undertaken to Anathematize all those who will not own her Authority and receive her Errors tho never so gross as Articles of Faith We are so fully convinced of the unreasonableness of her Pretences and of our own Liberty that we shall hardly be brought to submit our selves to the Conduct of such a blind Guide lest we sall into the same Ditch into which she her self is tumbled And it would certainly much better become our Author and his Brethren to consider how they can justify their Disobedience to their own Mother than to endeavour at this rate to lead us into the same Apostacy both to our Religion and our Church with them The Conclusion AND thus by the Blessing of God and the Advantage of a good Cause have I very briefly passed through this Author's Reflections and I am perswaded sufficiently shewn the weakness and falsity of the most of them If any one shall think that I ought to have insisted more largely upon some Points he may please to know that since by the importunate Provocations of those of the other Communion we have been forced too often to interrupt those Duties of our Ministry in which we could rather have wish'd to have employ'd our Time for these kind of Controversies which serve so very little to any purposes either of true Piety or true Charity among us We have resolved thus far at least to gratify both our selves and others as to make our Disputes as short as is possible and loose no more time in them than the necessary Defence of our selves and the Truth do require I have indeed pass'd by much of our Author's Discourses because they are almost intirely made up of tedious and endless Repetitions of the same things and very often in the same words But for any thing that is Argumentative or otherwise material to the main Cause I do not know that I have either let the Observation of it slip or dissembled at all the Force of it It was once in my thoughts to have made some Reflections in the Close upon the Changes of their Rituals in requital for our Author's Observations on the Alterations of our Liturgie but I have insisted longer than I designed already and shall therefore content my my self to have given the Hint of what might have been done and shall still be done if our Author or any in his behalf desire it of me In the mean time I cannot but observe the unreasonableness of that Method which is here taken from the Expressions of some of our Divines and the Concessions of others whose profess'd Business it was to reconcile if possible all Parties and therefore were forced sometimes to condescend more than was fit for the doing it and even these too miserably mangled and misrepresented to pretend to prove the Doctrine of our Church contrary to the express Declarations of the Publick Acts and Records of it This has been the endeavour of several of our late Writers but of this Discourser above any Had those worthy Persons whose Memory they thus abuse been yet living they might have had an ample Confutation from their own Pens as in the very Instance before us has been given them for the like ill use made by some among them of the pious Meditations of a most Excellent and Learned Father of our Church and who might otherwise in the next Age have been improved into a new Witness against us I do not think that Bp Taylour ever thought he should have been set up as a favourer of Popery who had written so expresly and warmly against it Yet I cannot but observe a kind of Prophetick Expression in his Book of the Real Presence which being so often quoted by these Men I somewhat wonder it should have slipp'd their Remark Where speaking of their Shifts to make any One they please of their side Real Presence §. xii n. 28. pag. 261. he has these words And I know no reason says he but it may be possible but a WITTY MAN may pretend when I am dead that in this Discourse I have pleaded for the Doctrine of the Roman Church We have now lived to see some of those WITTY MEN that have done but little less than this tho how Honest they are in the mean time I will not determine But I hope this Design too shall be from henceforth in good measure frustrated And therefore since neither their New Religion nor their New Advocates will do their Business since it is in vain that they either misrepresent their own Doctrine or our Authors in favour of it may they once please either honestly to avow and defend their Faith or honestly to confess that they cannot do it Such shuffling as this do's but more convince us of the weakness of their Cause and instead of defending their Religion by these Practices they only encrease in us our ill Opinion of that and lessen that good One which we willingly would but shall not always be able to conserve of those who by such indirect means as these endeavour to support it FINIS Books lately printed for Richard Chiswell A Dissertation concerning the Government of the Ancient Church more particularly of the Encroachments of the Bishops of Rome upon other Sees By WILLIAM CAVE D. D. Octavo An Answer to Mr. Serjeant's Sure Footing in Christianity concerning the Rule of Faith With some other Discourses By WILLIAM FALKNER D.D. 4o A Vindication of the Ordinations of the Church of England in Answer to a Paper written by one of the Church of Rome to prove the Nullity of our Orders By GILBERT BVRNET D. D. Octavo An Abridgment of the History of the Reformation of the Church of England By GILB BVRNET D. D. Octavo The APOLOGY of the Church of England and an Epistle to one Signior Scipio a Venetian Gentleman concerning the Council of Trent Written both in Latin by the Right Reverend Father in God JOHN JEWEL Lord Bishop of Salisbury Made English by a Person of Quality To which is added The Life of the said Bishop Collected and written by the same Hand Octavo The Life of WILLIAM BEDEL D. D. Bishop of â—ilmore in Ireland Together with Certain Letters which passed betwixt him and James Waddesworth a late Pensioner of the Holy Inquisition of Sevil in Matter of Religion concerning the General Motives to the Roman Obedience Octavo The Decree made at ROME the Second of March 1679. condemning some Opinions of the Jesuits and other Casuists Quarto A Discourse concerning the Necessity of Reformation with respect to the Errors and Corruptions of the Church of Rome Quarto First and Second Parts A Discourse concerning the Celebration of Divine Service in an Unknown Tongue Quarto A Papist not Misrepresented by Protestants Being a Reply to the Reflections upon the Answer to A Papist Misrepresented and Represented Quarto An Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England in the several Articles proposed by the late BISHOP of CONDOM in his Exposition of the Doctrine of the Catholick Church Quarto A Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the Exceptions of Monsieur de Meaux late Bishop of Condom and his Vindicator 4o A CATECHISM explaining the Doctrine and Practices of the Church of Rome With an Answer thereunto By a Protestant of the Church of England 8o A Papist Represented and not Misrepresented being an Answer to the First Second Fifth and Sixth Sheets of the Second Part of the Papist Misrepresented and Represented and for a further Vindication of the CATECHISM truly representing the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome Quarto The Lay-Christian's Obligation to read the Holy Scriptures Quarto The Plain Man's Reply to the Catholick Missionaries 24o An Answer to THREE PAPERS lately printed concerning the Authority of the Catholick Church in Matters of Faith and the Reformation of the Church of England Quarto A Vindication of the Answer to THREE PAPERS concerning the Unity and Authority of the Catholick Church and the Reformation of the Church of England Quarto
into Christ's Body than for Christ's Body to be changed into Bread a Vine a Door a Rock or whatever you please of the like kind But I have already shewn the ground of this mistake to be their want of considering the Customs and Phrases of the Jewish Passover and upon which both the Holy Eucharist it self and these Expressions in it were founded And I will only add this farther in confirmation of it That in the Stile of the Hebrew Language in general there is nothing more ordinary than for things to be said to * Expressions of this kind are very frequent in Holy Scripture The seed is the Word of God Luke viii 11. The field is the World the good seed are the children of the kingdom The tares are the children of the wicked one Matt. xiii 38. The seven Angels are the Angels of the seven Churches and the seven Candlesticks are the seven Churches Rev. i. 20. With infinite more of the like kind Be that which they Signifie or Represent Thus Joseph interpreting Pharaoh's Dream Gen. xli 26. The seven good Kine says he are seven years and again The seven good Ears of Corn are seven years i. e. as is plain they signify seven years And so in like manner in this place Christ took Bread and blessed and brake it and gave it to his disciples saying Take Eat this is my Body which is Broken for you That is this Bread thus Taken and Blessed and Broken and Given to you This Bread and this Action signifies and represents my Body which shall be Broken for you And indeed after all this seeming assurance it is nevertheless plain That they themselves are not very well satisfied with their own interpretation †See the Preface We have shewn before how little confidence their greatest Schoolmen had of this Doctrine those who have stood the most stifly for it could never yet * See their Opinions collected by Monsieur Aubertine de Eucharistiâ lib. 1. cap. 9.11 12 13 14. agree how to explain these words so as to prove it And Cardinal Bellarmine alone who reckons up the most part of their several ways and argues the weakness too of every one but his own may be sufficient to assure us that they are never likely to be And might serve to shew what just cause their own great * Tract 2. de Verbis quibus Conficitur Catharinus had so long since to cry out upon his Enquiry only into the meaning of the very first word This Consider says he Reader into what difficulties they are thrown who go about to write upon this matter when the word THIS only has had so many and such contradictory Expositions that they are enough to make a man lose his Wits but barely to consider them all 'T was this forced so many of their †See their Testimonies cited in the late Historical Treatise of Transubstantiation in the Defence of the Exposition of the Church of England p. 63 64 65. In the Preface above c. greatest and most learned men before Luther ingenuously to profess That there was not in Scripture any evident proof of this Doctrine and even Cardinal Cajetan since to own That had not the Church determined for the literal sense of those words This is my Body they might have passed in the Metaphorical It is the general acknowledgment of their ‖ See Bellarmin's words in the Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England pag. 56 57. To which may be added Salmer Tom. 9. Tr. 20. Suarez Disp 58. Sect. 7. Vasquez Disp 201. c. 1. c. greatest Writers at this day That if the Pronoun THIS in that Proposition This is my Body be referr'd to the Bread which our Saviour Christ held in his Hand which he bless'd which he brake and gave to his Disciples and of which therefore certainly if of any thing he said This is my Body the natural repugnancy that there is between the two things affirm'd of one another Bread and Christs Body will force them to be taken in a figurative Interpretation For as much as 't is impossible that Bread should be Christ's Body otherwise than in a figure And however to avoid so dangerous a Consequence they will rather apply it to any thing nay to nothing at all than to the Bread yet they would do well to consider whether they do not thereby fall into as great a danger on the other side since if the Relative THIS do's not determine those words to the Bread 't is evident that nothing in that whole Proposition do's And then how those words shall work so great a change in a Subject to which they have no manner of Relation will I believe be as difficult to shew as the change its self is incomprehensible to conceive And now after so plain an evidence of the weakness of that foundation which is by all confessed to be the chief and has by many of the most Learned of that Church been thought the only Pillar of this Cause I might well dispense with my self from entring on any farther examination of their other pretences to establish it But because they have taken great pains of late to apply the †Concil Trid. Sess xiii sixth Chapter of St. John to the Holy Eucharist tho' it might be sufficient in general to say that no good Argument for a matter of such consequence can be built upon a place which so many of the * See them thus ranged by Albertinus de Euch. lib 1. cap. 30. pag. 209. Two Popes Innocent III. Pius II. Four Cardinals Bonaventure D' Alliaco Cusan Cajetane Two Archbishops Richardus Armachannus Guererius Granatensis Five Bishops Stephanus Eduensis Durandus Mimatensis Gulielmus Altisiodorensis Lindanus Ruremondensis Jansenius Gandavensis Doctors and Professors of Divinity in great abundance Alexander Alensis Richardus de media villa Jo. Gerson Jo. de Ragufio Gabriel Biel Thomas Waldenfis Author tract contr perfidiam quorundam Bohemorum Jo. Maria Verratus Tilmannus Segebergensis Astesanus Conradus Jo. Ferus Conradus Sasgerus Jo. Hesselius Ruardus Tapperus Palatios Rigaltius Here are 50. of the Roman Church who reject this Application of this Chapter For the Fathers see the Learned Paraphrase lately set forth of this Chapter in the Preface All which shews how little strength any Argument from this Chapter can have to establish Transubstantiation most Eminent and Learned of that Communion have judged not to have the least Relation to this matter yet I will nevertheless beg leave very briefly to shew the Weakness of this Second Attempt too and that 't is in vain that they rally these scatter'd Forces whilst their main Body continues so intirely defeated It is a little surprizing in this matter that they universally tell us That neither the beginning nor ending of our Saviours Discourse in that Chapter belongs to this Matter that both before and after that passage which they refer to 't is
matter could have lived so long in the world without hearing of so eminent a matter in our Church-History as this The Author is treating about the difference between the Article establish'd in King Edward the six's time Dr. Burnet's Hist of the Refomation Vol 2. Pag. 405. Ann. 1559. Edit 2. 1683. and those in Q. Elizabeth's In the Article of the Lord's Supper there is a great deal left out For instead of that large Refutation of the Corporal Presence from the Impossibility of a Bodies being in more places at once from whence it follows That since Christ's Body is in Heaven the Faithful ought not to believe or profess a Real or Corporal Presence of it in the Sacrament In the new Article it is said That the Body of Christ is given and received after a spiritual manner M S S. C. Cor. Christ Cant. and the means by which it is received is Faith. But in the Original Copy of these Articles which I have seen subscribed by the Hands of All that sate in either House of Convocation there is a further Addition made The Articles were subscribed with that precaution which was requisite in a matter of such consequence For before the Subscriptions there is set down the Number of the Pages and of the Lines in every Page of the Book to which they set their Hands In that Article of the Eucharist these words are added An Explanation of Christ's Presence in the Sacrament Christ when he ascended into Heaven made his Body Immortal but took not from it the Nature of a Body For still it retains according to the Scriptures the Verity of a Humane Body which must be always in One definite place and cannot be spread into many or all places at Once Since then Christ being carry'd up to Heaven is to remain there to the end of the World and is to come from thence and from no place else as says S. Austin to judge the Quick and the Dead None of the Faithful ought to believe or profess the Real or as they call it the Corporal Presence of his Flesh and Blood in the Eucharist But this in the Original is dash't over with minium yet so that it is still legible The Secret of it was this The Queen and her Council studied as hath been already shewn to unite all into the Communion of the Church And it was alledged that such an express Definition against a Real Presence might drive from the Church many who were still of that Perswasion and therefore it was thought to be enough to condemn Transubstantiation and to say that Christ was present after a spiritual manner and received by Faith. To say more as it was judged superflous so it might occasion division Upon this these words were by common consent left out And in the next Convocation the Articles were subscribed without them of which I have also seen the Original This shews that the Doctrine of the Church subscribed by the whole Convocation was at that time contrary to the belief of a Real or Corporal Presence in the Sacrament only it was not thought necessary or expedient to publish it Though from this silence which flowed not from their Opinion but the Wisdom of that time in leaving a Liberty for different Speculations as to the manner of the Presence SOME have since inferr'd that the chief Pastors of this Church did then disapprove of the definition made in King Edwards time and that they were for a Real Presence Thus that Learned Historian And here let our Adversary consider what he thinks of this Account and whether after so evident a Confutation from plain matter of Fact of his Objection before it appear'd we may not reasonably complain both of his Weakness and In-sincerity neither to take any notice of such a plain History of this whole Transaction or to imagine that so vain a Surmise of Q. Elizabeth's being a great propugner of the Real Presence would be sufficient to obviate so clear and particular an Account of this matter But though this might suffice to shew the continuance of the same Doctrine of the Real Presence in this Queen's that was before profess'd in her Brother's Reign yet it may not be amiss to discover a little further the truth of this matter and how falsly this Author has alledged those great Names he has produced I will therefore beg leave to continue my Proof with an Induction of the most Eminent of our Divines that I have at this time the Opportunity to consult to our own days And first for Bishop Jewel Bp. JEWEL though the part he had in the Convocation before mention'd may sufficiently assure us of his Opinion yet it may not be improper to repeat the very words of a Person of his Learning and Eminence in our Church In his Reply to Harding thus he expresses the Doctrine of the Church of England as to the Real Presence Vth Article of the Real Presence against Harding pag. 237. Lond. 1611. See also his Defence of the Apology of the Church of England pag. 219 c. Whereas Mr. Harding thus unjustly reporteth of us that we maintain a naked Figure and a bare Sign or Token only and nothing else He knoweth well we feed not the People of God with bare Signs and Figures but teach them that the Sacraments of Christ be Holy Mysteries and that in the Ministration thereof Christ is set before us even as he was crucified upon the Cross We teach the People not that a naked Sign or Token but that Christ's Body and Blood indeed and verily is given unto us that we verily eat it that we verily drink it that we verily be relieved and live by it that we are Bones of his Bones and Flesh of his Flesh that Christ dwelleth in us and we in him Yet we say not either that the Substance of the Bread and Wine is done away or that Christ's Body is let down from Heaven or made Really or Fleshly present in the Sacrament We are taught according to the Doctrine of the Old Fathers to lift up our Hearts to Heaven and there to feed upon the Lamb of God Thus spiritually and with the Mouth of our Faith we eat the Body of Christ and drink his Blood even as verily as his Body was verily broken and his Blood verily shed upon the Cross Indeed the Bread that we receive with our Bodily Mouths is an earthly thing and therefore a Figure as the Water in Baptism is likewise also a Figure But the Body of Christ that thereby is represented and there is offer'd unto our Faith is the thing it self and not Figure To conclude Three things herein we must consider 1st That we put a difference between the Sign and the thing it self that is signified 2. That we seek Christ above in Heaven and imagine not him to be present Bodily upon the Earth 3. That the Body of Christ is to be eaten by Faith only and none
Council it was no matter of Faith nor but for its decision would have been now That the Ancients did not believe it that the Scripture does not express it in short that the interpretation which we give is altogether as agreeable to the words of Christ and in truth free from infinite inconveniences with which the other abounds All which plainly enough shews that not only the late private Heretical Spirit whose imperious sentiments and private Glosses and contradictory interpretations as a late * Consensus Veterum Pag. 27. Author has elegantly expressed it like the victorious Rabble of the Fishermen of Naples riding in triumph and trampling under foot Ecclesiastical Traditions Decrees and Constitutions Ancient Fathers Ancient Liturgies the whole Church of Christ but especially those words of his This is my Body has opposed this Doctrine but even those who are to be supposed to have had the greatest reverence for all these their own Masters and Doctors found it difficult to embrace so Absurd and Contradictory a Belief And here then let me beseech those into whose hands these Papers may chance to fall seriously to consider this matter and whether the sole Authority of such a Pope as Innocent III whose actions towards one of our own Kings and in favour of that very ill Man Dominick and his Inquisition K. John. were there nothing else remaining of his Life might be sufficient to render him detestable to all good Men ought to be of so great an Authority with us as to engage us to give up our senses and our reason nay and even Scripture and Antiquity it self in obedience to his arbitrary and unwarrantable Definition It is I suppose sufficiently evident from what has been before observed how little assurance their own Authors had for all the definition of the Council of Lateran of this Doctrine I shall not need to say what debates arose among the Divines of the Council of Trent about it And though since its determination there Men have not dared so openly to speak their Minds concerning it as before yet we are not to imagine that they are therefore ever the more convinced of its Truth I will not deny but that very great numbers in the Roman Communion by a profound ignorance and a blind obedience the two great Gospel perfections with some men disposed to swallow any thing that the Church shall think fit to require of them may sincerely profess the belief of this Doctrine because they have either never at all considered it or it may be are not capable of comprehending the impossibility of it Nor shall I be so uncharitable as to suppose that all even of the learned amongst them do wilfully profess and act in this matter against what they believe and know to be true I will rather perswade my self that some motives or prejudices which I am not able to comprehend do really blind their eyes and make them stumble in the brightness of a mid-day light But yet that all those who nevertheless continue to live in the external Communion of the Church of Rome are not thus sincere in the belief of it is what I think I may without uncharitableness affirm and because it will be a matter of great importance to make this appear especially to those of that Perswasion I will beg leave to offer such proofs of it as have come to my knowledge in some of the most eminent Persons of these last Ages and to which I doubt not but others better acquainted with these secrets than I can pretend to be might be able to add many more Examples And the first that I shall mention is the famous †Petri Picherelli Expositio Verborum institutionis Caenae Domini Lugd. Batav 1629. 12o. Picherellus of whom the testimonies prefix'd to his Works speak so advantagiously that I shall not need say any thing of the esteem which the learned World had of him * Hoc est Corpus meum i. e. Hic panis fractus est Corpus meum pag. 10. Hoc est Corpus meum i. e. Panis quem frangimus est communio cum Corpore Christi pag. 14. and pag. 27. Expounding Gratian. dist 2. Can. Non Hoc Corpus Ipsum Corpus invisibiliter de vero germano Corpore in Caelis agente intelligitur Non ipsum visibiliter de Corpore sanguine Sacramentalibus Pane Vino Corporis Christi sanguinis symbolis Quae rei quam significant nomen per supradictam metonymiam mutuantur I must transcribe his whole Treatise should I insist on all he has delivered repugnant to their Doctrine of Transubstantiation Suffice it to observe that in his Exposition of the words of Institution This is my Body He gives this plain interpretation of them This Bread is my Body which is both freely allowed by the Papists themselves to be inconsistent with their belief as to this matter and which he largely shews not only to be his own but to have been the constant Doctrine of the Primitive Fathers in this point But in this it may be there is not so much ground for our admiration that one who was not very fond of any of the Errors of that Church should openly dissent from her in this It will more be wondred that a person so eminent amongst them as Cardinal du Perron and that has written so much in defence of Transubstantiation should nevertheless all the while Himself believe nothing of it And yet this we are assured he freely confess'd to some of his Friends not long before his death That he thought the Doctrine to be Monstrous that He had done his endeavour to colour it over the best He could in his Books but that in short he had undertaken an ill cause and which was not to be maintain'd But I will set down the relation as I find it in Monsieur Drelincourt 's * Reponse à la Lettre de Monsig le Prince 〈◊〉 Ernest aus cinq Micistres de Paris c. Geneve 1664. Answer to the Landgrave of Hesse and who would not have presum'd to have offer'd a relation so considerable and to a person of such Quality had he at all fear'd that he could have been disproved in it †Votre Altesse me croira s'il luy plait Mais je luy puis dire avectonte sincerite verité que si le defunt Cardinal du Perron luy a persuadé la Transubstantiation il luy a persuadé ce qu'il n'a pû se persuader à forméme qu'il n'a nullement cru Car je scay par des Gene d' Honneur dignes de foy qui l'avoient apris de temoins oculaires que des Amis de cet illustre scavant Cardinal qui l'estoient allé visiter lors qu' il estoit languissant en son lit malade de la maladie dont il est mort le prierent de leâ—r dire franchement ce qu'il croyeit de la Transubstantiation
dans la Vie d'avoir les Originaux escrits de la main de l'Auteur nous ne scaurions empescher que feu Monsigneur ne passe dans l'Esprit de beaucoup de Gens pour HERETIQUE au sujet de l' Eucharistie Monsieur Baluze's Animadversion easily have concluded That if this be indeed the work of Monsieur de Marca 't will be impossible to hinder him from passing with many Persons for a HERETICK as to the point of the Eucharist But before I quit this Instance I cannot but observe with reference to this Treatise what care the Romanists take to hinder the sentiments of learned Men in this Point from coming to a publick knowledge And which might give us some cause to suspect that their great concern is not so much whether they do indeed believe Transubstantiation themselves as not to let the World know that they do not This has been heretofore shewn in another Treatise with reference to S. Chrysostom whose * Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of Engl. Appendix p. 127. n. v. Epistle to Caesarius some of the Sorbonne Doctors caused most shamefully to be cut out of Monsieur Bigot 's Edition of Palladius because it too plainly spoke the Doctrine of the Protestants as to this point And the same has almost happened to this Treatise of Monsieur de Marca here mentioned †See the Preface to the Reader before the Edition of the same Treatises 12º Anno 1669. and Monsieur Baluze's Letter to the Bishop of Tulle on this occasion p. 5. Before it came to a publick sight the passages that seemed most visibly to oppose their Doctrine were either changed or suppress'd * The Oiginal leaves cut out by them having fallen into my Hands may be seen by those that desire it in S. Martin's Library of which the passage before cited is one as appears by the Paris Edition now extant of them But †See Monsieur Baluze 2. Lettre pag. 15. the Providence of God that brought to light the other has discover'd this cheat too For before the alarm was given and that the Chancellor (a) Mais enfin le refus que Mrs. de Sorbonne luy ont fait de luy donner leur approbation luy ont fait ouvrir les yeux s'estant laissé entendre quoyqu'un peu tard qu'il a fait une Sottise ibid. the Sorbonne Doctors but especially Monsieur Baluze by his Letters to the President de Marca the Archbishop 's Son upon this occasion had awakened the Abbé Faget to consider more nearly what he had done (b) Et p. 16. Je dis un peu tard parce qu'il avoit de ja fait des presentes de son livre que le libraire en avoit aussi debite quelques uns several Presents had been made of the intire work as it was in the Authors MS. and if we may credit their own relations the Printer who was a Protestant and the same that printed (c) Baluze Lettre à Monsieur l'Evesque de Tulle p. 5. Monsieur Claude's Books against the Perpetuité had obliged that learned Person with a Copy by which means both the genuine sentiments of Monsieur de Marca in opposition to Transubstantiation are preserved and their fraudulent endeavours to suppress his opinion discovered To this eminent Person I will beg leave to subjoyn a fifth and he too no less known to the World both for his Learning and Reputation nor less a Heretick in this point however not hitherto so openly discovered as the other and that is Father Sirmond the Jesuit In his life of Paschasius Radbertus he tells us Sirmond Vit. Pasch Radbert That this Monk was the first who explained the genuine sense of the Catholick Church in this mystery and indeed if what * Eclaircissement de l'Euch c. 19. p. 431 c. Blondel and some others have observed concerning him be true that it was for Impanation not Transubstantiation the Jesuit perhaps spoke his real judgment of him though not in that sense that he is usually understood to have done it But however that be certain it is that this learned Father so little believed the Doctrine of the present Roman Church as to this point that he freely confess'd he thought it had herein departed from the antient Faith and at the desire of one of his Friends wrote a short Treatise to confirm his Assertion This though it be not yet made publick is neverthess in the hands of several Persons of undoubted integrity I will mention only one whose learning and worth are sufficiently known to the World viz. Monsieur Bigot who discoursing with Father Raynauld at Lyons about this matter the Jesuit confess'd to him that it was true that he had himself a copy of his Treatise which he would communicate to him and that it was Father Sirmond whom upon this account he reflected upon in his Book Ingenia praeclara in rebus difficilibus aliquid semper de suo comminisountur Nam praeclara ingenia multa novant circa scientias Theoph. Raynaudi S. J. Erotemata de malis ac bonis libris Lugduni 1653. p. 251. de bonis malis Libris where he observes That Men of great parts love to innovate and invent always somewhat of their own in difficult matters When Monsieur Bigot return'd to claim the performance of his promise the Jesuit excused himself to him that he could not light upon it which when he afterwards told to Father Chiflet another Jesuit of Dijonois he again confirmed to him the truth of the relation and voluntarily offer'd him a Copy of the Treatise which he told him was transcribed from Father Sirmonds Original This Monsieur Bigot has not only acknowledged to some of his Friends of my acquaintance but promised to communicate to them the very Treatise and I dare appeal to the candor of that worthy Person for the truth of what I have here related and whose name I should not have mentioned but only to remove all reasonable cause of suspicion in a matter of such importance And what I have now said of Father Sirmond I might as truly affirm of a fourth Person of as great a name a Doctor of the Sorbonne whose Treatise against Transubstantiation has been seen by several persons and is still read in the MS. But because I am not at liberty to make use of their names I shall not any further insist upon this example My next instance will be more undeniable and it is of the ingenious Monsieur de Marolles Abbot of Ville-loyn well known in France for his excellent Writings and great Abilities A little before his death which happen'd about the beginning of the Year 1681. being desirous to free his Conscience as to the point of the Holy Eucharist in which he supposed their Church to have many ways departed from the right Faith he caused a Paper to be Printed in which he declares his thoughts