these Transubstantiatours do say contrary to all learning that the accidentes of bread and wine doe hang alone in the ayre without any substance wherin they may be stayed And what can be sayd more foolishly Winchester The Mayster of the sentences shewing diuers mens sayings in discussion as they can of this mistery telleth what some say that had rather say somewhat then nothing which this author rehearseth as a determination of the church that indéede maketh no doctrine of that poynt so but acknowledgeth the mistery to exéede our capacity And as for the accidentes to be stayd that is to say to remayne without their naturall substaūce is without difficulty beleued of men that haue fayth considering the almighty power of Christ whose diuine body is there present And shall that be accounted for an inconuenience in the mistery that any one man saith whose saying is not as a full determination approued If that man should encounter with this author if he were aliue so to do I think he would say it were more tolerable in him of a zeale to agrée with the true doctrine to vtter his conceit fondly then of a malice to dissent from the true doctrine this author so fondly to improue his saying But if he should appose this author in learning and aske him how he will vnderstand Fiat lux in creation of the world where the light staied that was then create But I will proceed to peruse the other differences Caunterbury THe doctrine that euen now was so simple and playne is now agayne waxed so full of ambiguities and doubtes that learned men in discussing therof as they can be fayne to say rather some thing than nothing and yet were they better to say nothing at all then to say that is not true or nothing to purpose And if the master of the sentences saying in this poynt vary from the cōmon doctrine of the other Papists why is not this his errour reiected among other wherin he is not commonly helde And why do your selfe after approue the same saying of the Master as a thing beleeued without difficultie that the accidents be stayed without their naturall substāce And then I would know of you wherin they be stayed seeing they be not stayed in the ayre as in their substance nor in the bread and wine nor in the body of Christ For eyther you must appoynt some other stay for them or els graunt as I say that they hange alone in the ayre without any substance wherin they may be stayed And eyther I vnderstand you not in this place you speake so diffusely or els that thing which the Master spake and your self haue here affirmed you cal it a tollerable conceit fondly vttered And where as to answere the matter of the staying of the accidents you aske wherin the light was stayed as the creation of the world this is a very easy opposall and soone answered vnto For first God created heauen and earth and after made light which was stayed in them as it is now although not deuided from the darkenes in such sort as it was after Now followeth the third absurdity Thirdly that the substance of Christes body is there really corporally and naturally present without any accidents of the same And so the Papistes make accidents to be without substances and substances to be without accidents Winchester How Christes body is in circumstance present no man can define but that it is truly present and therfore really present corporally also and naturally with relation to the truth of the body present and not to the maner of presence which is spirituall exceeding our capacitye and therefore therein without drawing away accidentes or adding wee beleeue simplye the trueth howesoeuer it liketh this author without the booke to terme it at his pleasure and to speake of substaunce without accidentes and accidents without substance which perplexity in wordes can not iest out the truth of the catholike beleefe And this is on the authors part nothing but iesting with a wrong surmise and supposall as
neither reason learnyng nor fayth beareth that Christes body beyng onely in bread should gyue life vnto a man So that if it were an Article of our faith to beleue that Christ is present in the formes of bread and wine it were an vnprofitable Article seyng that his being in the bread should profit no man Irenee therefore meaneth not of the beyng of Christ in the bread and wyne but of the eatyng of him And yet he meaneth not of corporall eating for so Christ sayth him selfe that his flesh auayleth nothing but spirituall eatyng by fayth Nor he speaketh not of spirituall eatyng in receauyng of the Sacrament onely for then our lyfe should not be eternall nor endure no longer then we be eating of the sacrament for our spirituall life cōtinueth no lōger thē our spirituall feedyng And then could none haue lyfe but that receaue the Sacramēt and all should haue perished that dyed before Christes Supper and institutiō of the Sacrament or that dye vnder age before they receiue the Sacrament But the true meaning of Irenee Hilary Cyprian Cyrill and other that treated of this matter was this that as Christ was truely made man and crucified for vs and shed his bloud vpon the Crosse for our redemption now reigneth for euer in heauen so as many as haue a true fayth and belefe in him chawyng their cuddes and perfectly remembryng the same death and passion which is the spirituall eatyng of his flesh and drinkyng of his bloud they shall reigne in euerlastyng lyfe with him For they spiritually and truely by faith eate his flesh and drinke his bloud whether they were before the institution of the Sacrament or after And the beyng or not beyng of Christes body and bloud really and corporally in the Sacrament vnder the formes of bread and wine neither maketh nor marreth nor is to no purpose in this matter But for confirmation of this our fayth in Christes death and passion for a perpetuall memory of the same hath Christ ordeined this holy Sacrament not to be kept but to be ministred among vs to our singular comfort that as outwardly and corporally we eate the very bread and drinke the very wine and call them the body and bloud of Christ so inwardly and spiritually we eate drinke the very body and bloud of Christ. And yet carnally and corporally he is in heauen and shall be vntill the last Iudgement when he shall come to Iudge both the quicke and the dead And in the Sacrament that is to say in the due ministration of the Sacrament Christ is not onely figuratiuely but effectually vnto euerlastyng lyfe And this teachyng impugneth the heresies of the Ualentinians Arrians and other heretickes and so doth not your fayned doctrine of Transubstantiation of the reall presence of Christes flesh and bloud in the Sacrament vnder the formes of bread and wine and that vngodly and wicked men eate and drinke the same which shall be cast away from the eternall lyfe and perish for euer And for further aunswere to Hilary I referre the Reader to myne other aunswere made to him before And for S. Chrisostome Gelasius and Theodorete if there be no bread and wine in the Sacrament their Argumentes serue for the heretickes purpose and cleane directly agaynst them selues For their entent agaynst the heretickes is to proue that to the full perfection of Christ is required a perfect soule and a perfect body and to be perfect God and perfect man As to the full perfection of the Sacrament is required pure and perfect bread and wine and the perfect body and bloud of Christ. So that now turnyng the Argument if there be no perfect bread and wine as the Papistes falsely surmise then may the heretickes cōclude agaynst the Catholicke fayth and conuince Chrisostome Gelasius Theodorete with their own weapon that is to say with their own similitude that as in the Sacramēt lacketh the earthly part so doth in Christ lacke his humanitie And as to all our senses seemeth to be bread and wine and yet is none in deede so shall they argue by this similitude that in Christ seemed to all our senses flesh and bloud and yet was there none in very deede And thus by your deuilish Trāsubstantiation of bread and wine do you trāsubstantiate also the body and bloud of Christ not conuincyng but confirmyng most haynous heresies And this is the conclusion of your vngodly fayned doctrine of transubstantiation And where you would gather the same cōclusion if Christes flesh and bloud be not really present it seemeth that you vnderstand not the purpose and intent of these Authors For they bring not this similitude of the Sacrament for the reall presence but for the reall beyng That as the Sacrament consisteth in two partes one earthly an other heauenly the earthly part beyng the bread and wine and the heauenly the body and bloud of Christ and these partes be all truely and really in deede without colour or simulation that is to say very true bread and wine in deede the very true body and bloud of Christ in deede euē likewise in Christ be two natures his humanitie and earthly substaunce and his diuinitie and heauēly substaunce and both these be true natures and substaunces without colour or dissemblyng And thus is this similitude of the Sacrament brought in for the truth of the natures not for the presence of the natures For Christ was perfect God and perfect man whē his soule went downe to hell and his body lay in the graue bycause the body and soule were both still vnited vnto his diuinitie and yet it was not required that his soule should be present with the body in the sepulture no more is it now required that his body should be really present in the Sacrament but as the soule was then in hell so is his body now in heauen And as it is not required that where so euer Christes diuinitie is there should be really and corporally his manhode so it is not required that where the bread and wyne be there should be corporally his flesh and bloud But as you frame the Argument agaynst the heretickes it serueth so litle agaynst them that they may with the same frame and engine ouerthrow the whole Catholicke Church For thus you frame the Argument As the presence of Christes body in this mystery doth not alter the proprietie of the visible natures no more doth the Godhead in the person of Christ extinguish his humanitie Marke well now good Reader what foloweth hereof As the presence of Christes body in this mysterie doth not alter say you the proprietie of the visible natures no more doth the Godhead in the person of Christ extinguish his humanitie But the presence of Christes body in this mystery doth so alter the visible natures as the Papistes say that the substaunces of bread and wyne be extinguished and there remayneth no substaūce but of the body of Christ Ergo likewise in the
Gospel of S. John Whereby appeareth how euidently they set forth the doctrine of the mistery of the eating of Christes flesh drinking his bloud in the sacrament which must néedes be vnderstanded of a corporal eating as Christ did after order in the institution of the sayd Sacrament according to his promise and doctrine here declared Canterbury HEre before you enter into my seconde vntrueth as you call it you finde faulte by the way that in the rehearsall of the wordes of Christ out of the Gospell of S. Iohn I begine a little to lowe But if the reader consider the matter for the which I alleadge S. Iohn he shal wel perceiue that I began at the right place where I ought to begin For I doe not bring forth S. Iohn for the matter of the reall presence of Christ in the Sacrament whereof is no mention made in that chapter as it would not haue serued me for that purpose no more doth it serue you althoughe ye cyted the whole Gospell But I bring saynt Iohn for the matter of eating Christes flesh and drinking his bloud wherin I passed ouer nothing that pertaineth to the matter but rehearse the whole fully and faithfully And because the Reader may the better vnderstand the matter and iudge between vs both I shall rehearse the wordes of my former booke which be these THe Supper of the Lord otherwise called the holy communion or sacrament of the body and bloud of our Sauiour Christ hath been of many men and by sundry wayes very much abused but specially within these four or fiue hundered yeares Of some it hath beene vsed as a Sacrifice propiciatory for sinne and otherwise superstitiouslye far from the intent that Christ did first ordaine the same at the beginning doing therein great wrong and iniury to his death and passion And of other some it hath been very lightly estemed or rather contemned and despiced as a thing of smal or of none effect And thus betweene both the parties hath been much variance and contention in diuers partes of Christendome Therefore to the intent that this holy Sacrament or Lords Supper may hereafter neither of the one party be contemned or lightly esteemed nor of the other party be abused to any other purpose then Christ himselfe did first appoint ordain the same and that so the contention on both parties may be quieted and ended the most sure and playn way is to cleaue vnto holye scripture Wherein whatsoeuer is found must be taken for a most sure ground and an infallible truth and whatsoeuer cannot be grounded vpon the same touching our faith is mans deuise changeable and vncertain And therfore here are set forth the very words that Christ him selfe and his Apostle S. Paule spake both of the eating and drinking of Christs body bloud also of the eating drinking of the sacramēt of the same First as concerning the eating of the body and drinkinge of the bloud of our Sauiour Christ hee speaketh him selfe in the sixte Chapiter of Saynt Iohn in this wise Verely verely I say vnto you except ye eate the fleshe of the sonne of man and drink his bloud you haue no life in you who so eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud hath eternall life and I wil rayse him vp at the last day For my flesh is very meate and my bloud is very drinke Hee that eateth my fleshe and drinketh my bloud dwelleth in me and I in him As the liuing father hath sent me and I liue by the father euen so he that eateth me shall liue by me This is the bread which came downe from heauen Not as your fathers did eate Manna and are dead He that eateth this bread shall liue for euer Here haue I rehearsed the wordes of Christ faithfully and fully so much as pertayneth to the eating of Christes flesh and drinking of his bloud And I haue begun neither to high nor to low but taking only so much as serued for the matter But here haue I committed a fault say you in the translation for verely meate translating very meat And this is another of the euydent and manifest vntruthes by me vttered as you esteeme it Wherein a man may see how hard it is to escape the reproches of Momus For what an horrible crime trow you is committed here to call very meat that which is verely meat As who should say that very meat is not verely meate or that which is verely meate were not very meate The olde Authors say very meate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 verus cibus in a hundreth places And what skilleth it for the diuersitye of the wordes where no diuersity is in the sence And whether we say very meat or verely meate it is a figuratiue speache in this place and the sence is all one And if you will looke vpon the new testament lately set forth in Greeke by Robert Steuens you shall see that he had three Greeke copyes which in the said sixt chap. of Iohn haue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So that I may be bold to say that you finde faulte here where none is And here in this place you shew forth your olde condition which you vse much in this booke in following the nature of a cuttil The property of the cuttill saith Pliny is to cast out a black incke or color when soeuer she spieth her selfe in danger to be taken that the water being troubled and darckned therewith she may hide her selfe and to escape vntaken After like maner do you throughout this wholl booke for when you see no other way to flye and escape then you cast out your blacke colors maske your selfe so in cloudes and darcknes that men should not discerne where you become which is a manyfest argument of vntrue meaning for he that meaneth plainly speaketh plainly Et qui sophisticè loquitur odibilis est saith the wise man For he that speaketh obscurely and darckly it is a token that he goeth about to cast mistes before mennes eyes that they should not see rather then to open their eyes that they may cleerely see the truth And therfore to answere you plainly the fattie fleshe that was geuen in Christes last Supper was geuen also vpon the crosse and is geuen daylye in the ministration of the Sacrament But although it be one thinge yet it was diuerslye geuen For vpon the crosse Christ was carnally geuen to suffer and to dye At his last Supper he was spiritually geuen in a promise of his death and in the Sacrament he is daily geuen in remembraunce of his death And yet it is all but one Christ that was promysed to die that died in deede and whose death is remembred that is to say the very same Christ the eternall word that was made flesh And the same flesh was also geuen to be spiritually eaten and was eaten in deede before his supper yea and before his
incarnation also Of which eating and not of Sacramentall eating he spake in the sixt of Iohn My flesh is very meat and my bloud is very drincke He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud dwelleth in me and I in him And Cyrill I graunt agreed to Nestorius in the substance of the thing that was eaten which is Christes very flesh but in the manner of eating they varyed For Nestorius imagined a carnall eating as the papistes do with mouth and tearing with teeth But Cyrill in the same place sayeth that Christ is eaten onely by a pure faith and not that he is eaten corporally with our mouthes as other meates be Nor that he is eaten in the Sacrament onely And it seemeth you vnderstand not the matter of Nestorius who did not esteeme Christ to be made of two seuerall natures and seuerall persons as you report of him but his errour was that Christ had in hym naturallye but one nature and one person affirming that he was a pure man and not God by nature but that the Godhed by grace inhabited as hee doth in other men And where you say that in baptisme we receiue the Spirit of Christ and in the Sacrament of his body and bloud wee receeue his very fleshe and bloud This your saying is no small derogation to baptisme wherein wee receaue not only the Spirit of Christ but also Christ him selfe whole body and soule manhoode and Godhead vnto euerlasting life as well as in the holy communion For S. Paule sayth Quicunque in Christo baptizati estis Christū induistis as many as be baptized in Christ put Christ vpon them Neuerthelesse this is done in diuers respectes for in baptisme it is done in respect of regeneration and in the holy communion in respecte of nourishment and augmentation But your vnderstanding of the sixt chapiter of Iohn is such as neuer was vttered of any man before your time and as declareth you to be vtterly ignoraunte of Gods misteries For who euer sayd or taught before this time that the Sacrament was the cause why Christ sayd If we eate not the flesh of the sonne of man we haue not life in vs. The spirituall eating of his flesh and drincking of his bloud by faith by digesting his death in our mindes as our onely price raunsome and redemption from eternall damnation is the cause wherefore Christ sayd That if we eate not his flesh and drincke not his bloud we haue not life in vs and if we eate his fleshe and drincke his bloud we haue euerlasting life And if Christ had neuer ordayned the Sacrament yet should we haue eaten his flesh and droncken his bloud and haue had thereby euerlasting life as al the faithfull did before the the Sacrament was ordeyned and doe dayly when they receaue not the Sacrament And so did the holy men that wandered in the wildernesse and in all their life tune very seldome receaued the Sacrament and many holy Martyres either exyled or kept in prison did dayly feede of the foode of Christes body and drancke dayly the bloud that sprange out of his side or els they could not haue had euerlasting life as Christ him selfe sayd in the gospell of S. Iohn and yet they were not suffered with other Christen people to haue the vse of the Sacrament And therefore your argument in this place is but a fallax a non causa vt causa which is another tricke of the deuils sophistry And that in the sixt of Iohn Christ spake neither of corporall nor sacramentall eating of his flesh the time manifestly sheweth For Christ spake of the same present time that was then saying The bread which I will geue is my flesh And He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud dwelleth in me and Im him and hath euerlasting life At which time the sacramentall bread was not yet Christs flesh For the Sacrament was not then yet ordayned and yet at that time all that beléeued in Christ did eate his flesh and drinke hys bloude or els they could not haue dwelled in Christe nor Christ in them Moreouer you say your selfe that in the sixt of S. Iohns gospell when Christ sayd the bread is my flesh By the word flesh he ment his wholl humanity as is ment in this sentence The word was made flesh which he ment not in the word body when he said of bread this is my body Where by he ment not his wholl humanitye but his flesh onely neither his bloud nor his soule And in the vi of Iohn Christ made not bread his flesh when he said the bread is my flesh but he expounded in those wordes what bread it was that he ment of when he promised them bread that should geue them eternall life He declared in those wordes that himselfe was the bread that should geue life because they should not haue their fantasies of any bread made of corne And so the eating of that heauenly bread could not be vnderstanded of the Sacrament nor of corporall eating with the mouth but of spirituall eating by faith as all the olde authors do most cleerely expound and declare And seeing that there is no corporall eating but chawing with the teeth or swallowing as all men doe know if we eate Christ corporally thē you must confesse that we either swallow vp Christes flesh or chaw teare it with our teeth as pope Nicholas constrained Berengarius to confesse which S. Augustine saith is a wicked hainous thing But in few words to answere to this second euident manifest vntruth as you obiect against me I would wish you as truely to vnderstand these words of the sixt chap. of Iohn as I haue truely translated them Winchester Now where the author to exclude the mistery of corporall manducatiō bringeth forth of S. Augustine such wordes as intreat of the effect and operation of the worthy receauing of the Sacrament The handling is not so sincéere as this matter requireth For as hereafter shal be intreated that is not worthely and well done may because the principall intent fayleth be called not done and so S. Augustine saith Let him not thinke to eate the body of Christ that dwelleth not in Christ not because the body of Christ is not receaued which by S. Augustines minde euill men doe to their condemnation but because the effecte of life fayleth And so the Author by steight to exclude the corporall māducation of Christes most precious body vttereth such wordes as might sound Christ to haue taught the dwelling in Christ to be an eating which dwelling may be without this corporall manducation in him that cannot attayn the vse of it and dwelling in Christ is an effect of the worthy manducation and not the manducation it selfe which Christ doth order to be practised in the most precious Sacrament institute in his supper Here thou Reader mayst sée how this doctrine of Christ as I haue declared it openeth the
foūd this matter so fully prooued that he neither is nor neuer shal be able to answere thereto For I haue alleadged the scripture I haue alleadged the consent of the old writers holy fathers and martirs to prooue that Christ called bread his body and wine his bloud For the Euangelistes speaking of the Lords supper say that he took bread blessed it brake it gaue it to his disciples saying This is my body and of the wine he sayd Take this deuide it among you drinke it this is my bloud I haue alleadged Irene saying that Christ confessed bread to be his body and the cup to be his bloud I haue cyted Tertulliā who sayth in many places that Christ called bread his body I haue brought in for the same purpose Cyprian who sayth that Christ called such bread as is made of many cornes ioyned together his body and such wine he named his bloud as is pressed out of many grapes I haue written the wordes of Epiphanius which be these that Christ speakinge of a loafe which is round in fashion and can neither see heare nor feele said of it This is my body And S. Hierom writing ad Hedibiam sayth that Christ called the bread which he brake his body And S. Augustine sayth that Iesus called meate his body and drinke his bloud And Cyrill sayth more plainly that Christ called the peeces of bread his body And last of all I brought forth Theodorete whose saying is this that when Christe gaue the holy mysteries he called bread his body and the cuppe mixt with wine and water he called his bloud All these Authors I alleadged to prooue that Christ called bread his body and wine his bloud Which because they speak the thinge so plainly as nothing can be more and Smith seeth that he can deuise nothinge to answere these Authors like a wily fox he stealeth away by them softly as he had a flea in his eare saying nothing to all these authors but that they proue not my purpose If this be a sufficient answere let the Reader be iudge for in such sort I could make a short answere to Smithes whol booke in this one sentence that nothing that he sayth proueth his purpose And as for proofes of his saying Smith hath vtterly none but onely this fond reason That if Christ had called bread his body then should bread haue been crucified for vs because Christ added these words this is my body which shal be geuē to death for you If such wise reason shall take place a man may not take a loafe in his hand made of wheate that came out of Danske and say this is wheate that grew in Danske but it must follow that the loafe grew in Danske And if the wife shall say this is butter of my own cow Smith shall proue by this speach that her mayd milked butter But to this fantasticall or rather frantike reason I haue spoaken more in mine aunswere to Smithes preface How be it you haue taken a wiser way then this graunting that Christ called bread his body and wine his bloud but adding thereto that Christs calling was making Yet here may they that be wise learn by the way how euil fauoredly you and Smith agree among your selues And forasmuch as Smith hath not made answere vnto the Authors by me alleadged in this parte I may iustly require that for lacke of answere in time and place where he ought to haue answered he may be condemned as one that standeth mute And being condemned in this his chiefe demur he hath after nothing to answere at al. For this foundation being ouerthrown all the rest falleth down withall Wherefore now will I returne to aunswere you in this matter which is the last of the euident and manyfest vntruthes wherof you appeach me I perceaue here how vntoward you be to learn the truth being brought vp all your life in Papisticall errors If you could forget your law which hath been your chief profession and study from your youth and specially the Canon law which purposely corrupteth the truth of Gods word you should be much more apte to vnderstand and receaue the secretes of holy scripture But before those scales fall from your sawlish eyes you neither can nor will perceaue the true doctrine of this holy sacrament of Christes body bloud But yet I shall doe as much as lyeth in me to teach and instruct you as occasion shall serue so that the fault shall be either in your euill bringing vp altogether in popery or in your dulnes or frowardnes if you attaine not true vnderstanding of this matter Where you speake of the miraculous workinge of Christ to make bread his body you must first learne that the bread is not made really Christes body nor the wine his bloud but sacramētally And the miraculous working is not in the bread but in them that duely eate the bread and drink that drink For the marueylous worke of God is in the feeding and it is Christen people that be fed and not the bread And so the true confession and beleefe of the vniuersall Church from the beginning is not such as you many times affirme but neuer can proue for the Catholicke church acknowledgeth no such diuision betweene Christes holy flesh and his spirite that life is renued in vs by his holy spirite and increased by his holy flesh but the true fayth confesseth that both be done by his holy spirite and flesh iointly together as well the renouation as the increace of our life Wherfore you diminish here the effect of baptisme wherin is not geuen only Christes spirite but wholl Christ. And herein I will ioyne an issue with you And you shall finde that although you thinke I lacke law where with to follow my plea yet I doubt not but I shall haue helpe of Gods word inough to make al men perceiue that you be but a simple diuine so that for lacke of your proofes I doubt not but the sentence shall be geuen vpon my side by all learned and indifferent iudges that vnderstand the matter which is in controuersy betweene vs. And where you say that we must represse our thoughtes and imaginations and by reason of Christes omnipotency iudge his intent by his wil it is a most certayne truth that Gods absolute and determinate wil is the chiefe gouernour of all thinges and the rule wherby all things must be ordered and therto obey But where I pray you haue you any such will of Christ that he is really carnally corporally naturally vnder the formes of bread and wine There is no such will of Christ set forth in the scripture as you pretend by a false vnderstanding of these wordes this is my body Why take you then so boldly vpon you to say that this is Christs will and intent when you haue no warrant in scripture to beare you It is not a sufficient
proofe in Scripture to say God doth it because he can doe it For hee can doe many thinges which hee neither doth nor will doe He could haue sent moe then twelue Legions of Angels to deliuer Christ from the wicked Iewes and yet he would not doe it He could haue created the world and all thinges therin in one moment of time and yet his pleasure was to doe it in sixe dayes In all matters of our christen faith written in holy Scripture for our instruction and doctrin how farre so euer they seeme discrepant from reason we must represse our imaginations and consider Gods pleasure and will and yeald therto beleeuing him to be omnipotent And that by his omnipotent power such thinges are verelye so as holy scripture teacheth Like as we beleeue that Christ was borne of the blessed virgin Mary without company of man that our Sauyour Christ the third day rose agayn from death that he in his humanity ascended into heauen that our bodyes at the day of iudgement shall rise agayne and many other such like thinges which we all that be true christeÌ„ men do beleeue firmely because we finde these thinges written iu Scripture And therfore we knowing Gods omnipotency doe beleue that he hath brought some of the said things to passe already and those things that are yet to come he will by the same omnipotency without doubt likewise bring to passe Now if you can proue that your transubstantiatioÌ„ your fleshly presence of Christes body and bloud your carnall eating and drinking of the same your propitiatory sacrifice of the masse are taught vs as plainly in the scripture as the sayd articles of our faith be then I will beleeue that it is so in deede Otherwise neither I nor any man that is in his right wittes will beleeue your said articles because God is omnipotent and can make it so For you might so vnder pretence of Gods omnipotency make as many articles of our faith as you list if such arguments might take place that God by his omnipotent power can conuert the substance of bread and wine in to the substance of his flesh and bloud ergo he doth so in deede And although Christ be not corporally in the bread and wine yet Christ vsed not so many wordes in the mistery of his holy supper without effectual signification For he is effectually present and effectually worketh not in the bread and wine but in the godly receauers of them to whom he geeueth his own flesh spiritually to feede vpon and his own bloud to quench their great inward thirst And here I would wishe you to marke very wel one true sentence which you haue vttered by the way which is That Christ declared that eating of him signifieth beleeuing and start not from it an other time And marke the same I pray thee gentle Reader For this one sentence assoyleth almost all the argumentes that be brought by this Lawyer in his wholl booke against the truth And yet to the sayd true saying you haue ioyned an other vntruth haue yoaked them both together in one sentence For when Christ had taught of the eating of him being the bread descended froÌ„ heauen there was no murmuring thereat say you Which your saying I can not but wonder at to see you so farre deceaued in a matter so plaine and manifest And if I had spoaken such an euident and manifeste vntruth I doubt not but it should haue beene spoaken of to Rome gates For the text sayth there plainly Murmur abant Iudaei de illo qoud dixisset Ego sum panis vinus qui de coelo descendi The Iewes murmured at him because he sayd I am the bread of life that came from heauen But when you wrote this it seemeth you looked a litle to low and should haue looked higher And here by this one place the Reader may gather of your own wordes your intent and meaning in this your booke if that be true which you sayd before that euer where contention is on what parte the Reader seeth in any one point an open manifest lye there he may consider whatsoeuer excuse be made of truth yet the victory of truth not to be there intended An other vntruth also followeth incontinently that when Christ sayd The bread which I will geue you is my flesh which I will geue for the life of the world In these wordes say you Christ maketh mention of two gifts But what be those two giftes I pray you And by what wordes is the diuersitie of those two giftes expressed If the geuing as Smith sayth be geuing to death then those two giftes declare that Christ dyed for vs twise And if one of Christes giftes haue liuery and seisyn why hath not the other likewise And when was then that liuery and seisyn geuen And if eating of Christ be beleeuing as you sayd euen now then liuerey and seisyn is geuen when we first beleeue whether it be in baptisme or at any other time But what you mean by these wordes that Christ gaue in his supper his body as really to be eateÌ„ of vs as he did to be crucified for vs I vnderstand not except you would haue Christ so really eaten of his Apostles at his supper with their teeth as he was after crucified whipped and thrust to the hart with a speare But was he not then so really and corporally crucified that his body was rent and torne in peeces And was not he so crucified then that he neuer was crucified after Was he not so slayn then that he neuer dyed any more And if he were so eaten at his supper then did his Apostles teare his flesh at the supper as the Iewes did the day following And then how could he now be eaten agayn Or how could he be crucified the day following if the night before he were after that sort eaten all vp But aptly say you and conueniently Mary Sir I thanke you but what is the aptly and conueniently but spiritually and by faith as you said before not grosly with the teeth as he was crucified And so the manner was diuers I graunt and the substance all one But when Christ sayd the bread which I will geue is my flesh which I will geue for the life of the worlde if he had fulfilled this promise at his supper as you say he did then what needed he after to dye that we might liue if he fulfilled his promise of life at his supper Why said the Prophets that he should be wouÌ„ded for our iniquities and that by his wounds we should be healed if we had life and were healed before he was wounded Why doth the catholick faith teach vs to beleue that we be redeemed by his blud sheading if he gaue vs life which is our redemâ—ion the night before hee shed his bloud And why sayth S. Paule that there is no remission without bloud sheading Yea why did he say Absit mihi
knew they it not Forsooth because their mindes were grosse as yet and had not receaued the fulnes of the Spirite And therfore our Sauyour Christ minding to draw them from this grossenes tolde them of an other kinde of meate then they fantasied as it were rebuking them for that they perceiued not that there was any other kinde of eating and drinking besides that eating and drinking which is with the mouth and throate Likewise when he said to the woman of Samaria Who soeuer shall drink of that water that I shal geue him shal neuer be thirsty again They that heard him speak those words might well perceiue that he went about to make them well acquainted with an other kinde of drinking then is the drinking with the mouth and throate For there is no such kinde of drinke that with once drinking can quench the thirst of a mans body for euer Wherefore in saying he shall neuer be thirsty agayn he did draw their mindes from drinking with the mouth vnto another kinde of drinking wherof they knew not and vnto another kinde of thirsting wherewith as yet they were not acquainted And also when our Sauyour Christ said he that commeth to me shall not hunger and he that beleeueth on me shall neuer be thirsty he gaue them a plain watcheworde that there was another kinde of meate and drinke then that wherwith he fed them at the other syde of the water and an other kynde of hungryng and thirstyng then was the hungryng and thyrstyng of the bodye By these wordes therfore he droue the people to vnderstand an other kynde of eatyng and drynking of hungring and thirsting then that whiche belongeth onely for the preseruation of temporall life Now then as the thing that comforteth the body is called meate and drink of a lyke sorte the scripture calleth the same thinge that comforteth the soule meate and drinke Wherfore as here before in the first note is declared the hunger drought of the soule so is it nowe secondly to be noted what is the meate drinke and foode of the soule The meate drinke foode and refreshing of the soule is our Sauiour Christ as he sayd himselfe Come vnto me all you that trauaile and be laden and I will refresh you And If any man be dry sayth he let him come to me and drinke He that beleueth in me floudes of water of life shall flowe out of hys bellye And I am the bread of life saith Christe he that commeth to me shall not be hungry and he that beleeueth in me shall neuer be dry For as meate and drinke do comfort the hungry body so doth the death of Christes body and the shedding of his bloud comforte the soule when she is after her sorte hungry What thinge is it that comforteth and nourisheth the body Forsooth meate and drinke By what names then shall we call the body and bloud of our sauiour Christ which do comfort and nourish the hungry soule but by the names of meate and drynke And this symilitude caused our Sauiour to say my flesh is very meate and my bloud is very drinke For there is no kinde of meate that is comfortable to the soule but only the death of Christes blessed body Nor no kinde of drinke that can quench her thirst but only the bloudsheading of our Sauyour Christ which was shed for her offences For as there is a carnall generation and a carnall feeding and nourishment so is there also a spirituall generation and a spirituall feeding And as euery man by carnall generation of father and mother is carnally begotten and borne vnto this mortall life so is euery good christian spiritually borne by Christ vnto eternall life And as euery man is carnally fedde and nourished in his body by meat and drinke euen so is euery good christian man spiritually fed and nourished in his soule by the flesh and bloud of our Sauyour Christ. And this Christ hymselfe teacheth vs in thys syxt of Iohn saying Verely verely I say vnto you excepte ye eate the flesh of the sonne of man and drynke hys bloud you haue no life in you Who so eateth my flesh and drynketh my bloude hath eternall life and I will rayse him vp at the last daye For my flesh is very meate and my bloud is very drynke He that eateth my fleshe and drynketh my bloude dwelleth in me and I in hym As the liuing father hath sent me and I liue by the father euen so he that eateth me shall lyue by me And this S. Paul confessed him selfe saying That I haue life I haue it by faith in the Sonne of God And now it is not I that liue but Christ liueth in me The thyrd thyng to be noted is this that although our Sauiour Christ resembleth hys fleshe and bloud to meate and drynke yet he farre passeth and excelleth all corporall meates and drynkes For although eorporall meates and drynkes do nourish and continue our life here in this world yet they begin not our life For the beginning of our lyfe we haue of our fathers and mothers and the meate after we be begotten doth feede and nourish vs and so preserueth vs for a tyme. But our sauiour Christ is both the first beginner of our spirituall lyfe who first begetteth vs vnto God his father and also afterward he is our lyuely foode and nourishment Moreouer meate and drynke doe feede and nourishe onely our bodyes but CHRISTE is the true and perfect nourishment both of body and soule And besides that bodely foode preserueth the lyfe but for a tyme but Christ is such a spirituall and perfect foode that he preserueth both body and soule for euer as he sayde vnto Martha I am a resurrection and lyfe He that beleueth in me although he dye yet shall he lyue And hee that lyueth and beleeueth in me shal not dye for euer Fourthly it is to be noted that the true knowledge of these things is the true knowledge of Christ and to teache these thinges is to teache Christ. and the beleuing and feelyng of these thinges is the beleuyng and feelyng of Christ in our hartes And the more clearely we see vnderstand and beleue these thinges the more clearely we see and vnderstand Christ and haue more fully our fayth and comfort in hym And although our carnal generation and our carnal nourishment be known to all men by dayly experyence and by our common senses yet this our spirituall generation and our spirituall nutrition be so obscure and hyd vnto vs that we cannot attayne to the true and perfect knowledge and feelyng of them but onely by fayth which must be grounded vpon Goddes most holy worde and sacramentes And for this consideration our Sauiour Christ hath not only set forth these thyngs most playnly in his holy word that we may heare them with our eares but he hath also ordayned one visible sacrament of spirituall regeneration in water and an
other visible sacrament of spirituall nourishment in bread and wine to the intent that as much as is possible for man we may see Christ with our eyes smell hym at our nose taste hym with our mouthes grope hym with our handes and perceiue hym with all our senses For as the word of God preached putteth Christ into our eares so likewise these elementes of water bread and wyne ioyned to Gods word do after a sacramentall maner put Christ into our eyes mouthes handes and all our senses And for this cause Christ ordeyned baptisme in water that as surely as we se feele and touch water with our bodyes and be washed with water so assuredly ought we to beleue when we be baptised that Christ is veryly present with vs and that by him we be newly borne agayne spiritually and wafhed from our sinnes and grafted in the stocke of Christes owne body and be apparailed clothed and harnessed with hym in such wise that as the deuill hath no power agaynst Chryst so hath he none agaynst vs so long as we remayne grafted in that stocke and be clothed with that apparell and harnessed with that armour So that the washing in water of baptisme is as it were shewing of Christ before our eyes and a sensible touching feelyng and gropyng of hym to the confirmation of the inwarde fayth which we haue in hym And in like maner Christ ordeined the sacrament of hys bodye and bloud in bread and wine to preach vnto vs that as our bodyes be fed nourished and preserued with meate and drynke so as touching our spirituall life towardes God we be fed nourished and preserued by the body and bloud of our Sauiour Christ and also that he is such a preseruation vnto vs that neither the deuils of hell nor eternall death nor sinne can be able to preuayle agaynst vs so long as by true and constant faith we be fed and nourished with that meate and drynk And for this cause Christ ordeined this sacrament in bread and wine whiche we eate and drynke and be chiefe nutrimentes of our body to thintent that as surely as we see the bread and wine with our eyes smell them with our noses touch them with our handes and taste them with our mouthes so assuredlye ought we to beleue that Christ is a spirituall lyfe and sustinaunce of our soules like as the sayd bread and wine is the foode and sustinance of our bodyes And no lesse ought we to doubt that our soules be fed and liue by Christ then that our bodies be fed and liue by meate and drinke Thus our sauiour Christ knowing vs to be in this world as it were but babes and weakelinges in fayth hath ordeyned sensible signes and tokens whereby to allure and drawe vs to more strength and more constant fayth in hym So that the eatyng and drynkyng of thys sacramentall bread and wine is as it were shewing of Christe before our eies a smellyng of hym with our noses felyng and gropyng of hym with our handes and an eatyng chawing digestyng and feedyng vpon hym to our spirituall strength and perfection Fiftely it is to be noted that although there be many kindes of meates and drinkes which feede the body yet our Sauiour Christ as many auncyent authors write ordayned this sacrament of our spiritual feding in bread and wine rather then in other meates and drynkes because that bread and wine doe most liuely represent vnto vs the spirituall vnion and knot of all faythful people as well vnto Christ as also amonges them selues For like as bread is made of a great number of grains of corne ground baken and so ioyned together that therof is made one lose And an infinite number of grapes be pressed togither in one vessell and thereof is made wine likewise the whole multitude of true christen people spiritually ioyned first to Christ and then among them selues togither in one fayth one baptisme one holy spirite one knot and bond of loue Sixtly it is to be noted that as the bread and wine whiche we doe eate be turned into our fleshe and bloud and be made our very fleshe and very bloud and so be ioyned and myxed with our fleshe and bloud that they be made one whole body togither euen so be all faythfull christians spiritually turned into the body of Christ and so be ioyned vnto Christe and also togither amonge them selues that they doe make but one misticall body of Christe as S. Paule sayth We be one bread and one body as many as be partakers of one bread and one cup. And as one lofe is giuen among many men so that euery one is partaker of the same lofe and likewise one cup of wine is distributed vnto many persons wherof euery one is partaker euen so our Sauiour Christ whose flesh and bloud be represented by the misticall bread and wine in the Lords Supper doth geue him selfe vnto al his true members spiritually to feede them nourish them and to geue them continuall life by him And as the branches of a tree or member of a body if they be dead or cut of they neither liue nor receaue any nourishment or sustinance of the body or tree so likewise vngodly and wicked people which be cut of from Christes misticall body or be dead members of the same doe not spiritually feede vpon Christes body and bloud nor haue any life strength or sustentation thereby Seuenthly it is to be noted that where as nothing in this life is more acceptable before God or more pleasant vnto man thē christen people to liue together quietly in loue and peace vnity and concord this Sacrament doth most aptly and effectuously moue vs thereunto For when we be made all partakers of this one table what ought we to thinke but that we be all members of one spirituall body wherof Christ is the head that we be ioyned together in one Christ as a great number of graynes of corne be ioyned together in one loafe Surely they haue very hard and stony hartes which with these thinges be not moued and more cruell and vnreasonable be they then bruit beastes that cannot be perswaded to be good to their christen brethren and neighboures for whom Christ suffered death when in this Sacrament they be put in remēbrāce that the Sonne of God bestowed his life for his enemies For we see by daily experience that eating and drinking together maketh frendes and continueth frendshippe much more then ought the table of Christ to moue vs so to doe Wilde beastes and birdes be made gentile by geuing them meate and drinke why then should not christen men waxe meeke and gentle with this heauenly meate of Christ Hereunto we be stirred and moued as well by the bread and wine in this holy Supper as by the wordes of holy Scripture recited in the same Wherefore whose hart soeuer this holy Sacrament Communion and Supper of Christ wil not kindle with loue vnto his
say Christ is receaued in the mouth and entreth in with the bread and wine and for an aduersatiue therto I say that we which follow the Scriptures and aūcient writers say that he is receaued in the harte and entreth in by faith euery indifferent Reader vnderstandeth this aduersatiue vpon our side that we say Christ is not receaued in the mouth but in the hart specially seeing that in my fourth booke the second and third chapters I make purposely a processe therof to proue that Christ is not eaten with mouthes and teeth And yet to eschew all such occasions of sleight as you impute vnto me in this comparison to make the comparison more full and plain let this be the comparison They say that Christ is receiued with the mouth and entreth in with the bread and wine we say that he is not receaued with the mouth but with harte and entreth in by faith And now I trust there is no sleight in this comparison nor both the partes may not be vnderstand on both sides as you say they might before And as for S. Augustine serueth nothing for your purpose to proue that Christes body is eaten with the mouth For he speaketh not one word in the place by you alleadged neither of our mouthes nor of Christes body But it seemeth you haue so feruent desire to be doing in this matter that you be like to certain men which haue such a fond delight in shooting that so they be doyng they passe not how farre they shoote from the marke For in this place of S. Augustine against the Donatists he shooteth not at this butte whether Christes very naturall body be receaued with our mouthes but whether the Sacramentes in generall be receaued both of good and euill And there he declareth that it is all one water whether Symon Peter or Symon Magus be christned in it All one Table of the Lord and one cup whether Peter suppe thereat or Iudas All one oyle whether Dauid or Saule were annointed therewith Wherfore he concludeth thus Memento ergo Sacramentis Dei nihil obesse mores malorum hominum quo illa vel omnino non sint vel minus sancta sint sed ipsis malis hominibus vt haec habeant ad testimonium damnationis non ad adiutorium sanitatis Remēber therfore saith S. Augustine that the manners of euill men hinder not the Sacramentes of God that either they vtterly be not or be lesse holy but they hinder the euill men them selues so that they haue the Sacramentes to witnesse of their damnatiō not to helpe of their saluation And all the processe spoaken there by S. Augustine is spoaken chiefly of Baptisme against the Donatistes which sayd that the Baptisme was naught if either the minister or the receauer were naught Against whom S. Augustine concludeth that the Sacramentes of themselues be holy and be all one whether the minister or receauer be good or bad But this place of S. Augustine prooueth as wel your purpose that Christes body is receaued by the mouth as it prooueth that Poules steeple is higher then the crosse in Cheape For he speaketh not one worde of any of them al. And therefore in this place where you pretēd to shoote at the butte you shoote quite at rouers and cleane from the marke And yet if Iudas receaued Christ with the bread as you say and the deuil entred with the bread as S. Iohn saith then was the deuil and Christ in Iudas both at once And thē how they agreed I meruaile For S. Paul saith that Christ and Beliall cannot agree O what a wit had he neede to haue that will wittingly maintayn an open error directly against God his word and all holy auncient writers Now followeth the fourth comparison in my booke They say that Christ is really in the Sacramentall bread being reserued a wholl yeare or so long as the forme of bread remayneth But after the receauing thereof he flyeth vp say they from the Receauer vnto heauen as soone as the bread is chawed in the mouth or chaunged in the stomacke But we say that Christ remayneth in the man that worthely receaueth it so long as the man remayneth a member of Christ. Winchester This comparison is like the other before whereof the first parte is garnished and embossed with vntruth and the second parte is that the Church hath euer taught most truely and that all must beleeue and therefore that peece hath no vntruth in the matter but in the manner onely bring spoaken as though it differed from the continuall open teaching of the Church which is not so Wherefore in the manner of it in vtterance signifieth an vntruth which in the matter it selfe is neuerthelesse most true For vndoubtedly Christ remayneth in the man that worthely receaueth the Sacrament so long as the man remayneth a member of Christ. In this first parte there is a fault in the matter of the spéech for explication whereof I will examine it particularly This Author saith they say that Christ is really in the Sacramental bread being reserued an wholl yeare c. The Church geuing faith to Christes word when he said This is my body c. teacheth the body of Christ to be present in the Sacrament vnder the forme of bread vnto which wordes when doe put the word really it serueth onely to expresse that truth in open wordes which was before to be vnderstanded in sence For in Christ who was the body of all the shadowes and figures of the law and who did exhibite and gaue in his Sacramentes of the new law the thinges promysed in his Sacramentes of the olde law We must vnderstand his wordes in the institution of his Sacramentes without figure in the substance of the celestiall thing of them and therefore when be ordered his most precious body and bloud to be eaten and druken of vs vnder the formes of bread and wine we professe and beléeue that truely he gaue vs his most precious body in the Sacrament for a celestiall foode to comforte and strengthen vs in this miserable life And for certainty of the truth of his worke therein we professe he geueth vs his body really that is to say in déed his body the thing it selfe which is the heauenly parte of the Sacrament called Eucharistia hauing the visible forme of bread and wine and contayning inuisibly the very body and bloud of our Sauyour Christ which was not wonte to be reserued otherwise but to be ready for such as in daunger of death call for it and the same so long as it may be vsed is still the same Sacrament which onely tyme altereth not Whereof Cirill wrote to this sence many hundred yeares past and Hesychius also and what ought to be done when by negligence of the mynister it were reserued ouerlong Mary where it liketh the Author of these differences to say the church teacheth Christ to flée vp from the
the olde heresy denying the true taking of the flesh of Christ in the virgins wombe at the same tyme to reuiue When the true deliuerance of Christs flesh in the holy supper to be of vs eaten is also denied For as it is a meere trueth without figure and yet an high mistery Gods worke in the incarnation of Christ wherein our flesh was of Christ truely taken of the virgins substance So is it a meere trueth without figure in the substance of the celestiall thing yet an high mistery and Gods worke in the geuing of the same true flesh truely to be in the supper eaten When I exclude figure in the sacrament I mene not of the visible part which is called a figure of the celestial inuisible part which is truely there without figure so as by that figure is not impayred the truth of that presence which I ad to auoyd cauilation And make an end of this comparison this I say that this article declareth wantonnes to make a difference in words where none is in the sence rightly taken with a noueltie of spéech not necessary to be vttered now Caunterbury NOte well here reader how the cuttill commeth in with his darke coulours Where I speake of the substaunce of the thing that is eaten you turne it to the manner and circumstaunces thereof to blynde the simple reader and that you may make therof a riddle of yea and nay as you be wont to make blacke white and white blacke or one thing yea and nay black and white at your pleasure But to put away your darke coulours and to make the matter playne this I say that the fathers and prophets did eat Christes body and drinke his bloud in promise of redemptiō to be wrought and we eat and drink the same flesh and bloud in confirmation of our faith in the redemption all ready wrought But as the fathers did eat and drinke so did also the Apostles at Christ his supper in promise of redemtion to be wrought not in confirmation of redēption already wrought So that if wrought and to be wrought make the diuersitie of presence and not presence then the Apostles did not eat and drinke the flesh and bloud of Christ really present because the redemption was not then already wrought but promised the next day to be wrought And although before the crucifiyng of his flesh and effusion of his bloud our redemption was not actually wrought by Christ yet was he spiritually and sacramentally present and spiritually and sacramentally eaten and drunken not onely of the Apostles at his last supper before hee suffered his passion but also of the holy Patriarkes and fathers before his incarnation aswell as he is now of vs after his ascention And although in the manner of signifiyng there be great difference between their sacraments and ours yet as S. Augustine saith both we and they receaue one thing in the diuersitie of Sacraments And our Sacraments contain presently the very things signified no more then theirs did For in their sacraments they were by Christ presently regenerated and fed as we be in ours although their sacraments were figures of the death of Christ to com and ours be figurs of his death now past And as it is al one Christ that was to be borne and to dye for vs and afterward was borne in deede and dyed in deede whose byrth and death be now passed so was the same Christ and the same flesh and bloud eaten and drunken of the faithfull fathers before he was borne or dead and of his Apostles after he was born and before he was dead and of faithfull christen people is now dayly eaten and drunken after that both his natiuity and death be passed And al is but one Christ one flesh one bloud as concerning the sustance yet that which to the fathers was to come is to vs passed And neuerthelesse the eating drinking is all one for neither the fathers did nor we do eat carnally and corporally with our mouthes but both the fathers did and we do eat spiritually by true and liuely faith The body of Christ was and is all one to the fathers and to vs but corporally and locally he was yet borne vnto them from vs he is gone and ascended vp into heauē So that to neither he was nor is carnally substantially and corporally present but to them he was to vs he is spiritually present and sacramentally also and of both sacramētally spiritually and effectually eaten and drunken to eternall saluation euerlasting lyfe And this is plainly enough declared in the Scripture to them that haue willing mindes to vnderstand the truth For it is written in the old Testament Eccle. 24. in the person of Christ thus They that eat me shall yet hunger and they that drinke me shall yet be thirsty And S. Paule writeth to the Corinthians saying Our fathers did all eat the same spirituall meat and did all drink the same spirituall drinke and they drank of that spirituall rock that followed them which rock was Christ. These words S. Augustine expounding sayth What is to eat the same meat but that they did eate the same which wee doe Who so euer in Manna vnderstood Christ did eat the same spirituall meat that we do that is to say that meat which was receaued with fayth and not with bodyes Therefore to them that vnderstood and beleued it was the same meat and the same drinke So that to such as vnderstoode not the meate was onely Manna and the drinke onely water but to such as vnderstood it was the same that is now For thē was Christ to come who is now come To come and is come be diuers wordes but it is the same Christ. These be S. Augustines sayings And because you say that it is more agreable to the scripture to say that the fathers before Christs natiuity did not eat the body and drink the bloud of Christ I pray you shew me one scripture that so saith And shew me also one approued author that disalowed S. Augustines mind by me here alleaged because you say that all doe not agree to his vnderstanding And in the 77. Psalme S. Augustine saith also The stone was Christ. Therefore the same was the meat drinke of the fathers in the mistery wich is ours but in significatiō the same not in outward forme For it is one Christ him selfe that to them was figured in the stone and to vs manyfestly appeared in flesh And saint Augustine sayth playnely that both Manna and our Sacrament signifieth Christ and that although the Sacraments were dyuers yet in the thing by them ment and vnderstand they were both like And so after the mynd of S. Augustine it is cleare that the same thinges were geuen to the faithfull receiuers in the Sacraments of the old Testament that be geuen in the new the same to them was circumcisiō that to vs is baptisme and to
And yet it is not to be denied but that Christ is truely eaten as he was truly born but the one corporally and without figure and the other spiritually and with a figure Now followeth my 11 comparison They say that the body of Christ is euery day many tymes made as often as there be Masses sayd and that then and there he is made of bread and wine We say that Christes body was neuer but once made and then not of the nature substance of bread and wine but of the substance of his blessed mother Winchester The body of Christ is by Gods omnipotency who so worketh in his word made present vnto vs at such tyme as the church praye it may please him so to doe which prayer is ordred to be made in the booke of common prayer now set foorth Wherin we require of God the creatures of bread and wine to be sanctified and to be to vs the body and bloud of Christ which they can not be vnlesse God worketh it and make them so to be In which mistery it was neuer taught as this author willingly misreporteth that Christes most precious body is made of the matter of bread but in that order exhibited and made preset vnto vs by conuersion of the substaunce of bread into his precious body not a new body made of a new matter of bread and wine but a new presence of the body that is neuer old made present there where the substāce of bread and wine was before So as this comparison of difference is meere wrangling and so euident as it needeth no further aunswere but a note Lo how they be not ashamed to trifle in so great a matter and without cause by wrong termes to bring the truth in sclander if it were possible May not this be accompted as a part of Gods punishmēt for men of knowledge to write to the people such matter seriously as were not tolerable to be by a scoffer deuised in a play to supply when his fellow had forgotten his part Caunterbury Christ is present when so euer the church praieth vnto him and is gathered togither in his name And the bread and wine be made vnto vs the body and bloud of Christ as it is in the book of common praier but not by chaunging the substaunce of bread and wine into the substance of Christes naturall body and bloud but that in the godly vsing of thē they be vnto the receauers Christes body and bloud As of some the Scripture saith that their riches is their redemption and to some it is their damnatiō And as Gods word to some is life to some it is death and a snare as the prophet saith And Christ himself to some is a stone to stumble at to some is a raysing frō death not by conuersion of substances but by good or euill vse that thing which to the godly is saluation to the vngodly is damnation So is the water in baptism and the bread and wine in the Lords supper to the worthy receauers Christ himselfe and eternall life and to the vnworthy receauers euerlasting death and damnation not by conuersion of one substance into an other but by godly or vngodly vse thereof And therfore in the book of the holy communion we do not pray absolutely that the bread and wine may be made the body and bloud of Christ but that vnto vs in that holy mistery they may be so that is to say that we may so worthely receaue the same that we may be partakers of Christes body and bloud and that therwith in spirit and in truth we may be spiritually nourished And a like praier of old time were all the people wont to make at the communion of all such offerings as at that time all the people vsed to offer praying that their offerings might be vnto them the body and bloud of Christ. And where you say it was neuer taught as I say that Christs body is made of the matter of bread you knowingly and willingly misreport me For I say not of the matter of bread but of bread which when you deny that the Papists so say it semeth you be now ashamed of the doctrin which the Papistes haue taught thys 4. or 5. hundred yeres For is it not playnely written of all the Papists both lawyers and scholl authors that the body of Christ in the sacramēt is made of bread and his bloud of wine And they say not that his body is made present of bread wine but is made of bread and wine Be not their books in print ready to be shewed Do they not say that the substance of the bread neither remaineth still nor is turned into nothing but into the body of Christ And do not your selfe also say here in this place that the substance of bread is conuerted into Christes precious body And what is that els but the body of Christ to be made of bread and to be made of a new matter For if the bread doe not vanish away into nothing but be turned into Christes body then is Christs body made of it and then it must needes follow that Christes body is made of new and of an orher substance then it was made of in his mothers wombe For there it was made of her flesh and bloud and here it is made of bread and wine And the Papistes say not as you now would shift of the matter that Christes body is made present of bread but they say plainly without addition that it is made of bread Can you deny that this is the plain doctrine of the Papists Ex pane fit Corpus Christi of bread is made the body of Christ and that the substance of bread is turned into the substance therof◠And what reason sentence or english could be in this saying Christes body is made present of bread Marye to be present in bread might be some sentence but the speeche will you in no wise admitte And this your saying here if the reader mark it wel turneth ouer quite and cleane all the wholl Papisticall doctrine in this matter of the Sacrament as well touching transubstantiation as also the carnall presence For their doctrine with one whol consent and agreement is this That the substance of bread remaineth not but is turned into the substance of Christes body and so the body of Christ is made of it But this is false say you and not tollerable to be by a scoffer deuised in a place to supply when his fellow had forgotten his part And so the wholl doctrine of the papists which they haue taught these 4. or 5. hundreth yeares doe you condemne with condigne reproches as a teaching intollerable not to be deuised by a scoffer in a play Why doe you then take vpon you to defend the Papistical doctrine if it be so intollerable Why doe you not forsake those scoffers and players which haue iugled with the world so long and embrace the
and prayer If man should then waxe proud and glory as of him selfe and extoll his own deuotiō in these ministeries such men should bewray their own naughty hipocrisie yet therby empayr not the very dignity of the ministery ne the very true fruit and effect therof And therfore when the Church by the minister and with the minister prayeth that the creatures of bread and wine set on the aultar as the booke of common prayer in this Realme hath ordred may be vnto vs the body and bloud of our sauiour Christ we require then the celebration of the same Supper which Christ made to his Apostles for to be the continuall memory of his death with all fruite and effect such as the same had in the first institution Wherfore when the minister pronounceth Christes wordes as spoaken of his mouth it is to be beléeued that Christ doth now as he did then And it is to be noted that although in the Sacrament of Baptisme the minister saith I baptise thée yet in the celebration of his Supper the wordes be spoaken in Christes person as saying him selfe this is my body that is broaken for you which is to vs not onely a memory but an effectuall memory with the very presence of Christes body and bloud our very Sacrifice Who doing now as he did then offreth him selfe to his Father as he did then not to renue that offering as though it were imperfecte but continually to refresh vs that daily fall and decay And as S. Iohn saith Christ is our aduocate and intreateth for vs or pleadeth for vs not to supply any want on Gods behalfe but to relieue our wantes in edification wherein the ministery of the Church trauaileth to bring man to perfection in Christ which Christ himselfe doth assist and absolutely performe in his Church his misticall body Now whē we haue Christes body thus present in the celebration of the holy Supper and by Christes mouth present vnto vs saying this is my body which is betraied for you Then haue we Christes body recommended vnto vs as our Sacrifice and a Sacrifice propitiatory for all the sinnes of the world being the onely Sacrifice of Christes Church the pure and cleane Sacrifice wherof the Prophet Malachie spake and wherof the Fathers in Christs church haue since the beginning continually written the very true presence whereof most constantly beléeued hath encreased from time to time such ceremonies as haue béene vsed in the celebration of that Supper in which by Christes own mouth we be ascertained of his most glorious death and passion and the selfe same body that suffred deliuered vnto vs in mistery to be eaten of vs and therefore so to be worshipped and acknowledged of vs as our very onely Sacrifice in whom by whom and for whom our other priuate giftes and Sacrifices be acceptable and no otherwise And therfore as Christ declareth in the Supper himselfe an offering and Sacrifice for our sinne offering himselfe to his Father as our Mediator and so therewith recommendeth to his Father the Church his body for which he suffreth so the Church at the same Supper in their offering of laudes and thankes with such other giftes as they haue receaued from God ioyne them selues with their head Christ presenting and offering him as one by whom for whom and in whom all that by Gods grace man can doe well is auailable and acceptable and without whom nothing by vs done can be pleasaunt in the sight of God Wherupon this perswasion hath béen truely conceiued which is also in the booke of common prayer in the celebration of the holy supper retained that it is very profitable at that time when the memory of Christes death is solemnized to remember with prayer all estates of the Church and to recommend them to God which S. Paule to Timothy séemeth to require At which time as Christ signifieth vnto vs the certainty of his death and geueth vs to be eaten as it were in pledge the same his precious body that suffered So we for declaration of our confidence in the death and Sacrifice doe kindely remember with thankes his speciall giftes and charitably remember the rest of the mēbers of Christes church with praier and as we are able should with our bodely goodes remember at that time specyally to reléeue such as haue néede by pouerty And againe as Christ putteth vs in remembraunce of his great benefite so we should throughly remember him for our parte with the true confession of this mistery wherin is recapitulate a memoriall of all giftes and misteries that God in Christ hath wrought for vs. In the consideration and estimation wherof as there hath been a fault in the securitie of such as so their names were remembred in this holy time of memory they cared not how much they forgat themselues So there may be a fault in such as neglecting it care not whether they be remembred there at all therfore would haue it nothing but a plain eating and drinking How much the remembrance in prayer may auaile no man can prescribe but that it auaileth euery christen man must confesse Man may nothing arrogate to his deuotion But S. Iames said truely Multum valet oratio iusti assidua It is to be abhorred to haue hipocrites that counterfaite deuotion but true deuotion is to be wished of God and prayed for which is Gods gifte not to obscure his glory but to set it forth not that we should then trust in mennes merites and prayers but laude and glorifie God in them Qui talem potestatem dedit hominibus one to be iudged able to reléeue another with his prayer referring all to procéede from God by the mediation of our Sauiour and redéemer Iesus Christ. I haue taryed long in this matter to declare that for the effect of all celestiall or worldly giftes to be obteyned of God in the celebration of Christes holy Supper when we call it the communion is now prayed for to be present and is present and with Gods fauoure shalbée obtayned if we deuoutly reuerently charitably and quietly vse and frequents the same without other innouations then the order of the booke prescribeth Now to the last difference Caunterbury HOw is this comparison out of the matter of the presence of Christes most precious body in the Sacrament when the Papistes say that the masse is not a sacrifice propiciatory but because the presence of Christes most precious body beyng presently there And yet if this comparison be out of the matter as you say it is why doe you then wrastle and wrangle with it so much And doe I seeme to graunt the peesence of Christs body in the first part of my comparison when I do nothing there but rehearce what the Papists do say But because all this proceeds which you bring in here out of tune and time belōgeth to the last booke I wil passe it ouer vnto the propper place onely by the way touching shortly some
wherupoÌ„ we might coÌ„clude that Christ did in this mortal life but in one particular momeÌ„t of time offer him self to the father to what purpose you bring forth this momeÌ„t of time I caÌ„not tell for I made no meÌ„tâ—on therof but of the day of his death the scripture saith plainly that as it is ordained for euerye man to dye but once so Christe was offered but once And saith further that sinne is not forgeueÌ„ but by effusioÌ„ of bloud therefore if Christ had ben offered many times he should haue dyed many times And of any other offering of Christes body for sin the scripture speaketh not For although S. Paul to the PhillippiaÌ„s speaketh of the humiliatioÌ„ of Christ by his incarnatioÌ„ so to worldly miseries afflictioÌ„s eueÌ„ vnto death vpoÌ„ the crosse yet he calleth not euery humiliatioÌ„ of Christ a sacrifice oblatioÌ„ for remissioÌ„ of sin but onely his oblatioÌ„ vpoÌ„ good Fryday which as it was our perfect redeÌ„ptioÌ„ so was it our perfect recoÌ„ciliatioÌ„ propitiatioÌ„ satisfactioÌ„ for sinne And to what purpose you make here a long processe of our sacrifices of obedience vnto Gods coÌ„mauÌ„demeÌ„ts I caÌ„not deuise For I declare in my last booke that all our whole obedience vnto Gods will a commauÌ„demeÌ„ts is a sacrifice acceptable to God but not a sacrifice propitiatory for the sacrifice Christ onely made and by that his sacrifice all our Sacrifices be acceptable to God without that none is acceptable to him And by those sacrifices al christeÌ„ people offer theÌ„selues to God but they offer not Christ again for sin for that did neuer creature but Christ him self alone nor he neuer but vpoÌ„ good Fryday For although he did institute the night before a remeÌ„brance of his death vnder the SacrameÌ„ts of bread wine yet he made not at that time the sacrifice of our redeÌ„ptioÌ„ satisfaction for our sinnes but the next day following And the declaration of Christ at his last supper that he would suffer death was not the cause wherfore Ciprian sayd that Christ offered himselfe in his supper For I reade not in any place of Ciprian to my remeÌ„brance any such wordes that Christ offered himselfe in his supper but he saith that Christ offered the fame thing whiche Melchisedech offered And if Ciprian say in any place that Christ offered himself in his supper yet he sayd not that Christ did so for this cause that in his supper he declared his death And therfore here you make a deceitful fallax in sophistry pretending to shew that thing to be a cause which is not the true cause in deede For the cause why Ciprian and other olde authors say that Christ made an oblation and offering of him selfe in his last supper was not that he declared there that he would suffer death for that he had declared many times before but the cause was that there he ordained a perpetuall memory of his death which he would all faithfull christeÌ„ people to obserue froÌ„ time to time remembring his death with thankes for his benefites vntill his comming again And therfore the memoriall of the true sacrifice made vpon the crosse as S. Augustine saith is called by the name of a sacrifice as a thing that signifyeth an other thing is called by the name of the thing which it signifyeth although in very deede it be not the same And the long discourse that you make of Christes true presence and of the true eating of him and of his true assisting vs in our doing of his commaundement all these be true For Christes flesh bloud be in the sacrament truely present but spiritually and sacramentally not carnally and corporally And as he is truely present so is he truely eaten and dronken and assisteth vs. And he is the same to vs that he was to them that saw him with their bodely eyes But where you say that he is as familiare with vs as he was with theÌ„ here I may say the French terme which they vse for reuerence sake Saue vostre grace And he offered not him selfe then for them vpon the crosse and now offereth himself for vs daily in the Masse but vpon the crosse he offered him selfe both for vs and for them For that his one sacrifice of his body than onely offered is now vnto vs by fayth as auailable as it was then for them For with one sacrifice as S. Paul saith he hath made perfect for euer them that be sanctifyed And where you speake of the participation of Christes flesh and bloud if you meane of the sacramentall participatioÌ„ onely that therby we be ascertayned of the regeneration of our bodies that they shall liue and haue the fruition of God with our soules for euer you be in an horrible errour And if you meane a spirituall participation of Christes body and bloud then all this your processe is in vaine and serueth nothing for your purpose to proue that Christes flesh and bloud be corporally in the sacrament vnder the formes of bread and wine and participated of them that be euill as you teach which be no whit therby the more certain of their saluation but of their damnation as S. Paul saith And although the holy supper of the Lord be not a vain or phantasticall supper wherein thinges should be promised which be not performed to them that worthely come thereunto but Christes flesh and bloud be there truely eaten and dronken in deede yet that misticall supper can not be without misteries and figures And although wee feede in deede of Christes body and drinke in deed his bloud yet not corporally quantitatiuely and palpably as we shal be regenerated at the resurrection and as he was betrayed walked here in earth and was very man And therfore although the thinges by you rehearsed be all truely done yet all be not done after one sort and fashion but some corporally and visibly some spiritually and inuisibly And therfore to al your comparisons or similitudes here by you rehearsed if there be geuen to euery one his true vnderstanding they may be so graunted all to be true But if you will linke all these together in one sort and fashioÌ„ and make a chaine thereof you shall farre passe the bondes of wanton reason making a chaine of golde and copper together confounding and mixing together corporall and spiritual heauenly and earthly thinges and bring all to very madnes and impiety or plaine and manifest heresy And because one single error pleaseth you not shortly after you linke a number of errors almost together in one senteÌ„ce as it were to make an whole chaine of errors saying not onely that Christes body is verely present in the celebratioÌ„ of the holy supper meaning of corporal presence but that it is also our very sacrifice and sacrifice propitiatory for all the sinnes of the world and that it is the onely sacrifice of the church and that it is the pure aud cleane
so no certayntie of any true body to be in Christ This reason had been more fitte to be made by a man that had lost both his witte and reason For in this place Tertullian must needes be so vnderstand that by the body of Christ is vnderstand the figure of his body because Tertullian so expoundeth it him selfe And must it be always so bicause it is here so Must euer Christes body be taken for a figure bicause it is here taken for a figure as Tertullian sayth Haue you so forgotten your Logike that you will make a good argument à particulari ad vniuersale By your owne manner of argumentation bicause you make a naughty argumēt here in this place shall I conclude that you neuer make none good Surely this place of Tertullian as you haue handled it is neither secret nor manifest poynt eyther of learning witte or reason but a meere sophistication if it be no worse What other papistes haue aunswered to this place of Tertullian I am not ignoraunt nor I am sure you be not so ignoraunt but you know that neuer none aunswered as you do But your answer varieth as much from all other papists as yours theyrs also do varie from the truth Here the reader may note by the way how many fowle shiftes you make to auoyd the saying of Tertullian First you say that bread was a figure in the prophets mouth but not in Christes wordes Second that the thing which the prophet spake of was not that which Christ spake of Third that other haue aunswered this place of Tertullian before Forth that you call this matter but a wrangling argument Fift that if Tertulian call bread a figure yet he termeth it not onely figure These be your shiftes Now let the reader looke vpon Tertullians playn wordes whyche I haue rehearsed in my booke and then let him iudge whether you meane to declare Tertullians mynd truely or no. And it is not requiset for my purpose to proue that bread is onely a figure for I take vpon me there to proue no more but that the bread is a figure representing Christes body and the wine his bloud And if breade be a figure and not onely a figure than must you make bread both the figure and the truth of the figure Now heare what other authors I do here alleadge And saynt Ciprian the holy marter sayth of this matter that Christs bloud is shewed in the wine and the people in the water that is mixt with the wine so that the mixture of the water to the wine signifieth the spirituall commixtion and ioyning of vs vnto Christ. By which similitude Ciprian ment not that the bloud of Christ is wine or the people water but as the water doeth signifie and represent the people so doeth the wine signify and represent Christs bloud and the vniting of the water and wine together signifieth the vniting of Christian people vnto Christ himselfe And the same saynt Ciprian in an other place writing here of sayth that Christ in his last supper gaue to his apostles with his owne handes bread and wine which he called his flesh and bloud but in the crosse he gaue his very body to be wounded with the handes of the souldiours that the apostles might declare to the world how and in what manner bread and wine may be the flesh and bloud of Christ. And the manner he straight wayes declareth thus that those things which do signifye and those thinges which be signified by them may be both called by one name Here it is certain by saynt Ciprians mind wherfore and in what wise bread is called Christes flesh and wine his bloud that is to say because that euery thing that representeth and signifieth an other thing may be called by the name of thing which it signifieth And therfore Saynt Iohn Chrisostom sayth that Christ ordayned the table of his holy supper for this purpose that in that sacramēt he should dayly shew vnto vs bread and wine for a similitude of his body and bloud Saynt Hierom likewise sayth vpon the gospell of Mathew that Christ took bread which comforteth mans hart that he mght represent thereby his very body and bloud Also Saynt Ambrose if the booke be his that is intituled De his qui misterijs initianter sayth that before the consecration an other kind is named but after the consecration the body of Christ is signified Christ sayd his bloud beefore the consecration it is called an other thing but after the consecration is signified the bloud of Christ. And in his booke De sacramentis if that be also his he writeth thus Thou doost receiue the sacrament for a similitud of the flesh and bloud of Christ but thou doost obtayne the grace and vertue of his true nature And receiuing the bread in that foode thou art partaker of his godly substaunce And in the same booke he sayth As thou hast in baptisme reciued the similitude of death so likewise dost thou in the sacramēt drink the similitude of Christes precious bloud And agayne he sayeth in the sayd booke The priest sayth Make vnto vs this oblation to be acceptable which is the figure of the body and bloud of our Lord Iesu Christ. And vpon the epistle of Saynt Paule to the Corinthians he sayth that in eating and drinking the bread and wine we doe signifie the flesh and bloud which were offered for vs. And the olde tastament he sayeth was instituted in bloud because that bloud was a witnes of gods benefite in signification and figure wherof we take the mistical cup of his bloud to the tuitiō of our body soule Of these places of saynt Chrisostom saynt Hierom and saynt Ambrose it is cleare that in the sacramentall bread and wine is not rially and corporally the very naturall substance of the flesh and bloud of Christ but that the bread and wine be similitudes misteries and representations significations sacramentes figures and signes of his body and bloud and therfore be called and haue the name of his very body flesh and bloud Winchester Ciprian shal be touched after when we speake of him agayn Chrisostom shall open himselfe hereafter playnly Saynt Hierom speaketh here very pithely vsing the word represent which signifieth a true reall exhibision for saynt Hierom speaketh of the representation of the truth of Christes body which truth excludeth an onely figure For howsoeuer the visible matter of the sacrament be a figure the inuisible part is a truth which saynt Hierom sayth is here represented that is to say made present which onely signification doth not Saynt Ambrose shall after declare himselfe and it is not denied but the authors in speaking of the sacrament vsed these wordes signe figure similitude token but those speaches exclude not the veritie and truth of the body and bloud of Christ for no approued author hath this exclution to say an onely signe an only token an
eares be vij yeares The scripture sayth not signifieth vij yeares And vij kine be seuen yeares and many other like And so sayd saynt Paule that the stone was Christ and not that it signified Christ but euen as it had ben hee indede which neuerthelesse was not Christ by substaunce but by signification Euen so sayth saynt Augustine bicause the bloud signifieth and representeth the soule therfore in a sacrament or signification it is called the soule And contra Adamantium he writeth much like saying In such wise is bloud the soule as the stone was Christ and yet the Apostle sayth not that the stone signified Christ but sayth it was Christ. And this sentence Bloud is the soule may be vnderstand to be spoken in a signe or figure for Christ did not stick to say this is my body when he gaue the signe of his body Here S Augustine rehearsing diuers sentences which were spoken figuratiuely that is to say when one thing was called by the name of an other and yet was not the other in substance but in signification As the bloud is the soule vij kyne be vij yeares vij eares be vij yeares the stone was Christ. Among such maner of speaches he reherseth those wordes which Christ spake at his last supper this is my body Which declareth playnly Saynt Augustines mind that Christ spake those wordes figuratiuely not meaning that the bread was his body by substance but by signification And therfore S. Augustine sayth contra Maximinum that in the sacramentes we must not consider what they be but what they signifie for they be signes of thinges being one thing and signifiyng another Which he doeth shew specially of this sacrament saying the heauenly bread which is Christes flesh by some maner of speach is called Christes body when in very deede it is the sacrament of his body And that offering of the flesh which is done by the priestes handes is called Christes passion death and crucifiyng not in very dede but in a misticall signification Winchester As for saynt Agustine ad Bonifacium the author shall perceiue his fault at Martyne Bucers hand who in his epistle dedicatory of his enarations of the gospels reherseth his mind of Saynt Augustine in this wise Est scribit diuus Augustinus secundum quendam modum sacramentum corporis Christi Corpus Christi sacramentum sanguinis Christi sanguis Christi At secundum quem modum Vt significet tantum corpus sanguinem Domini absenta Absit Honorari enim percipi in simbolis visibilibus corpus sanguinem Domini idem passim scribit These wordes of Bucer may be thus englished Saynt Augustine writeth the sacrament of the body of Christ is after a certayn maner the body of christ the sacramēt of the bloud of christ the bloud of christ but after what maner that it should signifie onely the body and bloud absent Absit In no wise for the same Saynt Augustine writeth in many places the body and bloud of Christ to be honored and to be receiued in those visible tokens Thus sayth Bucer who vnderstandeth not saynt Augustine to say the sacrament of Christes body to be Christes body after a certayn maner of speach as this author doth nor S. Augustine hath no such wordes but onely secundum quendam modum after a certayne maner wherunto to put of speach is an addition more then truth required of necessitie In these wordes of Bucer may apeare his whole indgement concerning S. Augustine who affirmeth the very true presence of the thing signified in the sacrament which truth established in the matter the calling it a signe or a token a figure a similitude or a shewing maketh no matter when we vnderstand the thing really present that is signified Which and it were not in dede in the Sacrament why should it after Bucers true vnderstanding of S. Augustine be honored there Arguing vpon mens speaches may be without end the authors vpon diuers repsectes speake of one thing diuersly Therfore we should resort to the pith and knot of the matter and see what they say in expounding the speciall place without contention and not what they vtter in the heat of their disputation ne to search their dark and ambiguous places wherwith to confound that they speake openly and playnly Canterbury WHat nede you to bring Martine Bucer to make me answer if you could answer your selfe but bicause you be ashamed of the matter you would thrust Martine Bucer in your place to receaue rebuke for you But in this place he easeth you nothing at all for he sayth no more but that the body and bloud of Christ be exhibited vnto the worthy receiuers of the sacrament which is true but yet spiritually not corporally And I neuer sayd that Christ is vtterly absent but I euer affirmed that he is truly and spiritually present and truly and spiritually exhibited vnto the godly receiuours but corporally is he neither in the receiuors nor in or vnder the fourmes of bread or wine as you do teach clearly with out the consent of master Bucer who writeth no such thing And where I alleadge of Saynt Augustine that the sacrament of Christes body is called Christes body after a certayn maner of speach and you deny that saynt Augustine ment of a certayne maner of speach but sayth onely after a certayne maner Read the place of saynt Augustin who will and he shall find that he speaketh of the maner of speach and that of such a maner of speach as calleth one thing by the name of an other where it is not the very thing in dede For of the maner of speach is all the processe there as apeareth by these his wordes a day or two before good Friday we vse in common speach to say to morowe or this day two dayes Christ suffered c. Likewise vppon Easter day we say this day Christ rose And why do no men reproue vs as lyars whan we speake in this sort And we call those dayes so by a similitude c. And so it is called that day which is not that day in dede And sacramentes commonly haue the name of the thinges wherof they be sacramentes Therfore as after a certayne manner the sacrament of Christes body is Christes body so likewise the sacramēt of fayth is fayth And likewise sayth Saynt Paule that in baptisme we be buried he sayth not that we signifie buriall but he sayth playnly that we be buried So that the sacrament of so great a thing is called by the name of the thing All these be S. Augustines wordes shewing how in the common vse of speach one thing may haue the name of another Wherfore when Doctor Gardiner sayth that S. Augustine spake not of that maner of speach thou mayst beleue him hereafter as thou shalt see cause but if thou trust his wordes to much thou shalt soone be deceiued As for the reall presence of Christ
creatures of bread and wine be much bound vnto you and can no lesse do then take you for their sauior For if you can make them holy and godly then shall you glorifie them and so bryng them to eternall blisse And then may you aswell saue the true laboring bullocks and innocēt shepe and lambes and so vnderstand the prophet Homines iumenta saluabis domine But to admonish the reader say you how the bread and wine haue no holynes this fortune of spech not vnderstand of the people engendreth some scruple that nedeth not By which your saying I cannot tel what the people may vnderstand but that you haue a great scruple that you haue lost your holy bread And yet S. Paule speaketh not of your holy bread as you imagine being vtterly ignoraunt as appeareth in the scripture but he speaketh generally of all manner of meates which christian people receaue with thankes giuing vnto God whether it be bread wine or water fish flesh white meat herbes or what manner of meat and drinck so euer it be And the sanctified bread which S. Augustine writeth to be geuen to them that be catechised was not holy in it selfe but was called holy for the vse and signification And I expresse S. Cyprians minde truely and not a whit discrepant from my doctrine here when I say that the diuinitye may be sayd to bee powred or put sacramentally into the bread as the spirite of God is sayd to be in the water of baptisme when it is truely ministred or in his word when it is syncerely preached with the holy spirite working mightely in the hartes of the hearers And yet the water in it selfe is but a visible element nor the preachers word of it self is but a sound in the ayre which as soone as it is hard vanisheth away and hath in it selfe no holines at all although for the vse ministery therof it may be called holy And so likewise may be sayd of the sacramentes which as S. Augustine sayth be as it were Gods visible word And whereas you reherse out of my wordes in an other place that as hoat and burning yron is yron still yet hath the force of fyre so the bread and wine be tourned into the vertue of Christes flesh and bloud you neyther report my words truly nor vnderstād thē truely For I declare in my booke vertue to be in them that godly receaue bread and wine and not in the bread and wine And I take vertue there to signifie might and strength or force as I name it which in the greeke is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after which sence we say that there is vertue in herbs in words and in stones and not to signify vertue in holynes which in greek is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wher of a person is called vertuous whose fayth and conuersation is godly But you sophistically and fraudulently do of purpose abuse the word vertue to an other significatiō then I mēt to approue by my words your own vayne error that bread should be vertuous holy making in your argument a fallax or craft called equiuocation For where my meaning is that the death of Christ and the effusion of his bloud haue effect and strength in them that truely receaue the sacrament of his flesh and bloud you turne the matter quite as though I should say that the bread were godly and vertuous which is very frantick and vngodly opiniō and nothing pertaining to mine application of the similitude of yron But this is the mother of many errors both in interpretation of scriptures and also in vnderstandyng of old auncient writers when the mind and intent of him that maketh a similitude is not considered But the similitude is applied vnto other matters then the meaning was Which fault may be iustly noted in you here when you reason by the similitude of hoat burning yron that bread may conceiue such vertue as it may be called vertuous and holy For my onely purpose was by that similitude to teach that yron remayning in his proper nature substance by conceauing of fire may work an other thing thē is the nature of yrō And so likewise bread remaynyng in is proper nature and substaunce in the ministration of the sacrament hath an other vse then to feed the body For it is a memoriall of Christes death that by exercise of our fayth our soules may receaue the more heauenly food But this is a strange maner of spech which neither scripture nor approued author euer vsed before you to cal the sacrametal bread vertuous as you doe But into such absurdities men do cōmonly fall when they will of purpose impugne the euident truth But was there euer any man so ouersene say you as this author is Who seeth not S. Ambrose in these three latter speeches to speak as plainly as in the first Was there euer any man so destitute of reason say I but that he vnderstandeth this that when bread is balled bread it is called by the proper name as it is in deed and when bread is called the body of Christ it taketh the name of a thing which it is not in deed but is so called by a figuratiue spech And calling say you in the words of Christ signifieth making which if it signifieth when bread is called bread then were calling of bread a making of bread And thus is aunswered your demaund why this word call in the one signifieth the trueth and in the other not because that the one is a playne speche and the other a figuratiue For els by our reasoning out of reason when the cup which Christ vsed in his last supper was called a cup and when it was called Christes bloud all was one calling and was of like trueth without figure so that the cup was Christes bloud in deed And likewise the stone that flowed out water was called a stone and when it was called Christ the arke also when it was called the arke when it was called god all these must be one spech and of like trueth if it be true which you here say But as the arke was an arke the stone a stone bread very bread and the cup a cup playnely without figuratiue spech so whē they be called God Christ the body and bloud of Christ this can not be alike calling but must needes be vnderstād by a figuratiue spech For as Christ in the scripture is called a lambe for his innocency meeknes a Lyon for his might and power a doore and way wherby we enter into his fathers house wheat corne for the property of dying before they ryse vp bring increase so is he called bread and bread is called his body wine his bloud for the propertie of feedyng nourishing So that these al like speches where as one substaūce is called by the name of an other substaunce diuers and distinct in
But all this is spoken quite besides the matter and serueth for nothing but to cast a myst before mens eyes as it semeth you seeke nothing els thorow your whole booke And this your doctrine hath a very euill smacke that spirite and life should fall vppon naughty men although for theyr malice it tary not For by this doctrine you ioyne togither in one man Christ and Beliall the spirite of God and the spirite of the diuell lyfe and death and all at one tyme which doctrine I will not name what it is for all faythfull men know the name right well and detest the same And what ignoraunce can be shewed more in him that accoumpteth himselfe learned then to gather of Christes wordes where her sayth his wordes be spirit and life that spirit and lyfe should be in euill men because they heare his wordes For the wordes which you recyte by and by of S. Augustin shew how vayne your argument is when he sayth The wordes be spirite and life but not to thee that doest carnally vnderstand them What estimation of learning or of truth would you haue men to conceaue of you that bring such vnlearned argumentes wherof the inuadilitie appeareth within six lynes after Which must nedes declare in you either much vntruth and vnsincere proceding or much ignoraunce or at the least all exceding forgetfulnes to say anythyng reproued agayn within six lynes after And if the promises of God as you say be not disapoynted by our infidelitie then if euyll men eate the very body of Christ and drink his bloud they must nedes dwell in Christ and haue Christ dwelling in them and by him haue euerlasting lyfe bycause of these promises of Christ Qui manducat meam carnem bibit meum sanguinem in memanet et ego in eo Et quimanducat meam carnem bibit meum sanguinem habet vitam aeternam He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud hath euerlasting lyfe And he that eateth my flesh and drincketh my bloud dwelleth in me and I in him And yet the third promise Qui manducat me ipse viues propter me He that eateth me he shall also lyue by me These be .iij. promises of God which if they can not be disapoynted by our infidilitie then if euyll men eat the very body of Christ and drinke his bloud as you say they doe in the sacrament then must it nedes follow that they shall haue euerlasting life and that they dwell in Christ and Christ in them bicause our infidilitie say you can not disappoynt Goddes promises And how agreeth this your saying with that doctrine which you were wont earnestly to teach both by mouth and penne that all the promises of God to vs be made vnder condition if our infidilitie can not disappoynt Gods promises For then the promises of God must nedes haue place whether we obserue the condition or not But here you haue fetched a great compasse circuit vtterly in vayne to reproue that thing which I neuer denied but euer affirmed which is That the substaunce of the visible sacrament of the body and bloud of Christ which I say is bread and wine in the sacrament as water is in baptisme is all one substance to good and to badde and to both a figure But that vnder the fourme of bread and wine is corporally present by Christes ordinaūce his very body and bloud eyther to good or to ill that you neyther haue nor can proue yet thereupō would you bring in your conclusion here wherin you commit that folly in reasoning which is caled Petitio principij What neede you to make herein any issue when we agree in the matter For in the substance I make no diuersitie but I say that the substance of Christes body and bloud is corporally present neyther in the good eater nor in the euill And as for the substance of bread and wine I say they be all one whether the good or euill eate and drincke them As the water of Baptisme is all one whether Symon Peter or Symon Magus be christned therin and it is one word that to the euill is a sauoure of death and to the good is a sauoure of lyfe And as it is one Sonne that shineth vppon the good and the badde that melteth butter and maketh the earth harde one flower wherof the bee sucketh hony and the spyder poyson and one oyntment as Decumenius sayth that kylleth the bettyll and strengthneth the doue Neuerthelesse as all that be washed in the water be not washed with the holy spirite so all that eate the sacramentall bread eate not the very body of Christ. And thus you see that your issue is to no purpose except you would fight with your owne shadowe Now forasmuch as after all this vayne and friuolous consuming of wordes you begin to make answere vnto my profes I shall here reherse my profes and argumentes to the intent that the reader seyng both my profes and your confutations before his eyes may the better consider and geue his iudgement therein My forth booke begynneth thus THe grosse errour of the Papistes is Of the carnall eating and drinking of Christes flesh and bloud with our mouthes For they say that whosoeuer eate and drincke the sacramentes of bread and wine do eat and drincke also with theyr mouthes Christes very flesh and bloud be they neuer so vngodly and wicked persons But Christ him selfe taught cleane contrary in the sixt of Iohn that we eate not him carnally with our mouthes but spiritually with our fayth saying Verily verily I say vnto you he that beleueth in me hath euerlasting lyfe I am the bread of life Your fathers did eat Manna in the wildernes and dyed This is the bread that cam from heauen that who so euer shall eate therof shall not dye I am the liuely bread that cam from heauen If any man eat of this bread he shall liue for euer And the bread which I will geue is my flesh which I will geue for the lyfe of the world This is the most true doctrine of our sauiour Christ that whosoeuer eateth him shall haue euerlasting lyfe And by and by it followeth in the same place of S. Iohn more clearly Verely verely I say vnto you except you eat the flesh of the sonne of man and drincke his bloud you shall not haue life in you He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud hath life euerlasting and I will rayse him agayne at the last day For my flesh is very meate and my bloud is very drincke He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud dwelleth in me and I in him As the liuing father hath sent me and I liue by the father euen so he that eateth me shall liue by me This is the bread which came downe from heauen not as your fathers did eate Manna and are dead He that eateth this
the bread of life which came from heauen and of spirituall eating by fayth after which sorte he was at the same present tyme eaten of as many as beleued on him although the sacrament was not at that tyme made and instituted And therfore he sayd Your fathers did eate Manna in the desert and dyed but he that eateth this bread shall liue for euer Therfore this place of S. Ihon can in no wise be vnderstande of the sacramentall bread which neither came from heauen neither giueth life to all that eate Nor of such bread Christ could haue then presently sayd This is my flesh except they will say that Christ did than consecrate so many yeares before the institution of his holy Supper Winchester A third reason this author frameth himselfe wherby to take occasion to affirme how the vi chapiter of S. Ihon should not appertayne to the Sacramentall manducation the contrary wherof appeareth aswell by the wordes of Christ in that vi chapiter saying I will geue not I doe giue which promise was fulfilled in the supper as also by the catholique writers and specially by Cirill and therfore I will not further striue with this author in that matter but see how he can assoyle the authorities wherunto he entreth with great confidence Caunterbury THe third reason I framed not my selfe as you say I did but had it ready framed out of your owne shoppe in your booke of the Diuels sophistry And as for the vi chapiter of Ihon I haue sufficiently shewed my mind therin in my answere to Doctor Smithes preface which shall suffice also for aunswere to you in this place And as for Cirill is clearly agaynst you who declareth that when Christ sayd I will geue my flesh for the life of the world he fulfilled not that promise in his supper but in the crosse For if Christ had geuen to vs life in his supper what should he haue needed after to dye for the same purpose The wordes of Cirill be these vpon the wordes of Christ Panis quem ego dabo caro mea est quam ego dabo pro mundi vita Morior inquit pro omnibus vt permeip sum omnes viuificem caro mea omnium redemptio fiat morietur euim mors morte mea Which wordes meane thus much in English I will dye for all that by my death I may geue life to all and that my flesh may be the redemption of all for death shall dye by my death Thus expoundeth Cirill the wordes of Christ that when he sayd I will geue he did not fulfill that promise in his spuper but in the crosse giuing vs life by his death not by eating and drinking of him in his supper as you most ignorantly say And yet all men may iudge how much I beare with you when I call it but ignorance Now followeth myne answere to the authors wrested by the papistes Now that I haue made a full direct and playne answer to the vayne reasons and cauilations of the Papists order requireth to make likewise answer vnto their sophisticall allegations and wresting of authors vnto their phantasticall purposes There be chiefely three places which at the first shew seeme much to make for their intent but when they shall be throughly wayed they make nothing for them at all The first is a place of Ciprian in his sermon of the Lords supper where he sayth as is alledged in the Detection of the deuils Sophistry This bread which our Lord gaue to his disciples changed in Nature but not in outward forme is by the omnipotency of gods word made flesh Here the Papists sticke tooth and nayle to these wordes Changed in nature Ergo say they the nature of the bread is changed Here is one chiefe poynt of the diuels sophistry vsed who in the allegation of Scripture vseth euer eyther to adde therto or to take away from it or to alter the sence therof And so haue they in this author left out those wordes which would open playnly all the whole matter For next the wordes which be here before of them recited do follow these wordes As in the person of Christ the humanity was seene and the diuinity was hid euen so did the diuinity ineffably put it selfe into the visible sacrament Which wordes of Ciprian do manifestly shew that the sacrament doth still remayne with the diuinity and that sacramentally the diuinity is poured into the bread and wine the same bread wine still remayning like as the same diuinity by vnity of person was in the humanity of Christ the same humanity still remayning with the diuinite And yet the bread is changed not in shape nor substance but in nature as Ciprian truly sayth not meaning that the naturall substance of bread is cleane gone but that by Gods word there is added therto an other higher propertie nature and condition farre passing the nature and condition of common bread that is to say that the bread doth shew vnto vs as the same Ciprian sayth that we be partaker of the spirite of God and most purely ioyned vnto Christ and spiritually fead with his flesh and bloud so that now the sayde misticall bread is both a corporall food for the body and a spirituall foode for the soule And likewise is the nature of the water changed in baptisme for as much as beside his common nature which is to wash and make cleane the body it declareth vnto vs that our soules be also washed and made cleane by the holy ghost And thus is answered the chiefe authoritie of the doctours which the Papists take for the principall defence of their errour But for further declaration of S. Ciprians mind herein reade the place of him before recited fol. 320. Winchester First in Ciprian who speaketh playnly in the matter this author findeth a fault that he is not wholy alleadged wherupon this author brought in the sentence following not necessary to be rehersed for the matter of Transubstantiation and handsome to be rehersed for the ouerthrowe of the rest of this authors new catholique fayth and whither that now shall be added was materiall in the matter of Transubstantiation I require the Iudgement of thee O reader The first wordes of Ciprian be these This bread which our Lord gaue to his disciples changed in nature but not in outward forme is by the omnipotencye of gods word made flesh These be Ciprians wordes and then follow these As in the persone of Christ the humanity was seene and the diuinity hidden euen so the diuinite ineffably infused it selfe into the visible Sacrament Thus sayth Ciprian as I can English him to expresse the word Infudit by Latin English not liking the English word shed bicause in our English tongue it resembleth spilling euacuation of the whole and much lesse I can agree to vse the word powring although Iufundo in Latine may in the vse of earthly thinges signifie so bicause powring noteth a successiue working
mutation brought in by S. Ambrose the substances neuertheles remayned the same that skilleth not for the wonder of those meruayles serue for an induction to releeue the weake fayth of man in this miracle of the Sacrament and to represse the arrogancy of reason presuming to search such knowledge in Gods secret workes whereof if there might be a reason geuen it néeded no fayth And where there is a like there is no singularity as this miracle in the sacrament is notably singuler and therefore none other found like vnto it The Sacramentall mutation which this author newly so termeth is a mere shift to auoyd among such as be not learned the truth of Gods miracle in this chaunge which is in déed such as S. Ambrose speaketh of that of bread is made the body of Christ which S. Ambrose in an other place termeth it the grace of the body of Christ and all is one for it is a great grace to haue the body of Christ for our food present there And out of Christes mouth calling the bodye of Christ is making the body of Christ which wordes calling signifying naming vsed in S. Ambrose writinges do not limitte Christes wordes and restraynt them to an onely calling an onely signifiyng or an onely naming but geue an vnderstanding agréeable to other of S. Ambrose wordes that shew the bread after consecration to be the body of Christ the calling to be vnderstanded a real calling of the thing that so is made and likewise a reall signifying of the thing in déed present and a reall naming as the thing is in déed As Christ was named Iesus because he is the sauiour of his people in déede And thus perusing this authors answeres I trust I haue noted to the reader with how smal substaunce of matter this author impugneth transubstantiation and how slenderly hée goeth about to aunswere such authors as by their seuerall writinges confyrme the same besydes the consent of Christendome vniuersally receiuing the same And how in the meane way this author hath by his owne handes pulled downe the same vntrue doctrine of the fyguratiue speach that himselfe so lately hath deuised or rather because this matter in his booke goeth before he hath in his second booke marred his frame or euer be commeth to the third booke to set it vp Caunterbury OH what a capitall cryme is here committed that I haue englished this word conficere to do whose proper signification is to accomplish or make an end of a thing which being once brought to passe we vse in common spech to say I haue done as I haue done my house I haue done my booke I haue done my worke I haue done my dayes iourney that is to say I haue perfectly done and finished And is not this fully as much in spech as to say I haue made my dayes iourney or I haue made my house or my booke But some fault you must finde where none is partly to keep in vse your old custome of calumniatiō and partly to satisfy a new toy that you haue in your head that making is in the substaunce of the sacrament and doing is in the effect But whether it be translate making or dooing S. Ambrose spake of the wonderfull effectuall working of God in the vse and ministration of the sacramentes and that as well in baptisme as in the Lordes supper and not of his working in the substaunces of the elementes reserued As for the authority of the booke I stand not in it so that all your wordes therein be more then nedeth but to length your book and yet was the book neuer allowed amongst men learned and of iudgement to be S. Ambroses And Melancthon whome you alleage for the allowaunce of it geueth it two nips which you haue left out of purpose to serue your affection For he saith not as you report that it seemeth not to him vnlike but that it seemeth not to him farre vnlike and yet he confesseth that it is confusedly written which is a slender approbation that it should be S. Ambroses And where you confesse that S. Ambrose sayth not in wordes that the substances of bread and wine be gone and yet sayth so in effect because he speaketh of chaunge either you know that your argument is naught and yet bring it in purposely to deceiue some simple reader or your ignoraunce is more then I would haue thought that of this word chaunge woulde argue chaunge in substaunce as though there could be no chaunge but it must be in substaunce But if you had well considered the examples of S. Ambrose by me alleadged which he bringeth forth for the proofes and similitudes of the chaunge of bread and wine in the sacrament you should haue found that in all the sayd examples remayne the substaunces notwithstanding the chaunge As in the water of Iordane staying to runue after the naturall course in the dry stone that contrary to his nature flowed out water in the bitter water of Marath that was turned into sweetnesse in the yron that contrary to nature swame aboue the water in the spirituall generation of man aboue all naturall operation in the sacramētall mutation of the water of baptisme and in the incarnation of our sauiour Christ which all being brought by S. Ambrose for example of the chaunge in bread and wine as in them the substaunces remayned notwithstanding the chaunges so is it in the bread and wine whereof other were brought for examples But in your handling here of S. Ambrose you seem to be vtterly ignoraunt and not to know difference betweene sacramentall signes in the vse whereof almighty God inwardly worketh and other vayne signes which be nothing els but outward shewes to the eye For if you vnderstood the matter would you resemble a knaue playing in a princes coate in whom nothing is inwardly wrought or altered vnto a man beyng baptised in water who hath put vpō him outwardly water but inwardly is aparelled with Christ and is by the omnipotent working of God spiritually regenerated and chaunged into a new man Or would you compare him that banketeth at a feast to represent an anniuersary or tryumph vnto that man that in remembraunce of Christes death eateth and drinketh at his holy supper geuing thankes for his redemption and comforting himselfe with the benefyte thereof If you haue this opinion and veneration of the sacramentes it is well knowen what spirite you haue how ignoraunt you be and what is to be iudged of you And if you haue no such opinion becommeth it you then to dally with such profane examples tending to the profanation of the Sacraments and deceiuing of the readers And as for the holines of bread I say now as I said before that neither bread wine nor water haue any capacity of holinesse but holines is onely in the receauers and by the bread water and wine is sacramentally signified And therefore the marueilous alteration to an hyer estate nature and condition is chiefly
be Baptised for an other and if he be it auayleth nothyng so ought not one to receiue the holy Communion for an other For if a man be dry or hungry he is neuer a whit eased if an other man drinke or eate for him or if a man be all befiled it helpeth him nothing an other man to bewashed for him So auayleth it nothyng to a man if an other man be Baptised for him or be refreshed for him with the meate and drinke at the Lordes Table And therfore sayd S. Peter Let euery man be Baptised in the name of Iesu Christ. And our Sauiour Christ sayd to the multitude Take and care And further he sayd Drinke you all of this Whosoeuer therfore will be spiritually regenerated in Christ he must be Baptised him selfe And he that will liue him selfe by Christ must by him selfe eate Christes flesh and drinke his bloud And briefly to conclude He that thinketh to come to the kyngdome of Christ him selfe must also come to his Sacramentes him selfe and keepe his Commaundements him selfe and do all thynges that pertayne to a Christian man and to his vocation him selfe least if he referre these thynges to an other man to do them for him the other may with as good right clayme the kyngdome of heauen for him Therfore Christ made no such difference betwene the priest and the lay mā that the priest should make oblation and sacrifice of Christ for the lay man and eate the Lordes Supper from him all alone and distribute and apply it as him liketh Christ made no such difference but the difference that is betwene the priest and the lay man in this matter is onely in the ministration that the priest as a common minister of the Church doth minister and distribute the Lords Supper vnto other and other receaue it at his handes But the very Supper it selfe was by Christ instituted and geuen to the whole Church not to be offered and eaten of the priest for other men but by him to be deliuered to all that would duely aske it As in a princes house the officers and ministers prepare the Table and yet other aswel as they eate the meate and drinke the drinke so do the priests and ministers prepare the Lordes Supper read the Gospell and rehearse Christes wordes but all the people say therto Amen All remember Christes death all geue thankes to God all repent and offer them selues an oblation to Christ all take him for their Lord and Sauiour and spiritually feede vpon him and in token therof they eate the bread and drinke the wine in his mysticall Supper And this nothyng diminisheth the estimation and dignitie of priesthode and other ministers of the Church but aduaunceth and highly commendeth their ministration For if they are much to be loued honored and esteemed that be the kynges Chauncelours Iudges officers and ministers in temporall matters how much than are they to be estemed that be ministers of Christes wordes and Sacramentes and haue to them committed the keyes of heauen to let in and shut out by the ministration of his word and Gospell Now for asmuch as I trust that I haue playnly inough set forth the propitiatory sacrifice of our Sauiour Iesu Christ to the capacitie and comfort of all men that haue any vnderstandyng of Christ and haue declared also the haynous abhomination and Idolatry of the Popishe Masse wherein the priestes haue taken vpon them the office of Christ to make a propitiatory sacrifice for the sinnes of the people and I haue also told what maner of sacrifice Christen people ought to make it is now necessary to make aunswere to the subtle persuasions and Sophisticall cauillations of the Papistes whereby they haue deceaued many a simple man both learned and vnlearned The place of S. Paule vnto the Hebrues which they doe cite for their purpose maketh quite and cleane agaynst them For where S. Paule sayth that euery high priest is ordayned to offer giftes and sacrifices for sinnes he spake not that of the priestes of the new Testamēt but of the old which as he sayth offered Calues and Goates And yet they were not such priestes that by their offerynges and sacrifices they could take away the peoples sinnes but they were shadowes and figures of Christ our euerlastyng priest which onely by one oblation of him selfe taketh away the sinnes of the world Wherfore the Popish priestes that apply this text vnto thēselues do directly contrary to the meanyng of S. Paule to the great iniury and preiudice of Christ by whom onely S. Paule sayth that the sacrifice and oblation for the sinne of the whole world was accomplished and fulfilled And as litle serueth for the Papistes purpose the text of the Prophet Malachie that euery where should be offered vnto God a pure sacrifice and oblation For the Prophet in that place spake no word of the Masse nor of any oblation propitiatory to be made by the priestes but he spake of the oblation of all faythfull people in what place so euer they be which offer vnto God with pure hartes and myndes sacrifices of laude and prayse prophecying of the vocation of the Gentiles that God would extende his mercy vnto them and not be the God onely of the Iewes but of all nations from East to West that with pure fayth call vpon him and glorifie his name But the aduersaries of Christ gather together a great heape of Authours whiche as they say call the Masse or holy Communion a Sacrifice But all those Authours be aunswered vnto in this one sentence that they called it not a sacrifice for sinne bycause that it taketh away our sinne which is takē away onely by the death of Christ but bicause the holy Cōmunion was ordeined of Christ to put vs in remēbraūce of the sacrifice made by him vpō the crosse for that cause it beareth the name of that sacrifice as S. Augustin declareth plainly in his Epistle ad Bonifacium before rehearsed in this booke pag. 141. And in his booke De fide ad Petrum Diaconū And in his booke De Ciuitate Dei he sayth That which men call a sacrifice is a signe or representation of the true sacrifice And the Maister of the Sentence of whom all the Schoole Authours take their occasion to write iudged truely in this poynt saying That whiche is offered and consecrated of the priest Is called a sacrifice and oblation because it is a memory and representation of the true Sacrifice and holy oblation made in the aultar of the Crosse. And S. Iohn Chrisostome after he hath sayd that Christ is our Byshop which offered that Sacrifice that made vs cleane and that we offer the same now least any man might be deceiued by his maner of speakyng he openeth his meanyng more playnly saying That which we doe is done for a remembraunce of that whiche was done by Christ For Christ sayth Doe this in remembraunce of me Also
could deuise to deliuer some from Purgatory and some from hell if they were not there finally by God determined to abyde as they termed the matter to make rayne or faire wether to put away the plague and other sicknesses both from man and beast to halow and preserue them that went to Ierusalem to Rome to S. Iames in Compostella and other places in pilgrimage for a preseruatiue agaynst tempest and thunder agaynst perils and daungers of the Sea for a remedy agaynst moraine of cattell agaynst pensiuenesse of the hart agaynst all maner affliction and tribulations And finally they extoll their Masses far aboue Christes passion promising many thynges thereby which were neuer promised vs by Christes passion As that if a man heare Masse hee shall lacke no bodily sustenaunce that day nor nothyng necessary for him nor shal be letted in his iourney he shall not lose his sight that day nor dye no sodaine death he shall not waxe old in that time that he heareth Masse nor no wicked spirites shall haue power of him be he neuer so wicked a man so long as he looketh vpon the Sacrament All these foolish and deuilish superstitions the Papistes of their owne idle brayne haue deuised of late yeares which deuises were neuer knowen in the old Church And yet they cry out agaynst them that professe the Gospell and say that they dissent from the Church and would haue them to folow the example of their Church And so would they gladly do if the Papistes would folow the first Church of the Apostles which was most pure and incorrupt but the Papistes haue clearely varied frō the vsage and exāples of that Church and haue inuented new deuises of their own braynes and will in no wise cōsent to folow the primitiue Church and yet they would haue other to folow their Church vtterly variyng and dissentyng from the first most godly Church But thankes be to the eternall God the maner of the holy Communion which is now set forth within this Realme is agreable with the institution of Christ with Saint Paule and the old primitiue and Apostolicke Church with the right fayth of the Sacrifice of Christ vpon the Crosse for our redemption and with the true doctrine of our saluation iustification and remission of all our sinnes by that onely sacrifice Now resteth nothyng but that all faithfull subiectes will gladly receiue and embrace the same beyng sory for their former ignoraunce and euery man repentyng him selfe of his offences agaynst God and amendyng the same may yeld him selfe wholly to God to serue and obey him all the dayes of his lyfe and often to come to the holy Supper whiche our Lord and Sauiour Christ hath prepared And as he there corporally eateth the very bread and drinketh the very wine so spiritually he may feede of the very fleshe and bloud of Iesu Christ his Sauiour and redeemer remembryng his death thankyng him for his benefites and lookyng for none other sacrifice at no priestes handes for remission of his sinnes but onely trustyng to his sacrifice which beyng both the high priest and also the Lambe of God prepared from the begynnyng to take away the sinnes of the world offered vp him selfe once for euer in a sacrifice of sweete smell vnto his Father and by the same payd the raunsome for the sinnes of the whole worlde Who is before vs entred into heauen and sitteth at the right hand of his Father as a patron mediatour and intercessour for vs. And there hath prepared places for all them that be lyuely members of his body to reigne with him for euer in the glory of his father to whom with him and the holy Ghost be glory honour and prayse for euer and euer Amen Thus hauing rehearsed the whole wordes of my last booke I shall returne to your issue and make a ioynder or demurre with you therein And if you can not proue your propitiatory Sacrifice of the Priestes by Petrus Lombardus and Nicene Councell then must you confesse by your owne Issue that the Uerdite must iustly passe agaynst you and that you haue a fall in your own suite As for the sacrifice of laudes and thakesgeuyng I haue set it forth playnly in my booke but the sacrifice propitiatory deuised to be made by the priest in the Masse onely is a great abhominatiō before God how glorious soeuer it appeare befor◠men And it is set vp onely by Antichrist and therefore worthy to be abhorred of all that truely professe Christ. And first as concerning Nicene counsell because you begin with that first I will rehearse your wordes Winchester Fyrst to begin with the counsell of Nice the same hath opened the mistery of the sacrament of the body and bloud of Christ in this wise that christen men beleue the Lamb that taketh away the sinnes of the world to be situate vpon Gods woorde and to be sacrificed of the priestes not after the manner of other sacrifices This is the doctrine of the counsell of Nice and must then be called an holy doctrine and thereby a true doctrine consonant to the scriptures the foundation of all trueth If the author will deny this to haue bene the teaching of the counsell of Nice I shal alleadge therefore the allegation of the same by Decolampadius who being an aduersary to the truth was yet by Gods prouidence ordered to beare testimony to the truth in this poynt and by his meane is published to the world in greeke as followeth which neuerthelesse may otherwise appeare to be true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Iterum etiam hic in diuina mensa ne humiliter intenti simus ad propositum pannem poculum sed mente exaltata fide intilligamus situm esse in sacra illa mensa illum Dei agnum qui tollit peccata mundi sacrificatum à sacerdotibus non victimarum more mos preciosum illius corpus sanguinem verè sumentes credere haec esse resurrectionis nostrae Symbola Ideo enim non multum accipimus sed parum vt cognoscamus quoniam non in satietatem sed sanctificationem These wordes may be englished thus Agayne in this godly table we should not in base and low consideration direct our vnderstanding to the bread and cup set forth but hauing our mind exalted we should vnderstand by fayth to be situate in that table the Lamb of God which taketh away the sinnes of the world sacrificed of the priestes not after the maner of other Sacrifices and we receiuing truely the precious body and bloud of the same Lamb to beleue these to be the tokens of our resurrection And for that we receiue not much but a litle because we should know that not for saturity and filling but for sanctification This holy counsel of Niece hath bene beleued vniuersally in declaration of the mistery of the Trinity and the Sacramentes also And to them that confesse that counsell to be holy as the author here doth and
moreouer that Christ him selfe commeth downe vpon the child apparelleth him with his own selfe And as at the Lordes holy Table the Priest distributeth wine bread to feede the body so we must thinke that inwardly by fayth we see Christ feedyng both body and soule to eternall lyfe What comfort can be deuised any more in this world for a Christē man And on the other side what discomfort is in your papisticall doctrine what doubtes what perplexities what absurdities what iniquities what auayleth it vs that there is no bread nor wyne or that Christ is really vnder the formes and figures of bread and wyne and not in vs or if he be in vs yet he is but in the lippes or the stomacke and tarieth not with vs. Or what benefite is it to a wicked man to eate Christ and to receaue death by him that is lyfe From this your obscure perplex vncertaine vncomfortable deuilish and Papisticall doctrine Christ defend all his and graunt that we may come often and worthely to Christes holy Table to comfort our feeble and weake fayth by remembraunce of his death who onely is the satisfaction and propitiation of our sinnes and our meate drinke and foode of euerlastyng lyfe Amen Here endeth the Aunswere of the most Reuerend Father in God Thomas Archbyshop of Canterbury c. vnto the crafty and Sophisticall cauillation of Doct. Steuen Gardiner deuised by him to obscure the true sincere and godly doctrine of the most holy Sacrament of the body and bloud of our Sauiour CHRIST THE Aunswere of Thomas Archebishop of Caunterbury c. agaynst the false calumniations of doctour Richard Smith who hath taken vpon him to confute the defence of the true catholik doctrine of the body and bloud of our Sauiour Christ. I Haue now obtayned gentle reader that thing which I haue much desired which was that if all men would not imbrace the truth lately set forth by me concerning the Sacrament of the body and bloud of our Sauiour Christ at the least some man would vouchsafe to take penne in hand and write against my booke bicause that therby the truth might both better be serched out and also more certaynly knowen to the world And herein I hartely thanke the late Bishop of Winchester and doctor Smith who partely haue satisfied my long desire sauing that I would haue wished aduersaries more substantially learned in holy scriptures more exercised in the olde auncient ecclesiasticall authors and hauing a more godly zeale to the triall out of the truth than are these two both being crafty sophisters the one by art and the other by nature both also being drowned in the dregges of papistry brought vp and confirmed in the same the one by Duns and Dorbell and such like Sophisters the other by the Popish Canon law wherof by his degree taken in the uniuersity he is a professor And as concerning the late bishop of Winchester I will declare his craftye Sophistications in myne aunswere vnto his booke But doctour Smith as it appeareth by the title of his preface hath craftely deuised an easy way to obtayne his purpose that the people being barred from the serching of the truth might be stil kept in blindnes and errour as wel in this as in al other matters wherin they haue bene in times past deceaued He seeth full well that the more diligently matters be serched out and discussed the more clearly the craft and falsehode of the subtill Papistes will appeare And therfore in the preface to the reader he exhorteth all men to leaue disputing and resoning of the fame by learning and to giue firme credite vnto the church as the title of the sayd preface declareth manifestly As who should say the truth of any matter that is in question might be tryed out without debating and reasoning by the word of God wherby as by the true touchstone all mens doctrines are to be tryed and examined But the truth is not ashamed to come to the light and to be tryed to the vttermost For as pure golde the more it is tryed the more pure it apeareth so is all manner of truth Where as on the other side all maskers counterfayters and false deceiuors abhorre the light and refuse the triall If all men without right or reason would geue credite vnto this Papist and his Romish church agaynst the most certayne word of God and the olde holye and Catholicke Churche of Christ the matter should be soone at an end and out of all controuersie But for as muche as the pure word of God and the first church of Christ from the beginning taught the true catholike fayth and Smith with his church of Rome do now teach the cleane contrary the chaffe can not be tryed out from the pure corne that is to say the vntruth discerned from the very truth without threshing windowing and fanning serching debating and reasoning As for me I ground my beleefe vpon gods word wherin can be no errour hauing also the consent of the primatiue church requiring no man to beleue me further then I hane gods word for me But these Papistes speake at their pleasure what they lift and would be beleeued without godes word bicause they beare men in hand that they be the church The church of Christ is not founded vpon it selfe but vppon Christ and his word but the Papistes build their church vpon them selues deuising new articles of the fayth from tyme to tyme without any scripture and founding the same vpon the Pope and his cleargy monkes and fryers and by that meanes they be both the makers and Iudges of their fayth themselues Wherfore this Papist like a politike man doth right wisely prouide for himselfe and his church in the first entry of his booke that all men should leaue searching for the truth and sticke hard and fast to the church meaning himselfe and the church of Rome For from the true catholike church the Romish church which he accomteth catholike hath varied and dissented many yeares passed as the blindest that this day do liue may well see and perceaue if they will not purposely winke and shut vp their eyes This I haue written to answere the title of his preface NOw in the beginning of the very preface it selfe when this great doctor should recite the wordes of Ephesine counsell he translateth them so vnlearnedly that if a young boy that had gone to the grammer schole but thre yeres had done no better he should scant haue escaped some scholemasters handes with sixierkes And beside that he doth it so craftily to serue his purpose that he cannot be excused of wilfull deprauation of the wordes calling celebration an offering and referring the participle made to Christ which should be referred to the word partakers and leauing out those wordes that should declare that the sayd counsell spake of no propiciatory sacrifice in the Masse but of a sacrifice of laud and thankes which christen people geue vnto God
at the holy communion by remembrance of the death resurrection and ascention of his sonne Iesu Christ and by confessing and setting forth of the same Heare by the vngodly handeling of this godly councell at his first beginning it may appeare to euery man how sincerely this Papist entendeth to proceede in the rest of this matter And with like sinceritie he vntruly belieth the sayd counsell saying that it doth playnly set forth the holy sacrifice of the Masse wich doth not so much as once name the Masse but speaketh of the sacrifice of the church which the sayd councell declareth to be the profession of christen people in setting forth the benefite of Christ who onely made the true sacrifice pro piciatory for remission of sinne And whosoeuer else taketh vpon him to make any such sacrifice maketh himselfe Antichrist And than he belyeth me in two thinges as he vseth commonly throughout his whole booke The one is that I deny the sacrifice of the Masse which in my booke haue most playnly set out the sacrifice of christen people in the holy communion or masse if D. Smith will needes so terme it and yet I haue denyed that it is a sacrifice propitiatory for sinne or that the priest alone maketh any sacrifice there For it is the sacrifice of all christen people to remember Christes death to laude and thanke him for it and to publish it and shew it abroad vnto other to his honor and glory The controuersy is not whether in the holy communion be made a sacrifice or not for herein both D. Smith and I agree with the foresayd councell at Ephesus but whether it be a propitiatory sacrifice or not and whether onely the priest make the sayd sacrifice these be the poyntes wherin we vary And I say so far as the councell sayth that there is a sacrifice but that the same is propitiatory for remission of sinne or that the priest alone doth offer it neyther I nor the counsell do so say but D. Smith hath added that of his owne vayne head The other thing wherin D. Smith belyeth me is this He sayth that I deny that we receaue in the sacrament that flesh which is adioyned to Gods owne sonne I meruaile not a little what eyes Doctor Smith had when he red ouer my booke It is like that he hath some priuy spectacles within his head wherwith when soeuer he loketh he seeth but what he list For in my booke I haue written in moe then an hundred places that we receaue the selfe same body of Christ that was borne of the virgine Mary that was crucified and buried that rose agayne ascended into heauen and sitteth at the right hand of God the father almighty And the contention is onely in the manner and forme how we receaue it For I say as all the olde holy Fathers and Martirs vsed to say that we receaue Christ spiritually by fayth with our myndes eating his flesh and drincking his bloud so that we receaue Christes owne very naturall body but not naturally nor corporally But this lying papist sayth that we eate his naturall body corporally with our mouthes which neyther the counsell Ephesine nor any other auncient councell or doctor euer sayd or thought And the controuersy in the councell Ephesine was not of the vniting of Christes flesh to the formes of bread and wine in the sacrament but of the vniting of his flesh to his diuinity at his incarnation in vnity of person Which thing Nestorius the heretike denyed confessing that Christ was a godly man as other were but not that he was very God in nature which heresy that holy counsell confuting affirmeth that the flesh of Christ was so ioyned in person to the dyuine nature that it was made the proper flesh of the sonne of God and flesh that gaue life but that the sayd flesh was present in the sacramēt corporally and eaten with our mouthes no mention is made therof in that councell And here I require D. Smith as proctor for the Papists eyther to bring forth some auncient councell or doctor that sayth as he sayth that Christs own naturall body is eaten corporally with our mouthes vnderstanding the very body in deed and not the signes of the body as Chrisostome doth or els let him confesse that my saying is true and recant his false doctrine the third tyme as he hath done twise already THan forth goeth this Papist with his preface and sayth that these wordes This is my body that shall be giuen to death for you no man can truely vnderstand of bread And his profe therof is this bicause that bread was not crucified for vs. First here he maketh a lye of Christ. For Christ said not as this papist alleadgeth This is my body which shal be giuen to death for you but onely he sayth This is my body which is giuen for you which wordes some vnderstand not of the giuing of the body of Christ to death but of the breaking and giuing of bread to his apostles as S. Paule sayd The bread which we breake c. But let it be that he spake of the geuing of his body to death and said of the bread This is my body which shal be geuen to death for you by what reason can you gather hereof that the bread was crucified for vs If I looke vpon the image of kinge Dauid and say This is he that killed Goliath doth this speach mean that the image of King Dauid killed Goliath Or if I hold in my hand my booke of S. Iohns gospell and say This is the gospell that S. Iohn wrote at Pathmos which fashion of speach is commonly vsed doth it folow hereof that my booke was written at Pathmos Or that S. Iohn wrote my booke which was but newly printed at Paris by Robert Stephanus Or if I say of my booke of S. Paules epistles This is Paule that was the great persecuter of Christ Doth this manner of speach signify that my booke doth persecute Christ Or if I shew a booke of the new testament saying This is the new testament which brought life vnto the world by what forme of argument can you induce hereof that my booke that I bought but yesterday brought life vnto the world No man that vseth thus to speake doth meane of the bookes but of the very thinges themselues that in the bookes be taught and contayned And after the same wise if Christ called bread his body saying This is my body which shall be giuen to death for you yet he ment not that the bread should be giuen to death for vs but his body which by the bread was signified If this excellent clarke and doctor vnderstand not these maner of speaches that be so playne then hath he doth lost his sences and forgotten his gramer which teacheth to referre the relatiue to the next antecedent But of these figuratiue speaches I haue spokē at large in my third booke First in the
viii chap. prouing by authority of the oldest authors in Christs church that he called bread his body and wine his bloud And agayne in the ix x. xi and xii chapters I haue so fully intreated of such figuratiue speaches that it should be but a superfluous labour here to speake of any more but I referre the reader to those places And if M. doctor require a further answere herein let him looke vpon the late bishop of Winchesters booke called the detection of the diuels sophistry where he writeth plainly that when Christ spake these wordes This is my body he made demonstration of the bread THan further in this prologue this Papist is not ashamed to say that I set the cart before the horses putting reason first and fayth after which lye is so manifest that it needeth no further proofe but onely to looke vpon my booke wherein it shall euidently appeare that in all my fiue bookes I ground my foūdation vpon gods word And least the Papistes should say that I make the expositions of the scripture my selfe as they commonly vse to do I haue fortified my foundation by the authority of all the best learned and most holy authors and martyrs that were in the beginning of the church and many yeares after vntill the Antichrist of Rome rose vp and corrupted altogither And as for naturall reason I make no mention therof in all my v. bookes but in one place onely which is in my second booke speaking of Transubstantiation And in that place I set not reason before fayth but as an handmayden haue appoynted her to do seruice vnto fayth and to wayte vpon her And in that place she hath done such seruice that D. Smith durst not once looke her in the face nor find any fault with her seruice but hath flylye and craftely stolen away by her as though he saw her not But in his owne booke he hath so impudently set the cart before the horses in Christes owne wordes putting the wordes behind that goe before the wordes before that goe behind that except a shameles Papist no man durst be so bolde to attempt any such thing of his owne head For where the Euangelist and S. Paule rehearse Christes wordes thus Take eate this is my body he in the confutation of my second booke turneth the order vpside downe and sayth This is my body take eate After this in his Preface hee rehearseth a great number of the wonderfull workes of God as that God made all the world of nought that he made Adam of the earth and Eue of his side the bush to flame with fire and burne not and many other like which be most manifestly expressed in holy scripture And vpon these he concludeth most vainly and vntruly that thing which in the scripture is neyther expressed nor vnderstanded that Christ is corporally in heauen and in earth and in euery place where the sacrament is And yet D. Smith sayth that Gods word doth teach this as playnly as the other vsing herein such a kind of sophisticall argumēt as all Logitiās do reprehend which is called petitio principij whē a mā taketh that thing for a supposition and an approued truth which is in controuersy And so doth he in this place when he sayth Doth not Gods word teach it thee as playnly as the other Here by this interrogatory he required that thing to be graunted him as a truth which he ought to proue and whereupon dependeth the whole matter that is in questiō that is to say whether it be as playnly set out in the scripture that Christes body is corporally in euery place where the sacrament is as that God created all thinges of nothing Adam of the earth and Eue of Adams side c. This is it that I deny and that he should proue But he taketh it for a supposition saying by interrogation doth not the word of God teach this as playnly as the other Which I affirme to be vtterly false as I haue shewed in my third boobe the xi and twelfe chap. where I haue most manifestly proued as well by Gods word as by aūcient authors that these wordes of Christ This is my body and This is my bloud be no playne speaches but figuratiue THen forth goeth this papist vnto the vi chap. of S. Thou saying Christ promised his disciples to geue them such bread as should be his owne very naturall flesh which he would geue to death for the life of the world Can this his promise sayth M. Smith be verified of common bread Was that giuen vpon the crosse for the life of the world Wherto I answer by his owne reason Can this his promise be verified of sacramentall bread was that geuen vpon the crosse for the life of the world I meruayle here not a little of M. Smithes eyther dulnes or maliciousnes that cannot or will not see that Christ in this chap. of S. Ihon spake not of Sacramentall bread but of heauenly bread nor of his flesh onely but also of his bloud and of his godhead calling them heauenly bread that giueth euerlasting life So that he spake of him selfe wholy saying I am the bread of life He that cōmeth to me shall not hunger and he that beleueth in me shall not thirst for euer And neyther spake he of common bread nor yet of sacramentall bread For neyther of them was giuen vpon the crosse for the life of the world And there can be nothing more manifest then that in this vi chap. of Ihon Christ spake not of the sacrament of his flesh but of his very flesh And that aswell for that the sacrament was not then instituted as also that Christ sayd not in the future tense the bread which I will giue shal be my flesh but in the present tense the bread which I will geue is my flesh which sacramentall bread was neyther then his flesh nor was then instituted for a Sacrament nor was after giuen to death for the life of the world But as Christ when he sayd vnto the woman of Samaria The water which I will geue shall spring into euerlasting life he ment neyther of materiall water nor of the accidents of water but of the holy ghost which is the heauenly fountayne that springeth vnto eternall life so likewise when he sayd The bread which I will geue is my flesh which I will geue for the life of the world he ment neyther of the materiall bread neither of the accidents of bread but of his owne flesh Which although of it selfe it auayleth nothing yet being in vnity of persō ioyned vnto his diuinity it is the same heauenly bread that he gaue to death vpon the crosse for the life of the world But here M. Smith asketh a question of the tyme saying thus When gaue Christ that bread which was his very flesh that he gaue for vs to death if he did it not at his last supper when he sayd This is my
body that shal be giuen for you I answer according to Cirils mynd vpon the same place that Christ alone suffered for vs all and by his woundes were we healed he bearing our sinnes in his body vpon a tree and being crucified for vs that by his death we might liue But what need I M. Smith to labor in answering to your question of the tyme when your question in it selfe contayneth the aunswere appoynteth the tyme of Christ giuing himselfe for the life of the world when you say that he gaue himselfe for vs to death which as you confes skant three lines before was not at his supper but vpon the crosse And if you will haue none other giuing of Christ for vs but at his supper as your reason pretendeth or els it is vtterly naught then surely Christ is much bound vnto you that haue deliuered him from all his mocking whipping scourging crucifying and all other paynes of death which he suffered for vs vpon the crosse and bring to passe that he was giuen onely at his supper without bloud or payne for the life of the world But then is all the world litle beholding vnto you that by deliuering of Christ from death will suffer all the world to remayne in death which can haue no life but by his death AFter the gospell of S. Ihon M. Smith aleadgeth for his purpose S. Paule to the corinthians who biddeth euery man to examine him selfe before he receaue this sacrament for he that eateth and drinketh it vnworthely is gilty of the body and bloud of Christ eating and drinking his owne damnation bicause he discerneth not our lordes body Here by the way it is to be noted that D. Smith in reciting the words of S. Paule doth alter them purposely commonly putting this word sacrament in the steede of these wordes bread and wine which wordes he semeth so much to abhorre as if they were toades or serpents bicause they make agaynst his Transubstantiation where as S. Paule euer vseth those wordes and neuer nameth this word Sacrament But to the matter What need we to examine our selues sayth D. Smith when we shall eate but common bread and drincke wine of the grape Is a man gilty of the body and bloud of Christ which eateth and drinketh nothing els but onely bare bread made of corne and meare wine of the grape Who sayth so good syr Do I say in my booke that those which come to the Lordes table do eate nothing els but bare bread made of corne nor drinke nothing but meare wine made of grapes How often do I teach and repeate agayne and agayne that as corporally with our mouthes we eate and drincke the sacramentall bread and wine so spiritually with our hartes by fayth do we eate Christes very flesh and drincke his very bloud and do both feed and liue spiritually by him although corporally he be absent from vs and sitteth in heauē at his fathers right hand And as in baptisme we come not vnto the water as we come to other common waters when we washe our handes or bath our bodies but we know that it is a misticall water admonishing vs of the great and manifold mercies of God towards vs of the league and promise made betwene him and vs and of his wonderfull working and operation in vs. Wherfore we come to that water with such feare reuerence and humility as we would come to the presence of the father the sonne and the holy ghost and of Iesus Christ himselfe both God and man although he be not corporally in the water but in heauen aboue And who soeuer cōmeth to that water beyng of the age of discretiō must examine himselfe duely least if hee come vnworthely none otherwise then hee would come vnto other commō waters he be not renewed in Christ but in steede of saluation receaue his damnation Euen so it is of the bread and wine in the Lordes holy supper Wherfore euery man as S. Paule sayth must examine himselfe when he shall aproche to that holy table and not come to gods borde as he would do to common feastes and bankets but must consider that it is a misticall table where the bread is misticall and the wine also misticall wherin we be taught that we spiritually feed vpon Christ eating him and drincking him and as it were sucking out of his side the bloud of our redemption foode of eternall saluation although he be in heauen at his fathers right hand And whosoeuer cōmeth vnto this heauenly table not hauing regarde to Christes flesh bloud who should be there our spirituall foode but commeth therto without fayth feare humility reuerence as it were but to carnall feeding he doth not there feed vpon Christ but the deuill doth feede vpon him and deuoureth him as he did Iudas And now may euery man perceaue how fondly and falsly M. Smith concludeth of these wordes of S. Paule that our Sauiour Christes body and bloud is really and corporally in the sacrament AFter this he falleth to rayling lying and sclaundering of M. Peter Martir a man of that excellent learning and godly liuing that hee passeth D. Smith as farre as the sunne in his cleare light passeth the moone being in the Eclipse Peter Martyr sayth he at his first coming to Oxford when he was but a Lutherian in this matter taught as D. Smith now doth But when he came once to the Court saw that doctrine misliked them that might do him hurt in his liuing he anone after turned his tippet and sang an other song Of M. Peter Martyr his opinion and iudgement in this matter no man can better testify than I. For as much as hee lodged within my house long before he came to Oxford and I had with him many conferences in that matter and know that he was then of the same mynd that he is now and as hee defended after openly in Oxford and hath written in his booke And if D. Smith vnderstode him otherwise in his Lectures at the beginning it was for lacke of knowledge for that then D. Smith vnderstoode not the matter nor yet doth not as it appeareth by this folish and vnlearned booke which he hath now set out No more than he vnderstood my booke of the Cathechisme and therfore reporteth vntruly of me that I in that booke did set forth the reall presence of Christes body in the sacrament Unto which false report I haue aunswered in my fourth booke the eight chapiter But this I confesse of my selfe that not long before I wrot the sayd Cathechisme I was in that error of the real presence as I was many yeares past in diuers other errors as of Transubstantiation of the sacrifice propitiatory of the priestes in the Masse of pilgrimages purgatory pardons and many other superstitions and errors that came from Rome being brought vp from youth in them and nouseled therin for lacke of good instruction from my youth the outragious fluds of Papisticall errors at
corporal manducation of his most holy flesh and drincking of his most precious bloud which he gaue in his supper vnder the formes of bread and wine Caunterbury THis is the third euident and manifest vntruth whereof you note me And because you say that in citing of S. Augustin in this place I handle not the matter so sincerely as it requireth let here be an issue between you and me which of vs both doth hādle this matter more sincerely and I will bring such manifest euidence for me that you shall not be able to open your mouth against it For I alledge S. Augustine iustly as he speaketh adding nothing of my selfe The wordes in my booke be these Of these wordes of Christ it is plain and manifest that the eating of Christs body and drincking of his bloud is not like to the eating and drinking of other meates and drinkes For although without meat and drinke man cannot liue yet it followeth not that he that eateth and drinketh shall liue for euer But as touching this meate and drinke of the body and bloud of Christ it is true both he that eateth and drinketh them hath euerlasting life And also he that eateth and drinketh them not hath not euerlasting life For to eate that meate and drinke that drink is to dwell in Christ and to haue Christ dwelling in him and therfore no man can say or think that he eateth the body of Christ or drinketh his bloud except he dwelleth in Christ and haue Christ dwelling in him Thus haue you heard of the eating and drinking of the very fleshe and bloud of our Sauiour Christ. Thus alleadge I S. Augustin truely without adding any thing of mine own head or taking any thing away And what sleight I vsed is easy to iudge for I cite directly the places that euery man may see whether I say true or noe And if it be not true quarrell not with me but with S. Augustine whose wordes I onely rehearse And that which S. Augustine sayeth spake before him S. Ciprian and Christ himselfe also plainlye inough vpon whose wordes I thought I might be as bold to build a true doctrine for the setting forth of Gods glory as you may be to peruert both the words of Ciprian and of Christ him selfe to stablish a false doctrine to the high dishonor of God and the corruption of his most true word For you adde this word worthely wherby you gather such an vnworthy meaning of S. Augustines wordes as you list your self And the same you doe to the very words of Christ him selfe who speaketh absolutely and plainly without adding of any such word as you put thereto What sophistry this is you know well inough Now if this be permitted vnto you to adde what you list and to expound how you list then you may say what you list without controlment of any man which it seemeth you looke for And not of like sort but of like euilnes doe you handle in reprehending of my seconde vntruth as you call it an other place of S. Augustine in his booke de doctrina Christiana where he sayth that the eating and drinkinge of Christes flesh and bloud is a figuratiue speach which place you expound so farre from S. Augustines meaning that who soeuer looketh vpon his wordes may by and by discern that you do not or wil not vnderstand him But it is most like the words of him being so plain and easy that purposely you will not vnderstand him nor nothing els that is against your will rather then you will goe from any part of your will and receaued opinion For it is plain and cleare that S. Augustine in that place speaketh not one worde of the separation of the two natures in Christ and although Christs flesh be neuer so surely and inseparably vnited vnto his Godhead without which vnion it could profite nothing yet being so ioyned it is a very mans flesh the eating wherof after the proper speech of eating is horrible and abominable Wherfore the eating of Christes flesh must needes be otherwise vnderstanded then after the proper and common eatinge of other meates with the mouth which eating after such sort could auayle nothing And therefore S. Augustine in that place declareth the eating of Christes fleshe to be onely a figuratiue speach And he openeth the figure so as the eatinge must be ment with the minde not with the mouth that is to say by chawing and digesting in our mindes to our great consolation and profite that Christ dyed for vs. Thus doth S. Augustine open the figure and meaning of Christ when he spake of the eating of his flesh and drinking of his bloud And his flesh being thus eaten it must also be ioyned vnto his diuinitie or els it could not geue euerlasting life as Cyrill and the councell Ephesin truly decreed But S. Augustine declared the figuratiue speech of Christ to be in the eating not in the vnion And where as to shift of the playn words of Christ spoken in the sixt of Iohn he that eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud dwelleth in me and I in him you say that dwelling in Christ is not the manducation You say herein directly against S. Cyprian who saith quod mansio nostra in ipso sit manducatio that our dwelling in him is the eating And also against S. Augustine whose wordes be these Hoc est ergo manducare escam illam illum bibere potum in Christo manere illum manentem in se habere This is to eat that meat and drinke that drinke to dwell in Christ to haue Christ dwelling in him And although the eating and drinking of Christ be here defined by the effect for the very eating is the beleeuing yet where so euer the eating is the effect must be also if the definition of S. Augustine be truely geuen And therfore although good bad eate carnally with their teeth bread being the Sacrament of Christes body yet no man eateth his very flesh which is spiritually eaten but he that dwelleth in Christ and Christ in him And where in the end you referre the Reader to the declaration of Christes wordes it is an euill sequele you declare Christes wordes thus Ergo they be so ment For by like reason might Nestorius haue preuayled against Cyrill Arrius agaynst Alexander and the Pope against Christ. For they al proue their errors by the doctrine of Christ after their own declarations as you doe here in your corporall manducation But of the manducation of Christs flesh I haue spoken more fully in my fourth booke the second third and fourth chapters Now before I answere to the fourth vntruth which I am appeached of I will reherse what I haue said in the matter and what fault you haue found my booke hath thus Now as touching the Sacramentes of the same our Sauiour Christ did institute them in bread wine at his last Supper which
he is maried and ioyned in his proper kynd and in his wordes and sacramentes as it were sensibly geuen But how so euer I report Origene you captiously and very vntruely do report me For wheras I say that in Gods word and in the sacramēts of baptisme and of the Lordes supper Christ is manifested and exhibited vnto vs as it were face to face and sensibly you leauing out these wordes as it were make a quarell to this word sensibly or rather you make that word sensibly the foundation of all your weake building as though there were no difference betwene sensibly and as it were sensibly and as it were all one thing a man to lye sleaping and as he were sleaping or deade and as he were dead Do not I write thus in my first booke that the washing in the water of baptisme is as it were a shewing of Christ before our eyes and a sensible touching feeling and groping of him And do these wordes import that we see him grope him indede And further I say that the eating and drinking of the sacramentall bread and wine is as it were a shewing of Christ before our eyes a smelling of him with our noses and a feeling groping of him with our handes And doe we therfore see him indede with our corporall eyes smell him with our noses and put our handes in his side and fele his woundes If it were so indede I would not adde these wordes as it were For what speach were this of a thing that is in dede to say as it were For these wordes as it were signifie that it is not so indede So now likewise in this place of Origene where it is sayd that Christ in his wordes and sacramentes is manifested and exhibited vnto vs as it were face to face and sensibly it is not ment that Christ is so exhibited in dede face to face and sensibly but the sence is cleane contrary that he is not there geuen sensibly nor face to face Thus it apeareth how vprightly you handell this matter and how truely you reporte my wordes But the further you proceade in your aunswer the more you shew crafty iuggeling legier de mayne passe a gods name to blynd mens eyes strange speaches new inuentions not without much impietie as the wordes sound but what the meaning is no man can tell but the maker him selfe But as the words be placed it seemeth you meane that in the Lordes supper we be not made by Christes spirite participant of the benefyt of his passion nor by baptisme or Gods word we be not made participant of his godhead by his humanite and furthermore by this distinction which you fayne without any ground of Origene we receaue not man and God in baptisme nor in the Lordes supper we be not by meanes of his godhead made participant of the effect of his passion In baptisme also by your distinction we receaue not a pledge of the regeneration of our flesh but in the Lordes supper nor Christ is not truely present in baptisme Which your sayd differences do not onely derogate and diminish the effect and dignitie of Christes sacraments but be also blasphemous agaynst the ineffable vnite of Christes person separating his diuinitie from his humanitie Here may all men of iudgement see by experience how diuinity is handled when it cometh to the discussion of ignoraunt lawyers And in all these your sayinges if you meane as the wordes be I make an yssue with you for the price of a fagot And where you say that our flesh in the generall resurrection shal be spirituall here I offer a like yssue except you vnderstand a spirituall body to be a sensible and palpable body that hath all perfect members distinct which thing in sundrie places of your booke you seeme vtterly to deny And where you make this difference betwene baptisme and this sacrament that in baptisme Christ is not really present expounding Really present to signifie no more but to be indede present yet after a spirituall manner if you deny that presence to be in baptisme yet the third fagot I will aduenture with you for your strange and vngodly doctrine within xx lines togither who may in equalitie of errour contend with the Ualentines Arrians or Anabaptistes But when you come here to your lies declaring the wordes sensibly really substancially corporally and naturally you speake so fondly vnlearnedly and ignorantly as they that know you not might thinke that you vnderstood neither grammer english nor reason For who is so ignoraunt but he knoweth that aduerbes that ende in ly be aduerbes of quallity and being added to the verbe they expresse the manner forme and fashion how a thing is and not the substance of it As speaking wisely learnedly and playnly is to speake after such a forme and manner as wise men learned and playn men do speake And to do wisely and godly is to do in such sort and fashion as wise and godly men do And sometyme the aduerbe ly signifieth the maner of a thing that is indede and sometyme the maner of a thing that is not As when a man speaketh wisely that is wise indede And yet somtyme we say fooles speake wisely which although they be not wise yet they vtter some speaches in such sorte as though they were wise The King we say vseth him selfe princely in all his doinges who is a prince in dede but we say also of an arrogant wilfull and proude man that he vseth him selfe princely and Imperiousely although he be neither Prince nor Emperoure and yet we vse so to speake of him bicause of the maner forme and fashion of vsing him selfe And if you aunswer foolishly and vnlearnedly be you therfore a foole and vnlearned Nay but then your aūswers be made in such wise maner sort and fashion as you were neither learned nor wise Or if you send to Rome or receaue priuate letters from thence be you therfore a Papist God is iudge therof but yet do you Popishly that is to say vse such maner and fashion as the Papistes do But where the forme and maner lacketh there the aduerbes of qualitie in ly haue no place although the thing be there indede As when a wise man speaketh not in such a sorte in such a fashion and wise as a wise man should speake not withstanding that he is wise in dede yet we say not that he speaketh wisely but foolishly And the godly King Dauid did vngodly when he took Bersabe and slew Urye her husband bicause that maner of doing was not godly So do all English men vnderstand by these wordes sensibly substancially corporally naturally carnally spiritually and such like the maner and forme of being and not the thing it selfe without the sayde formes and maners For when Christ was borne and rose from death and wrought miracles we say not that he did these thinges naturally bicause the meane maner was not after a naturall sort
although it was the selfe same Christ in nature But we say that he did eat drinke sleepe labour and sweat talke and speake naturally not bicause onely of his nature but bicause the maner and fashion of doing was such as we vse to do Likewise when Iesus passed through the people and they saw him not he was not then sensibly and visibly among them their eyes being letted in such sort that they could not see and perceaue him And so in all the rest of your aduerbes the speach admitteth not to say that Christ is there substancially corporally carnally and sensibly where he is not after a substanciall corporall carnall and sensuall forme and maner This the husband man at his plough and his wife at her rock is able to iudge and to condemne you in this poynt and so can the boyes in the gramer schole that you speake neither according to the english tonge grammer nor reason when you say that these wordes and aduerbes sensibly corporally and naturally do not signifie a corporall sensible and naturall maner I haue bene here somewhat long and tedious but the reader must pardon me for this subtill and euill deuise of your owne brayne without ground or authoritie contayneth such absurdities and may cast such mistes before mens eies to blind them that they should not see that I am constrayned to speake thus much in this matter and yet more shall do if this suffice not But this one thing I wonder much at that you being so much vsed and accustomed to lye do not yet know what lye meaneth But at length in this mater when you see none other shift you be faine to flye to the church for your shotte anker And yet it is but the Romish church For the olde first Church of Christ is cleerely agaynst you And Origen sayth not as you do that to vnderstand the sayd wordes of Christ spiritually is to vnderstand them as the spirite of God hath taught the church but to vnderstand them spiritually is to vnderstand them otherwise then the wordes sound for he that vnderstādeth them after the letter sayth Origen vnderstandeth them carnally and that vnderstanding hurteth and destroyeth For in playne vnderstanding of eating and drinking without trope or figure Christes flesh cannot be eaten nor his bloud dronken Next followeth in order S. Cyprian of whom I write thus And likewise ment Ciprian in those places which the aduersaries of the truth allege of him concerning the true eating of Christes very flesh and drinking of his bloud For Ciprian spake of no grose and carnall eating with the mouth but of an inward spirituall and pure eating with hart and mind which is to beleue in our hartes that his flesh was rent and torne for vs vpon the crosse and his bloud shed for our redemption and that the same flesh and bloud now sitteth at the right hand of the father making continuall intercession for vs and to imprint and digest this in our mindes putting our whole affiance and trust in him as touching our saluation and offering our selues clearly vnto him to loue and serue him all the dayes of our life This is truely sincerely and spiritually to eat his flesh and to drincke his bloud And this sacrifice of Christ vpon the crosse was that oblatiō which Cipriā sayth was figured and signified before it was done by the wine which Noe dranke and by the bread and wine which Melchisedech gaue to Abraham and by many other figures which S. Cyprian there reherseth And now when Christ is come and hath accomplished that sacrifice the same is figured signified and represēted vnto vs by that bread and wine which faythfull people receaue dayly in the holy communion Wherin like as with their mouthes carnally they eate the breade and drincke the wine so by their fayth spiritually they eate Christes very flesh and drincke his very bloud And hereby it apeareth that S. Ciprian clearly affirmeth the most true doctrine and is wholy vpon our side And agaynst the papistes he teacheth most playnly that the Communion ought to be receaued of all men vnder both kindes and that Christ called bread his body and wine his bloud and that there is not transubstantiation but that bread remayneth there as a figure to represent Christes body and wine to represent his bloud and that those which be not the liuely members of Christ do eat the bread and drincke the wine and be not nourished by them but the very flesh and bloud of Christ they neither eate nor drincke Thus haue you declared the mynd of S. Cyprian Winchester As touching Ciprian this author maketh an exposition of his owne deuise which he would haue taken for an answer vnto him Where as Ciprian of all other like as he is auncient within 250. yeares of Christ so did he write very openly in the matter and therfore Melancthon in his epistle to Decolampadius did chuse him for one whose words in the affirmation of Christes true presence in the sacrament had no ambiguitie And like iudgement doth Hippinus in his book before alleaged geue of Cyprianus faith in the sacrament which two I allege to counteruayle the iudgement of this author who speaketh of his owne head as it liketh him playing with the words grosse and carnall and vsing the word represent as though it expressed a figure only Hippinus in the sayd booke alleadgeth Cyprian to say Lib 3. ad Quirinum that the body of our Lord is our sacrifice in flesh meaning as Hipinus sayth Eucharistiam wherin S Augustin as Hippinus saith further in the praier for his mother speaking of the bread and wine of Eucharistia sayth that in it is dispensed the holy host and sacrifice whereby was cancelled the byl obligatory that was agaynst vs. And further Hippinus sayth that the olde men called the bread and wine of our Lordes supper a sacrifice an host and oblation for that specially because they beleued taught the true body of Christ and his true bloud to be destribute in the bread and wine of Eucharistia and as S. Augustin sayth ad Ianuarium to enter in be receiued with the mouth of them that eat These be Hippinus very words who because he is I thinke in this authors opinion taken for no Papist I rather speake in his words then in myne owne whom in an other part of this worke this author doth as it were for charity by name sclaunder to be a Papist Wherfore the sayd Hippinus wordes shal be as I thinke more weighty to oppresse this authors talke then mine be and therfore howsoeuer this author handleth before the wordes of S. Cyprian De vnctione chrismatis and the word shewing out of his epistles yet the same Cyprians fayth appeareth so certayne otherwise as those places shall need no further aunswere of me here hauing brought forth the iudgement of Hippinus Melancton how they vnderstand S. Cyprians fayth which thou reader oughtest to regard