Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n
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A44535
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The honesty of the Protestant and dishonesty of the popish divinity in a letter to a lady revolted to the Church of Rome / by Anthony Horneck.
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Horneck, Anthony, 1641-1697.
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1681
(1681)
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Wing H2844; ESTC R28116
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32,752
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156
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of it be considered there is nothing in nature can be more absurd or irrational and the Church of ROME had need oblige men to deny both their reason and senses to beleive a transubstantiation Here indeed a Faith is neeessary strong enough to remove mountaines and though never any Miracles were wrought but were wrought on purpose to convince our senses yet here we must believe one which neither sence nor reason can discover When Christ gave the Sacrament to his Disciples saith the Apostle 1 Corinth 11. 24 He brake the bread and said take eat this is my body which is broken for you It is a wonderful thing that the word is in the first Sentence this is my Body should have a litteral sense and in the very next sentence pronounced with the same breath cannot admit of a Litteral sense for the word is in the second sentence must necessarily stand for shall be because Christs Body when he gave the Bread was not yet broken If it will not admit of a Litteral Sense in the very next sentence because of the absurdity that would follow that Christ was Crucified before he was Crucified why should we understand it in the first sentence litterally when the absurdity is far greater Nay that the word is should not be capable of being understood litterally in the second essential part of the Sacrament This cup is the New Testament that here I say it should import and can import nothing else but signifies or is a sign of the new Testament and yet must not be understood so in the first part of the Sacrament is a thing we cannot comprehend And when the Apostle speaking of the Lords Supper or Eucharist 1 Cor. 10. 16. The Cup of blessing which we bless is it not the Communion of the Blood of Christ and the Bread which we break is it not the Communion of the Body of Christ Let the rigidest Papist that hath not quite banished his reason tell me how he will make sense of the word is here except he understand it figuratively most certainly it cannot be understood literally for the Cup is not that Communion but is a sign of it One would admire how men can be so obstinate in a thing as clear as the Sun and you might as well conclude that Christ is a Door made of boards and nailes because the Scripture sayth he is a Door and that he is a real Vine with green Leaves and Grapes about him because the Scripture saith he is a Vine But suppose the word is in these words This is my body must be understood literally how doth this make for transubstantiation Are the words is and is transubstantiated all one A thing may be said to be a thousand ways and yet without transubstantiation so that if by the word is you understand transubstantiation you your selves must go from the literal sense and assume a sense which is not expressed in that saying All the Jews are so well versed in the sense of Sacramental expressions that by the word is they understand nothing but signifies or represents and therefore it s a horrid shame that Christians meerly for fear of being laughed at for departing from an absurd opinion and losing the credit of a pretended infallibility should make themselves ignorant in that which the meanest Jew even before the Gospel understood without a Teacher for we may confidently beleive that no Jew before Christs time was so sottish to think when it 's said the flesh is the Passeover Exod. 12. 11. that the flesh or blood was really the Passeover but only a sign and representation of it or a token to them as Moses calls it ver 13. I will not here put you in mind of the strange absurdities that must follow from this Doctrine of Transubstantiation viz. that Christ when he did eat and drink in this Sacrament must have eaten his own flesh and that the Apostles must have eaten his body while he was at the Table with them and before it was Crucified c. I could tell you that this Doctrine is against the great Article of our Faith that Christ is ascended into Heaven and there sitteth at the Right Hand of GOD until the day of Judgment That it is against the Nature of a real Body to be in a thousand places at once And that from hence it must follow that the Body and Blood of Christ is capable of being devoured by Vermine capable of being poisoned and instead of giving life may be so order'd that it shall kill and murther witness Victor the third Pope of ROME and Henry the VIIth Emperour who were poisoned in the Sacrament not to mention a thousand more of such Monstrous consequences But since Madam you do insist so much upon that place of Scripture John 6. 53. Except you eat my flesh and drink my blood you have no life in you I le but breifly shew you how ill a Logician you are either to believe that this is spoke of the Sacrament or that these words infer a Corporal manducation of Christs real Body and blood if they be meant of the Eucharist it will necessarily follow that Christ oblig'd the Jews and his hearers to come to the Sacrament at the time he spake these words for he speakes of their present eating and drinking Except ye eat c. But this he could not possibly do for the Sacrament of his body and blood was not instituted till at least a whole twelve months after nor did any of his disciples at that time dream of any such thing as his dying and being crucified nor doth Christ speak the least word of it in the whole Chapter which he must necessarily have done if he had intended the Sacrment by it which is all together founded in his crucifixion For this Sermon of Christ concerning eating and drinking his flesh and blood was delivered just about the Feast of the Passeover ver 4. After which feast as it is said John 7. 1. 2. the Jews celebrated the feast of Tabernacles and after this they kept another feast of the Passeover the last which Christ was at which was no less than a twelve month after John 11. 55. John 12. â—1 So that the Sacrament of Christs Body and blood not being instituted before the last Passover as all the Evangelists agree it was not possible that either the believing Jews or the Apostles could understand it of the Sacrament and I suppose Christ intended to be understood because there was no such thing as yet instituted Besides it is impossible that it can be understood of the Sacramental eating and drinking of the Body and Blood of Christ for without this eating and drinking there is no Salvation to be had as it is said Joh. 6. 53 54. and if it were to be understood of the Eucharist we must exclude all Christians from Salvation that are not in a capacity nor in a possibility of receiving it which I am sure your own Church will not
THE HONESTY OF THE PROTESTANT AND DISHONESTY OF THE Popish Divinity IN A LETTER TO A LADY Revolted to the Church of ROME By Anthony Horneck Preacher at the SAVOY The Second Edition London Printed for James Collins at his Shop by the Temple Church 1681. A LETTER Of a Protestant Gentleman to a Lady revolted to the Church of ROME Madam AND are you indeed got into the onely Catholick Church And are you sure the Men you have lately believed have not deceived you as you fancy we have done for tho you may be so Charitable as to think that we have not intentionally couzened you yet since you cannot suppose Us to be both in the Right you must necessarily conclude that we have at least ignorantly abused and imposed upon you and did you ever rightly consider what a truely Catholick Church does mean Men of Sense and Reason always believed that a Church which hold's the truely Catholick Faith is a true and sound Member of the Catholick Church and dares malice it self say that we do not hold the Apostles the Nicene and Athanasius's Creed The Church of ROME her self confesses that these Creed's contain the truely Catholick Faith And most certainly when the Nicene Councel was celebrated and in Athanasius's time that Church was counted a sound Member of the Catholick Church that held that Catholick Faith which is expressed in those Creeds and do we not hold that Faith do we not stand up at it to express our readiness to defend it and what have we done that we must not be counted a Catholick Church Is it because we will not receive things which the Church of Rome hath since added to the Catholick Faith Is it because we will not admit of the Doctrines which that Church was first induced to believe by the darkness and ignorance of the Ages it lived in and at last loath to part withal for fear they should be thought to have been so long in an Error Is it because we will not yield to things which we apprehend to be directly against the Word of God and destructive to that Catholick Faith the Christian World hath professed in all Ages Is it because we will not deceive the People of the Cup in the Blessed Sacrament which Christ intended as a mighty comfort to them Is it because we will not believe the Miracle of Transubstantiation against four of our Senses and Reason and Scripture to boot Is it because we will not suffer the Worship of God or that which is very like it to be given to Creatures because of the very appearance of the evil of Idollatry which we are commanded to shun as much as Idollatry it self Is it because we will not believe a Purgatory fire which cleanseth little but peoples Purses of their money Is it because we will not indulge the Pride and Arrogance of a Man at Rome who having first wheadled the Christian Princes out of their means and Power hath at last made that Power and Riches hereditary to his Successors under a pretence of a Legacy from Christ Is it because we will not believe contrary to the Apostles Rule that publick Prayers which are intended for the benefit are understanding of the Multitude must be said in a Tongue unknown to the People These must certainly be the reasons why we cannot now passe with the Church of ROME for members of the Catholick Church That these things were not in the Ancient Catholick Creeds I hope you are convinced for you have read them over and found none of all these Additions in them And now I beg of you in the name and by the mercy of that Jesus in whom you beleive to judge which is most likely to be the truly Catholick Church our's or their's our's that keeps to the truly antient Catholick Faith or their's that hath added things contrary to Scripture and reason and antiquity And dare you continue in a Church where your very Communion with it is an approbation of their Actions which are directly contrary to the command of Christ can there be any thing more contrary to it than their denying the Cup to the Laity And when you receive the Sacrament but in one kind contrary to Christs command do not you Sin and allow of the Sin of that Church you are in Is not your disobedience to Christs Command a Sin or can you imagine that you are more obliged to Obey men than Christ himself You confess you dare not live in any one Sin But how dare you live in this Sin You talk of the benefit of Confession and absolution when that very Priest to whom you confesse and who absolves you lives in that Sin you are guilty of and neither absolves himself nor you from it and you both continue in it as if the Blind had a mind to lead the Blind How dare you act thus against your Reason and Conscience Are you not affraid when you are going to confesse that God will laugh at your Mock Confession since you neither confesse that Sin of living contrary to Christs Command about the Cup nor are willing to part with it Tell me not here that you drink the blood of Christ in eating his Flesh if so to what purpose doth the Priest Consecrate Wine for himselfe if he drinks the blood of Christ in eating his Flesh But suppose the Bread were transubstantiated into the Flesh and Blood of Christ you know that the not giving the Cup of Blessing to those that come to the Lords Supper is contrary to Christs institution who distinctly consecrated the Cup and gave that to his Disciples who were representatives of all Believers as well as the Bread and peremptorily commanded Drink ye all of this and I hope you do not call eating the consecrated Wafer drinking the Wafer But let Us grant you your strange Doctrine that you do participate of the Blood of Christ in eating the Consecrated Wafer who gave your Church Authority to alter Christ's Institution How can Men dispense with an express Law of God Can they annull what God would have Established and continue to the Worlds end And can you consent to so great a Sacriledge Doth not some horrour seize on you when you seriously think that you approve of the Priests sinning against so notorious a Precept and which he that runs may read And pray Madam wherein have you bettered your self in going over to the Roman Church Is this your proficiency in Religion to forsake a Church where you felt the lively Oracles of Heaven coming warm upon your Soul and to joyn your self to a Church where you hear nothing but Latine Prayers and where the Priest if he be not a good man may as well Curse you as Bless you for any thing you understand of his Language or Devotion Is this Your proficiency in Religion to leave a Church where you were taught to Worship God in Spirit and in Truth and now to cleave to one where they teach your Prayers to