was not begun in the seventh or other Century but was alwaies believed since the Apostles seeing that in the nineth Century Christians universally believed that in the holy Eucharist the bread and wine were changed into the body and blood of our Saviour and as such adored them and embraced this doctrine of the real presence not as a doctrine newly found out by themselves or their immediate Fore-fathers by reading the holy Scriptures or other means but as taught them by their Fore-fathers uninterruptedly from the Apostles and seeing likewise this has ever been the way of the Catholick Church to teach and pretend to teach Posterity not new Doctrines of her own but what she had learnt from her Ancestors Hence S. Vincent Lerinensis twelve hundred years ago in his Golden Treatise against the profane Innovations of Heresies upon those words of S. Paul Siquis c. If any one Evangelize to you besides what you have received let him be Anathema Sed forsitan c. But perhaps those things were commanded the Galatians only Then those things also which follow in the same Epistle were commanded the Galatians only Be not desirous of vain-glory provoking one another envying one another Or perhaps was it then commanded if anyone announce besides what has been announced let him be Anathemaâ—ized but now it is not commanded Therefore and that also which he there saies But I say walk in the Spirit and do not perfect the desires of the Flesh was then only commanded but is not now commanded But if it be impious and pernicious to believe so it necessarily follows that as these things are to be observed by all Ages so those things also which are established concerning not changing the Faith are commanded to all Ages Wherefore it was never lawful it is not now lawful nor ever shall be lawful to Christian Catholicks to announce any thing besides what they have received Let him cry and cry again and to all and alwaies and every where let him cry by his Epistle that Vessel of Election that Master of the Gentils that Trumpet of the Apostles that Preacher of the World Conscious to the secrets of Heaven let him cry if any one preach a new Doctrine let him be Anathematiz'd And on the contrary side let certain Froggs and Cynifes and Flies that are to perish such as are the Pelagians reclame and this to Gatholiks We say they being Authors we being Heads we being Expositors Condemn what ye did hold hold what ye did Condemn reject the ancient Faith the institutions of your Fathers the depositions of your Ancestors and receive but what I have a horror to mention them for they are such proud things c. But may not general Councils at least presume to reach new Doctrines Hear the same S. Vincent chap. 32. Hoc semper neque quicquam praeterea c. The Catholick Church excited by the Novelties of Hereticks by the decrees of her Councils even did this and not thing more than this what she had received by Tradition only this she consigned to Posterity by writing comprehending a great sum of things in a few letters and for the most part for the light of understanding signing the not new sense of Faith with the propriety of a new name Take notice that the Christian Church using this means to preserve the Faith first received its impossible she should ever lose or change it For if Fathers from the beginning had resolved to teach their Children what they had learnt or even thought they had learnt from their Parents as to the point of the Real prefence or other doctrine its impossible they should teach another doctrine For should they teach another doctrine it must happen either because they were ignorant what was taught them by their Parents which is impossible not only to whole Nations but even to the Inhabitants of one small Town or else because though they knew what was taught by their Parents yet they would teach otherwise than they had been taught but then they must forsake their first resolution of teaching their Children what they thought they had learnt from their Fathers contrary to the Supposition But on the other side let us suppose a book fully written as to all points to be believed by Christians by the first teachers of Christianity Let them together with this Book give charge to their 〈◊〉 Converts neither to add to it nor to diminish it and to believe as in their Consciences they shall think that Book shall teach them Though Generation after Generation be never so faithful to such a charge yet they may in after Ages come to lose or change their Faith because the Book may seem to one Generation to bear one sense and to another Generation to bear another Especially if the mysteries to be believed be very sublime and the Book obscure in many places and admit of divers senses when it speaks of those mysterieâ— For example these words This is my Body may seem to one Age to bear this sense This is a sign of my body and â—o another This is really and truly my body But no ten Families who have been taught by their Parents either to believe our Saviours body is in the Euecharist or that it is not there can possibly mistake what their immediate Fathers taught them and frequently inculcated to them as to this point both by themselves and choice persons ordained on purpose for this end to teach what they learnt from their immediate Masters and Fathers Nothing can make a change here but a resolution to go contrary to what they know was taught them by their Parents Wherefore seeing God Almighty is resolved not to teach every Age by immediate infallible Missionants from himself but to send inspired Ambassadors to one particular Generation only and to leave that Generation to teach their Children successively till the day of Judgment what they learnt from the immediate infallible Messengers of Heaven And seeing also a Book with a charge not to change or alter it and with a charge also to follow what should seem to every Generation to be the sense of it and supposing every Generation faithful to such a charge would not have been a sufficient means to keep the first divine Faith from Corruption we may safely conclude the Almighty has not taken that way to teach the world But seeing Oral teaching by inspired Pastors at first with a charge to every Generation to follow what they thought was taught them by their immediate Parents and Teachers provided every Generation were true to this charge would have kept the first Faith inviolate we may also conclude the Almighty has taken this way Especially finding a Congregation of so vast a spread in being who pretends to have made use of this means to preserve her first Faith taught her Ancestors many hundred years ago nor can she be evinced by any History or Tradition or any thing but mere sayings and ungrouâ—â—â—d surmises to have lost
they were almost all able to dispute of Dogms To whom when their gathering together in one seemed to add a confidence of daring and decreeing something from themselves yet notwithstanding they would presume nothing arrogate nothing at all to themselves but took all possible heed lest they should deliver to their Posterity what themselves had not received from their Fathers and not only well disposed the matter for the present but also gave example to them that were to come after them to wit that they should reverence the dogms of sacred Antiquity and condemn Adinventa the additional inventions of profane Novelty This then was not an Age wherein to introduce new doctrins into the Church nor any other before S. Vincent For he tells us chap. 9. Mos iste c. That custome has always flourished in the Church and by how much any one hath been more Religious the more readily has he opposed new inventions We have hereof plenty of examples every where The same S. Vincent witnesses that in the third Age the Assertors of Rebaptization wanted neither wit nor eloquence nor number nor verisimilitude of Truth nor Oracles of the divine Law but understood in a bad and new manner chap. 9 and 10. How came they then to lose their cause S. Stephen and his Collegues reclamed Nihil novandum c. Nothing is to be innovated besides what has been delivered to us Agrippinus Bishop of Carthage holding Rebaptization against the rule of the Universal Church against the sense of all his fellow Priests against the custom and institutions of his Ancestors and hereby as S. Vincent observes giving a form of Sacriledge to all Hereticks this overthrew him Had now the doctrin of the Real presence been an Idolatrous Novelty its manifest no Introducer of it could have perswaded it to a Christian Church thus principled as the Doctors of these times were They would all unanimously have reclamed Nothing must be innovated besides what has been delivered to us by our Ancestors Moreover that the Christian doctrin remained pure and incorrupt for some Centuries of years after its first planting is further evinced by considering the state of the Christian Church for the first 300. years to wit that it was severely persecuted all the world over Now can any reasonable man imagin that they who were continually exposing their lives for their Religion would if they could agree together so notoriously to change it as to make themselves most gross Idolaters by adoring bread and wine as the true body and blood of their Creator and God Nor can it be imagin'd when the Centuries of the persecuted state of the Church were ended that the Christians now in a full liberty of professing and practising their Faith would all on the sudden so notoriously change that Faith which had been delivered them by their Fore-fathers who had seal'd it with their blood And this none can doubt of who reflects how tenacious all man kind is of that Religion they were bred up in In so much as let any one consult the whole world and he shall never find so much as one Nation or Country to have changed their Religion without a great deal of â—oise and difficulty and a considerable length of time and so as Posterity could for many Ages give an account of such a change how and by what means it happened so as to satisfie any rational demander of an account of such a change without flying to imperceptible mutations by little and little but when or by whom no account is to be given The usual refuge of our Adversaries when we demand of them how not one Country but all the Christian Countrys in the world came to believe so universally this strange doctrin of the change of Bread and Wine into our B. Saviours body and blood The whole world formerly in a manner Pagan except a handful of Jews is now become Christians we give an account of it Twelve men dividing the world amongst them by stupendious Miracles a holy life and glorious death converted great numbers of several Nations to the Christian Faith and these taught it their Children under sharp persecutions for some three hundred years and after that through the favour of Emperors and Kings Converted to be Christians it made that spread we now see Arrianism over-ran a great part of the Christian world and we are able to give an account how and by what means without recurring to imperceptible growing by little and little Arrius first broach'd that Heresie and by the favour of Emperors it got a great footing in Christendom In like manner had the strange doctrin of Transubstantiation been a Novel Invention 't is not possible but at first teaching it must needs have been opposed and could not have so over-spread the Christian world in the nineth Century as its evident to any one versed in Ecclesiastical History it did without great preaching of its first Abettors and strange favour of Christian Princes That the whole Christian world for the first six hundred years should be wholly ignorant of this strange mysterious doctrin and so hard to be believed and that in the nineth Century it should be generally believed and not as a new doctrin neither which was pretended by that Age to have been found out by vertue of greater light by reading the Holy Scriptures c. but as a doctrin they had been taught from their Fore-fathers by an immemorable Tradition is harder to believe than the mystery it self to any judicious considerer how difficultly as I hinted above we are perswaded to leave the doctrins we have been taught by our Parents from our Child-hood In confirmation of this let but any one consider the state of our own Country About the year 1500 we generally believed and adored the bread and wine in the H. Eucharist as our B. Saviours true body and blood Now 't is confess'd we a hundred for one believe the contrary But how was this new Faith bred in us By stopping the mouthes of all the Preachers of the antient mysterious doctrin and by persecuting with severe Laws all Professors of that antient Faith And yet you see even all this diligence has not been able to root out the antient belief universally neither Much-less was what has been done been effected so without noise but all our Chronicles mention how our new belief was wrought And can any one think that not one Kingdom but all the Kingdoms of the Christian world could be brought so universally to change their Faith without any mention in any History how and by whom this strange change was wrought Especially if he reflect how hardly human nature does believe strange things which neither sense nor reason can give any evidence of And on the contrary how easily and gladly we relinquish Beliefs which have been imposed upon us when we have as we think the evidence both of sense and reason for our change All which notwithstanding you see how that after a 150
years labour neither eloquence of false Teachers nor force of civil powers has been able so wholly to pervert our Nation as to the belief of that high mystery of the real presence but even still there remain a considerable number retainers of the antient belief And can you think that not in a much greater space of time to wit betwixt the sixth and nineth Century all the Christian world could be perswaded to admit so strange a doctrin to nature and reason and yet no man by vertue of History or Tradition should be able to give any account what Orators prevailed with the world to relinquish the belief of their Ancestors or what power of civil Magistrates forced them to it Especially seeing there have not wanted Ecclesiastical Historigraphers who have made mention of matters of far less note than such a change of Faith must needs have made But what place will there remain for doubting that this high mystery was always believed if not only all writers be silent as to any change but also the seventh and eighth Age yea the most Primitive times do positively attest this very mystery by the pens of the chiefest Champions of the Christian Church who have left us any memorials of their learning and piety in their deservedly admired works I shall faithfully recount their words be your own judge what their sentiment was In the first place then glorious Saint and great Doctor S. Augustin tell us your Faith concerning the Holy Eucharist Is it Bakers bread or the body of our Lord and God I remember saies the holy Doctor in his 28. Ser. de verbis Domini when I treated of the Sacraments I told you that before the words of Christ that which is offered up is called Bread but when the words of Christ shall have been pronounced now it is no longer called bread but the body of Christ. And explicating those words of the Royal Prophet Psal. 98. v. 5. Exalt ye our Lord God and adore his foot-stool for it is holy Now what is this Foot-stool of God why saies this great Doctor The Earth is his Foot-stool But how is the Earth holy and to be adored by us The Saint goes on and tells us how Our Lord took Earth of the Earth because Flesh is of the Earth and he took Flesh of the Flesh of Mary And because he walked here in Flesh and gave to us that very Flesh to be eaten by us to our Salvation but no body eats that Flesh unless he shall first have adored it And indeed what could we expect that S. Austin should teach and believe concerning this divine Sacrament but what he had been taught by his Father and Instructor in Christ the glorious St. Ambrose And what was that Hear his words lib. 4. De Sacramentis Thou wilt perhaps say nnto me my Bread is ordinary Bread but that bread is bread before the Sacramental words but when Consecration has been made of bread it is made the Flesh of Christ. But how can bread be the body of Christ By Consecration Consecration by what and whose words is it perfected By the words of our Lord Jesus For all other things which are said Praise is given to God By prayer supplication is made for the people for Kings for the rest When the time is come that the Venerable Sacrament is to be made now the Priest does not use his own words but the words of Christ therefore the word of Christ makes this Sacrament But what word of Christ That word by which all things were made Our Lord commanded and Heaven was made our Lord commanded and the Earth was made Our Lord commanded and the Seas were made Our Lord commanded and every Creature was produced Doest thou see then how operative the word of Christ is If then there be so great force in the word of our Lord Jesus that it could make things which were not begin to be how much rather is it operative that those things which were should be and be charged into another thing Heaven was not the Sea was not the Earth was not but hear him saying He said the word and they were made he commanded and they were Created That therefore I may Answer thee the body of Christ was not before Consecration bâ— after Consecration I say unto thee that now the Body of Christ is He said it and it was made He commanded and it was Created And in chap. 5. of the same Book Before the words of Christ the Chalice is full of Wine and Water but when the words of Christ have bad their operation then it is made the blood which Redeemed the people See then in how many kinds of things the word of Christ is able to change all things Moreover our Lord Jesus himself testifies unto us that we receive his body and blood ought we then to doubt of his testification Add to S. Austin and S. Ambrose the Learned S. Hierom in his Epistle ad Heliodorum Far be it from me saies the Saint that I should speak amiss of those who succeeding the Apostles do make the body of Christ with their sacred mouth And in his 85. Epistle to Enagrius By whose prayers the body and blood of Christ is made Take notice that these three Holy Fathers lived not four hundred years after our B. Saviours death S. Cyprian yet nearer the Apostles age does no less clearly nor fully attest the same verity in his Serm. de Caena Domini That bread which our Lord gave to his Disciples being changed not in shape but in its nature by the Omnipotency of the Word was made Flesh. And in his Book de Lapsis reprehending such as were angry with the Priests of God who refused to admit them to the holy Communion of the B. Sacrament after they had polluted themselves with the profane Sacrifices of Heathen Idolaters expresses their sin in these words He that has fall'n from his Faith threatens them that have stood firm Sacrilegious wâ—etch he is angry with the Priests of God that he is not prosently admitted with defiled hands to receive the Body of our Lord or to drink his blood with his defiled mouth And this was the very doctrin of his learned Master Tertullian who yet nearer approached the holy Apostles lib. de Resur cur The Flesh is fed with the body and blood of Christ that the soul may be made fat with God And in his Book de Idololatria he complains of the prosaneness of some Christians who made no scruple to day to be working in their Shops making Idolatrous Statues for the Heathens and yet to morrow would presume to come into the Christian Congregations and receive the Sacred mysteries of our Lords body and blood and communicate them to others His words are these To touch the body of our Lord with those hands which give bodies to Devils Nor is this all their Crime would be less did they only receive from the hands of others what they contaminate and pollute