the condition use and office of the Bread is wholly changed that is of common and ordinary it becomes our Mystical and Sacramental food whereby as they affirm and believe the true Body of Christ is not only shadowed and figured but also given indeed and by worthy Communicants truly received Yet they believe not that the bread loseth its own to become the substance of the Body of Christ for the holy Scripture and the ancient Interpreters thereof for many ages never taught such an Essential change and conversion as that the very substance the matter and form of the Bread should be wholly taken away but only a mysterious and Sacramental one whereby our Ordinary is changed into Mystick bread and thereby designed and appointed to another use end and office than before This change whereby supernatural effects are wrought by things natural while their Essence is preserved entire doth best agree with the grace and power of God 2. There is no reason why we should dispute concerning Gods Omnipotency whether it can do this or that presuming to measure an infinite power by our poor ability which is but weakness We may grant that he is able to do beyond what we can think or apprehend and resolve his most wonderful acts into his absolute will and power but we may not charge him with working contradictions And though Gods Almightiness were able in this Mystery to destroy the substance of Bread and Wine and essentially to change it into the Body and Bloud of Christ while the accidents of Bread and Wine subsist of themselves without a subject yet we desire to have it proved that God will have it so and that it is so indeed For that God doth it because he can is no Argument and that he wills it we have no other proof but the confident Assertion of our Adversaries Tertullian against Praxias declared That we should not conclude God doth things because he is able but that we should enquire what he hath done For God will never own that praise of his Omnipotency whereby his unchangeableness and his truth are impaired and those things overthrown and destroy'd which in his word he affirms to be for take away the Bread and Wine and there remains no Sacrament 3. They that say that the matter and form of the Bread are wholly abolished yet will have the accidents to remain But if the substance of the Bread be changed into the substance of Christs Body by vertue of his words what hinders that the accidents of the Bread are not also changed into the accidents of Christs Body They that urge the express Letter should shew that Christ said This is the substance of my Body without its accidents But he did not say That he gave his Disciples a Phantastick Body such a visionary figment as Marcion believed but that very Body which was given for us without being deprived of that extention and other accidents of humane bodies without which it could not have been crucified since the Maintainers of Transubstantiation grant that the Body of Christ keeps its quantity in Heaven and say it is without the same in the Sacrament they must either acknowledge their contradiction in the matter or give over their opinion 4. Protestants dare not be so curious or presume to know more than is delivered by Scripture and Antiquity they firmly believing the words of Christ make the form of this Sacrament to consist in the Union of the thing signified with the sign that is the exhibition of the Body of Christ with the consecrated bread still remaining bread by divine appointment these two are made one and though this Union be not natural substantial personal or local by their being one within another yet it is so straight and so true that in eating the blessed Bread the true body of Christ is given to us and the names of the sign and thing signified are reciprocally changed what is proper to the body is attributed to the bread and what belongs only to the bread is affirmed of the body and both are united in time though not in place For the presence of Christ in this Mystery is not opposed to distance but to absence which only could deprive us of the benefit and fruition of the object 5. From what hath been said it appears that this whole controversie may be reduced to four Heads 1. Concerning the Signs 2. Concerning the thing signified 3. Concerning the Union of both and 4. Concerning their participation As for the first The Protestants differ from the Papists in this that according to the nature of Sacraments and the Doctrine of holy Scripture we make the substance of Bread and Wine and they accidents only to be signs In the second they not understanding our opinion do misrepresent it for we do not hold as they say we do that only the merits of the Death of Christ are represented by the blessed Elements but also that his very Body which was crucified and his Bloud which was shed for us are truly signified and offered that our Souls may receive and possess Christ as truly and certainly as the material and visible signs are by us seen and received And so in the third place because the thing signified is offered and given to us as truly as the sign it self in this respect we own the Union betwixt the Body and bloud of Christ and the Elements whose use and office we hold to be changed from what it was before But we deny what the Papists affirm that the substance of Bread and Wine are quite abolished and changed into the Body and Bloud of our Lord in such sort that the bare accidents of the Elements do alone remain united with Christs Body and Bloud And we also deny that the Elements still retain the nature of Sacraments when not used according to divine institution that is given by Christs Ministers and received by his People so that Christ in the consecrated bread ought not cannot be kept and preserved to be carried about because he is present only to the Communicants As for the fourth and last point we do not say that in the Lords Supper we receive only the benefits of Christs Death and Passion but we joyn the ground with its fruits that is Christ with those advantages we receive from him affirming with St. Paul That the bread which we break is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Communion of the body of Christ and the Cup which we bless the Communion of his bloud of that very substance which he took of the blessed Virgin and afterwards carried into heaven differing from those of Rome only in this that they will have our Union with Christ to be corporal and our eating of him likewise and we on the contrary maintain it to be indeed as true but not carnal or natural And as he that receives unworthily that is with the mouth only but not with a faithful heart eats and drinks his own damnation so he that doth it
is natural to corporal things or that wherein his own body subsists in heaven but according to the manner of Existence proper to Spirits whole and entire in each part of the Host And though by himself he be neither seen toucht nor moved yet in respect of the Species or accidents joyned with him he may be said to be seen toucht and moved And so the accidents being moved the body of Christ is truly moved accidentally as the Soul truly changeth place with the Body so that we truly and properly say that the body of Christ is removed lifted up and set down put on the Patent or on the Altar and carried from hand to mouth and from the mouth to the stomach as Berengarius was forced to acknowledge in the Roman Council under Pope Nicholas that the Body of Christ was sensually toucht by the hands and broken and chewed by the teeth of the Priest But all this and much more to the same effect was never delivered to us either by holy Scripture or the ancient Fathers And if Souls or Spirits could be present as here Bellarmine teacheth yet it would be absurd to say that bodies could be so likewise it being inconsistent with their nature 2. Indeed Bellarmine confesseth with St. Bernard That Christ in the Sacrament is not given to us carnally but spiritually and would to God he had rested here and not outgone the holy Scriptures and the Doctrine of the Fathers For endeavouring with Pope Innocent III. and the Council of Trent to determine the manner of the presence and Manducation of Christs body with more nicety than was fitting he thereby foolishly overthrew all that he had wisely said before denied what he had affirmed and opposed his own Opinion His fear was lest his Adversaries should apply that word spiritually not so much to express the manner of presence as to exclude the very substance of the Body and Bloud of Christ therefore saith he upon that account it is not safe to use too muc◠that of St. Bernard The body of Christ is not Corporally in the Sacrament without adding presently the above-mentioned explanation How much do we comply with humane pride and curiosity which would seem to understand all things Where is the danger And what doth he fear as long as all they that believe the Gospel own the true nature the real and substantial presence of the body of Christ in the Sacrament using that Explication of St. Bernard concerning the manner which he himself for the too great evidence of truth durst not but admit And why doth he own that the manner is spiritual not carnal and then require a carnal presence as to the manner it self As for us we all openly profess with St. Bernard that the presence of the body of Christ in the Sacrament is spiritual and therefore true and real and with the same Bernard and all the Ancients we deny that the Body of Christ is carnally either present or given The thing we willingly admit but humbly and religiously forbear to enquire into the manner 3. We believe a Presence and Union of Christ with our soul and body which we know not how to call better than Sacramental that is effected by eating that while we eat and drink the consecrated Bread and Wine we eat and drink therewithal the Body and Bloud of Christ not in a corporal manner but some other way incomprehensible known only to God which we call spiritual for if with St. Bernard and the Fathers a man goes no further we do not find fault with a general explication of the manner but with the presumption and self-conceitedness of those who boldly and curiously inquire what is a spiritual presence as presuming that they can understand the manner of acting of Gods holy Spirit We contrariwise confess with the Fathers that this manner of presence is unaccountable and past finding out not to be searcht and pried into by Reason but believed by Faith And if it seems impossible that the flesh of Christ should descend and come to be our food through so great a distance we must remember how much the power of the holy Spirit exceeds our sense and our apprehensions and how absurd it would be to undertake to measure his Immensity by our weakness and narrow capacity and so make our Faith to conceive and believe what our Reason cannot comprehend 4. Yet our Faith doth not cause or make that Presence but apprehends it as most truly and really effected by the word of Christ And the Faith whereby we are said to eat the flesh of Christ is not that only whereby we believe that he died for our sins for this Faith is required and supposed to precede the Sacramental Manducation but more properly that whereby we believe those words of Christ This is my Body which was St. Austins meaning when he said Why dost thou prepare thy stomach and thy teeth Believe and thou hast eaten For in this Mystical eating by the wonderful power of the Holy Ghost we do invisibly receive the substance of Christs Body and Bloud as much as if we should eat and drink both visibly 5. The result of all this is That the Body and Bloud of Christ are Sacramentally united to the Bread and Wine so that Christ is truly given to the Faithful and yet is not to be here considered with sense or worldly reason but by Faith resting on the words of the Gospel Now it is said that the Body and Bloud of Christ are joyned to the Bread and Wine because that in the celebration of the holy Eucharist the Flesh is given together with the Bread and the Bloud together with the Wine All that remains is That we should with faith and humility admire this high and sacred Mystery which our tongue cannot sufficiently explain nor our heart conceive CHAP. IV. 1. Of the change of the Bread and Wine into the Body and Bloud of Christ which the Papists call Transubstantiation 2. Of Gods Omnipotency 3. Of the Accidents of the Bread 4. The Sacramental Union of the thing signified with the sign 5 and 6. The question is stated Negatively and Affirmatively 7. The definition of the Council of Trent The Bull of Pope Pius IV. and the form of the Oath by him appointed The Decretal of Innocent III. The Assertions of the Jesuits 8. Transubstantiation a very monstrous thing 1. IT is an Article of faith in the Church of Rome that in the Blessed Eucharist the substance of the Bread and Wine is reduced to nothing and that in its place succeeds the Body and Bloud of Christ as we shall see more at large § 6 and 7. The Protestants are much of another mind and yet none of them denies altogether but that there is a conversion of the Bread into the Body and consequently of the Wine into the Bloud of Christ For they know and acknowledge that in the Sacrament by vertue of the words and blessing of Christ
Sacramental figure no more can the Bread be the Body of Christ but in the same sense 5. As to what Bellarmine and others say That it is not possible the words of Christ can be true but by that conversion which the Church of Rome calls Transubstantiation that is so far from being so that if it were admitted it would first deny the Divine Omnipotency as though God were not able to make the Body of Christ present and truly to give it in the Sacrament whilst the substance of the Bread remains 2. It would be inconsistent with the Divine Benediction which preserves things in their proper being 3. It would be contrary to the true nature of a Sacrament which always consisteth of two parts And lastly It would in some manner destroy the true substance of the Body and Bloud of Christ which cannot be said to be made of Bread and Wine by a Priest without a most high presumption But the truth of the words of Christ remains constant and can be defended without overthrowing so many other great truths Suppose a Testator puts Deeds and Titles in the hand of his Heir with these words Take the House which I bequeath thee There is no man will think that those Writings and Parchments are that very House which is made of Wood or Stones and yet no man will say that the Testator spake falsly or obscurely Likewise our blessed Saviour having sanctified the Elements by his words and prayers gave them to his Disciples as Seals of the New Testament whereby they were as certainly secured of those rich and precious Legacies which he left to them as Children are of their Fathers Lands and Inheritance by Deeds and Instruments signed and delivered for that purpose 6. To the Sacred Records we may add the judgment of the Primitive Church For those Orthodox and holy Doctors of our holier Religion those great Lights of the Catholick Church do all clearly constantly and unanimously conspire in this That the presence of the Body of Christ in the Sacrament is only mystick and spiritual As for the entire annihilation of the substance of the Bread and the Wine or that new and strange Tenet of Transubstantiation they did not so much as hear or speak any thing of it Nay the constant stream of their Doctrine doth clearly run against it how great soever are the brags and pretences of the Papists to the contrary And if you will hear them one by one I shall bring some of their most noted passages only that our labour may not be endless by rehearsing all that they have said to our purpose on this subject 7. I shall begin with that holy and ancient Doctor Justin Martyr who is one of the first after the Apostles times whose undoubted Writings are come to us What was believed at Rome and elsewhere in his time concerning this holy mystery may well be understood out of these his words After that the Bishop hath prayed and blessed and the people said Amen those whom we call Deacons or Ministers give to every one of them that are present a portion of the Bread and Wine and that food we call the Eucharist for we do not receive it as ordinary Bread and Wine They received it as bread yet not as common bread And a little after By this food digested our flesh and bloud are fed and we are taught that it is the Body and Bloud of Jesus Christ Therefore the substance of the Bread remains and remains corruptible food even after the Consecration which can in no wise be said of the immortal Body of Christ For the flesh of Christ is not turned into our flesh neither doth it nourish it as doth that food which is Sacramentally called the Flesh of Christ But the Flesh of Christ feeds our souls unto eternal life 8. After the same manner it is written by that holy Martyr Irenaeus Bishop much about the same time The bread which is from the earth is no more common bread after the invocation of God upon it but is become the Eucharist consisting of two parts the one earthly and the other heavenly There would be nothing earthly if the substance of the bread were removed Again As the grain of wheat falling in the ground and dying riseth again much increased and then receiving the word of God becomes the Eucharist which is the Body and Bloud of Christ So likewise our bodies nourished by it laid in the ground and dissolved shall rise again in their time Again We are fed by the Creature but it is he himself that gives it he hath ordained and appointed that Cup which is a Creature and his Bloud also and that Bread which is a Creature and also his Body And so when the Bread and the Cup are blessed by Gods Word they become the Eucharist of the Body and Bloud of Christ and from them our bodies receive nourishment and increase Now that our flesh is fed and encreased by the natural body of Christ cannot be said without great impiety by themselves that hold Transubstantiation For naturally nothing nourisheth our bodies but what is made flesh and bloud by the last digestion which it would be blasphemous to say of the incorruptible body of Christ Yet the sacred Elements which in some manner are and are said to be the body and bloud of Christ yield nourishment and encrease to our bodies by their earthly nature in such sort that by vertue also of the heavenly and spiritual food which the faithful receive by means of the material our bodies are fitted for a blessed Resurrection to immortal glory 9. Tertullian who flourished about the two hundredth year after Christ when as yet he was Catholick and acted by a pious zeal wrote against Marcion the Heretick who amongst his other impious opinions taught that Christ had not taken of the Virgin Mary the very nature and substance of a humane body but only the outward forms and appearances out of which Fountain the Romish Transubstantiators seem to have drawn their Doctrine of accidents abstracted from their subject hanging in the air that is subsisting on nothing Tertullian disputing against this wicked Heresie draws an Argument from the Sacrament of the Eucharist to prove that Christ had not a Phantastick and imaginary but a true and natural body thus The figure of the Body of Christ proves it to be natural for there can be no figure of a Ghost or a Phantasm But saith he Christ having taken the Bread and given it to his Disciples made it his Body by saying This is my Body that is the figure of my Body Now it could not have been a figure except the body were real for a meer appearance an imaginary Phantasm is not capable of a figure Each part of this Argument is true and contains a necessary Conclusion For 1. The bread must remain bread otherwise Marcion would have returned the Argument against Tertullian saying as the
mortal to save us mortals so he might by a thing visible fitly represent to us a thing invisible Some receive the Sacred Sign at the Lords Table to their Salvation and some to their Ruine but the thing signified is life to every man and death to none whoever receives it is united as a member to Christ the head in the Kingdom of Heaven for the Sacrament is one thing and the efficacy of it another For the Sacrament is received with the mouth but the grace thereof feeds the inward man And as the first is turned into our substance when we eat it and drink it so are we made the Body of Christ when we live piously and obediently Therefore the Faithful do well and truly receive the body of Christ if they neglect not to be his members and they are made the Body of Christ if they will live of his Spirit All these agree not in the least with the new Doctrine of Rome and as little with that opinion they attribute to Paschasius and therefore he is rejected as erroneous by some Romish Authors who writ four and six hundred years after him But they should have considered that they condemned not only Rabanus but together with him all the Doctors of the Primitive Church 32. Johannes Erigena our Country-man whom King Alfred took to be his and his Childrens Tutor and to credit the new founded University of Oxford while he lived in France where he was in great esteem with Charles the Bald wrote a Book concerning the Body and Bloud of our Lord to the same purpose as Rabanus and back'd it with clear Testimonies of Scripture and of the Holy Fathers But entring himself into the Monastery of Malmsbury as he was interpreting the Book of Dyonisius about the heavenly Hierarchy which he translated into Latine and withal censuring the newly-hatcht Doctrine of the Carnal Presence of Christ in the Eucharist he was stabb'd with Pen knives by some unworthy Schollars of his set on by certain Monks though not long after he was by some others numbred among Holy Martyrs 33. Walasridus Strabo about the same time wrote on this manner Therefore in that Last Supper whereat Christ was with his Disciples before he was betrayed after the solemnities of the ancient Passeover he gave to his Disciples the Sacrament of his Body and Bloud in the substance of Bread and Wine and instructed us to pass from carnal to spiritual things from earthly to heavenly things and from shadows to the substance 34. As for the opinion of Bertram otherwise called Ratramnus or Ratramus perhaps not rightly it is known enough by that Book which the Emperour Charles the Bald who loved and honoured him as all good men did for his great learning and piety commanded him to write concerning the Body and Bloud of our Lord. For when men began to be disturbed at the Book of Paschasius some saying one thing and some another the Emperour being moved by their disputes propounded himself two questions to Bertram 1. Whether what the Faithful eat in the Church be made the Body and Bloud of Christ in Figure and in Mystery 2. Or whether that natural body which was born of the Virgin Mary which suffered died and was buried and now sitteth on the right hand of God the Father be it self dayly received by the mouth of the Faithful in the Mystery of the Sacrament The first of these Bertram resolved Affirmatively the second Negatively and said that there was as great a difference betwixt those two bodies as betwixt the earnest and that whereof it is the earnest It is evident saith he that that Bread and Wine are figuratively the Body and Bloud of Christ According to the substance of the Elements they are after the Consecration what they were before For the Bread is not Christ substantially If this mystery be not done in a figure it cannot well be called a Mystery The Wine also which is made the Sacrament of the Bloud of Christ by the Consecration of the Priest shews one thing by its outward appearance and contains another inwardly For what is there visible in its outside but only the substance of the Wine These things are changed but not according to the material part and by this change they are not what they truly appear to be but are some thing else besides what is their proper being For they are made spiritually the Body and Bloud of Christ not that the Elements be two different things but in one respect they are as they appear Bread and Wine and in another the Body and Bloud of Christ Hence according to the visible Creature they feed the body but according to the vertue of a more excellent substance they nourish and sanctifie the souls of the Faithful Then having brought many Testimonies of holy Scripture and the ancient Fathers to confirm this he at last prevents that Calumny which the followers of Paschasius did then lay on the Orthodox as though they had taught that bare signs figures and shadows and not the Body and Bloud of Christ were given in the Sacrament Let it not be thought saith he because we say this that therefore the Body and Bloud of Christ are not received in the Mystery of the Sacrament where Faith apprehends what it believes and not what the eyes see for this meat and drink are spiritual feed the soul spiritually and entertain that life whose fulness is eternal For the question is not simply about the real truth or the thing signified being present without which it could not be a Mystery but about the false reality of things subsisting in imaginary appearances and about the Carnal Presence 35. All this the Fathers of Trent and the Romish Inquisitors could not brook and therefore they utterly condemned Bertram and put his Book in the Catalogue of those that are forbidden But the Professors of Doway judging this proceeding much too violent and therefore more like to hurt than to advance the Roman Cause went another and more cunning way to work and had the approbation of the Licencers of Books and the Authors of the Belgick Index expurgatorius That Book of Bertram say they having been already Printed several times read by many and known to all by its being forbidden may be suffered and used after it is corrected for Bertram was a Catholick Priest and a Monk in the Monastery of Corbie esteemed and beloved by Charles the Bald. And being we bear with many errors in Ancient Catholick Authors and lessen and excuse them and by some cunning device behold the good mens fidelity often deny them and give a more commodious sense when they are objected to us in our disputes with our Adversaries we do not see why Bertram should not also be amended and used with the same Equity lest Hereticks cast us in the teeth that we burn and suppress those Records of Antiquity that make for them And as we also fear
lest not only Hereticks but also stubborn Catholicks read the Book with the more greediness and cite it with the more confidence because it is forbidden and so it doth more harm by being prohibited than if it was left free What patch then will they sow to amend this in Bertram Those things that differ are not the same that Body of Christ which died and rose again and is become immortal dies no more being eternal and impassable But that which is celebrated in the Church is temporal not eternal is corruptible and not incorruptible To this last mentioned passage they give a very commodious sense namely that it should be understood of the corruptible species of the Sacrament or of the Sacrament it self and the use of it which will last no longer than this world If this will not do it may not be amiss to leave it all out to blot out visibly and write invisibly And this What the Creatures were in substance before the Consecration they are still the same after it must be understood according to the outward appearance that is the accidents of the Bread and Wine Though they confess that then Bertram knew nothing of those accidents subsisting without 〈◊〉 substance and many other things which thi◠latter age hath added out of the Scriptures wit◠as great truth as subtilty How much easier had it been at one stroke to blot out the whole Book And so make short work with it as the Spanish Inquisitors did i◠their Index expurgat Let the whole Epistle say they of Udalricus Bishop of Ausburg be blotted out cencerning the single life of the Clergy and let the whole Book of Bertram the Priest about the Body and Bloud of the Lord be supprest What is this but as Arnobius said against the Heathen to intercept publick Records and fear the Testimoy of the Truth For as for that which Sixtus Senensis and Possevin affirm That that Book of the Body and Bloud of the Lord was writ by Oecolampadius under the name of Bertram it is so great an untruth that a greater cannot be found 36. We are now come to the tenth Century wherein besides those many Sentences of Catholick Fathers against Innovaters in what concerns the Body and Bloud of Christ collected by Herigerus Abbas Lobiensis we have also an ancient Easter Homily in Saxon English which then used to be read publickly in our Churches out of which we may gather what was then the Doctrine received amongst us touching this Point of Religion but chiefly out of that part wherein are shewn many differences betwixt the natural Body of Christ and the Consecrated Host For thus it teacheth the people There is a great difference betwixt that body wherein Christ suffered and that wherein the Host is consecrated That Body wherein Christ suffered was born of the Virgin Mary consisting of bloud and bones skin and nerves humane members and a rational soul But his spiritual body which we call the Host is made of many united grains of corn and hath neither bloud nor bones neither members nor soul Afterwards The Body of Christ which once died and rose again shall die no more but remains eternal and impassible but this Host is temporal and corruptible divided into parts broken with the teeth and swallowed down into the stomach Lastly this Mystery is a pledge and a figure The body of Christ is that very truth What is seen is bread but what is spiritually understood is life There is also another Sermon of Bishop Wulfinus to the Clergy bearing the title of a Synod of Priests wherein the same opinion and Doctrine is explained in this manner That Host is the Body of Christ not corporally but spiritually not that Body wherein he suffered but that Body whereof he spake when he consecrate◠the Bread and Wine into an Host Which to this day in the Church of England we hold to be a Catholick truth 37. And so hitherto we have produced the agreeing Testimonies of Ancient Fathers for a thousand years after Christ and have transcribed them more at large to make it appear to every one that is not blind that the true Apostolick Doctrine of this Mystery hath been universally maintained for so long by all men some few excepted who more than eight hundred years after Christ presumed to dispute against the ancient Orthodox Doctrine of the manner of Christs Presence and of his being received in the Sacrament though they durst not positively determine any thing against it Now what more concerns this Point we refer to the next Chapter lest this should be too long CHAP. VI. Shews more at large that the Doctrine and Practice of the Primitive Church is inconsistent with Transubstantiation and Answers the Romish Objections vainly alleadged out of Antiquity 1. MAny more Proofs out of Ancient Records might have been added to those we have hitherto brought for a thousand years but we desiring to be brief have omitted them in each Century As in the First After the holy Scriptures the Works of Clemens Romanus commended by the Papists themselves and those of St. Ignatius Bishop of Antioch and Martyr are much against Transubstantiation In the Second likewise St. Theophilus fourth Bishop of Antioch after Ignatius Athenagoras and Tatianus Scholars to Justin Martyr In the Third Clemens Alexandrinus Tutor to Origen and Minutius Felix a Christian Orator In the Fourth Eusebius Bishop of Cesarea Juvencus a Spanish Priest Macarius Egyptius St. Hilary Bishop of Poictiers Optatus Bishop of Milevis Eusebius Emissenus Gregorius Nazianzenus Cyrillus Alexandrinus Epiphanius Salaminensis St. Hierom Theophilus Alexandrinus and Gaudentius Bishop of Brixia In the Fifth Sedulius a Scotch Priest Gennadius Massiliensis and Faustus Bishop of Regium In the Sixth Fulgentius Africanus Victor Antiochenus Primasius Bishop and Procopius Gazeus In the Seventh Hesychius Priest in Jerusalem and Maximus Abbot of Constantinople In the Eighth Johannes Damascenus In the Ninth Nicephorus the Patriarch and Hincmarus Archbishop of Rhemes Lastly in the Tenth Fulbert Bishop of Chartres And to compleat all to these single Fathers we may add whole Councils of them as that of Ancyra of Neocesarea and besides the first of Nice which I have mentioned that of Laodicea of Carthage of Orleans the fourth of Toledo that of Bracara the sixteenth of Toledo and that of Constantinople in Trullo Out of all these appears most certain that the infection of the Doctrine of Transubstantiation was not yet spread over the Christian world but that the sound Doctrine of the Body and Bloud of Christ and of their true yet spiritual not carnal Presence in the Eucharist with the Elements still the same in substance after Consecration was every where owned and maintained And though the Fathers used both ways
of speaking that is that the Bread and Wine are the true Body and Bloud of Christ and that their substance still remaining they are Signs Types Resemblances and Pledges of them Images Figures Similitudes Representations and Samplers of them yet there was no cantrariety or diversity in the sense For they were not so Faithless as to believe that these are only naturall Elements or bare Signs and they were not of so gross and so dull an apprehension as not to distinguish betwixt the Sacramental and Mystick and the carnal and natural presence of Christ as it is now maintained by the Patrons of Transubstantiation For in this they understood no other change than that which is common to all Sacraments whereby the outward natural part is said to be changed into the inward and divine only because it represents it truly and efficaciously and makes all worthy Receivers partakers thereof and because by the vertue of the Holy Spirit and of Christ's holy institution the Elements obtain those divine Excellencies and Prerogatives which they cannot have of their own nature And this is it which was taught and believed for above a thousand years together by pious and learned Antiquity concerning this most holy Mystery 2. There are also some other things whereby we may understand that the Ancients did not belief Transubstantiation or that the presence of the Body and Bloud of Christ is so inseparably tyed to the accidents of Bread and Wine that Christ must needs be present as long as those accidents retain any resemblance of Bread and Wine even when they are not put to that use appointed by divine institution For it is certain that it was the custom of many of the Ancients to burn what remained of the Bread and Wine after the Comunion was ended And who can believe that any Christian should dare or be willing to burn his Lord and Saviour in Body and Bloud though it were never so much in his power Doubtless it would have been as horrid and detestable an action as was that of the perfidious Jews for Christians if they believed Transubstantiation to burn that very natural body which the Jews Crucified and which was born of the Virgin Mary Therefore those Christians who used anciently to burn those fragments of the Bread and remains of the Wine which were not spent in the celebration of the Sacrament were far enough from holding the present Faith and Doctrine of Rome The same appears further by the penalty threatned by the Canon to every Clergy-man by whose neglect a Mouse or any other Creature should eat the Sacrifice that is the Consecrated Bread And who but an Idiot a man deprived of his reason could ever believe that the natural Body of Christ can be gnawed and even eaten by Rats or any brute Creatures This sorely perplext the first maintainers of Transubstantiation who would invent any thing rather than own it possible well knowing how abominable it is and how dishonourable to Christian Religion Yet this is not inconsistent with the now Roman Faith nay it necessarily follows from the Tenet of Transubstantiation that the Body of Christ may be in the belly of a Mouse under the accidents of Bread And the contrary opinion is not only disowned now by the Papists but under pain of Excommunication forbidden by the Pope ever to be owned so that they must believe as an Article of Faith what is most abhorrent to Faith 3. But yet at last let us see what props these new builders pretend to borrow from Antiquity to uphold their Castle in the air Transubstantiation They use indeed to scrape together many Testimonies of the Fathers of the first and middle age whereby they would fain prove that those Fathers believed and taught the Transubstantiation of the Bread and Wine into the natural Body and Bloud of Christ just as the Roman Church at this day doth teach and believe We will therefore briefly examine them that it may yet more fully appear that Antiquity and all Fathers did not in the least favour the new Tenet of Transubstantiation but that that true Doctrin which I have set down in the begining of this book was constantly owned and preserved in the Church of Christ 4. Now almost all that they produce out of the Fathers will be conveniently reduced to certain heads that we may not be too tedious in answering each testimony by it self 5. To the first head belong those that call the Eucharist the Body and Bloud of Christ But I answer those Fathers explain themselves in many places and interpret those their expressions in such a manner that they must be understood in a Mystick and spiritual sense in that Sacraments usually take the names of those things they represent because of that resemblance which they have with them not by the reality of the thing but by the signification of the Mystery as we have shewn before out of St. Austin and others For no body can deny but that the things that are seen are signs and figures and those that are not seen the Body and Bloud of Christ And that therefore the nature of this mystery is such that when we receive the Bread and Wine we also together with them receive at the same time the body and Bloud of Christ which in the celebration of the holy Eucharist are as truly given as they are represented Hence came into the Church this manner of speaking the Consecrated Bread is Christs Body 6. We put in the second rank those places that say that the Bishops and Priests make the body of Christ with the sacred words of their mouth as St. Hierom speaks in his Epistle to Heliodorus and St. Ambrose and others To this I say that at the prayer and blessing of the Priest the common Bread is made Sacramental bread which when broken and eaten is the Communion of the body of Christ and therefore may well be called so Sacramentally For the bread as I have often said before doth not only represent the body of our Lord but also being received we are truly made partakers of that precious body For so saith S. Hier. The body and bloud of Christ is made at the Prayer of the Priest that is the Element is so qualified that being received it becomes the Communion of the Body and Bloud of Christ which it could not without the preceding Prayers The Greeks call this To prepare and to consecrate the Body of the Lord. As S. Chrysostam saith well These are not the works of mans power but still the operation of him who made them in the last Supper as for us we are only Ministers but be it is that sanctifies and changeth them 7. In the third place to what is brought out of the Fathers concerning the conversion change transmutation transfiguration and transelementation of the Bread and Wine in the Eucharist wherein the Papists do greatly glory boasting of the consent of
that by that food which he gives us we become his flesh Such is that of St. Austin Let us give thanks not only that we are made Christians but also made Christ Lastly such is that of B. Leo In that mystical distribution it is given us to be made his flesh Certainly if any man would wrangle and take advantage of these he might thereby maintain as well that we are Transubstantiated into Christ and Christs flesh into the Bread as that the Bread and Wine are Transubstantiated into his Body and Bloud But Protestants who scorn to play the Sophisters interpret these and the like passages of the Fathers with candour and ingenuity as it is most fitting they should For the expressions of Preachers which often have something of a Paradox must not be taken according to that harsher sound wherewith they at first strike the Auditors ears the Fathers spake not of any Transubstantiated bread but of the mystical and consecrated when they used those sorts of expressions and that for these Reasons 1. That they might extoll and amplifie the dignity of this Mystery which all true Christians acknowledge to be very great and peerless 2. That Communicants might not rest in the outward Elements but seriously consider the thing represented whereof they are most certainly made partakers if they be worthy Receivers 3. And lastly That they might approach so great a Mystery with the more zeal reverence and devotion And that those Hyperbolick expressions are thus to be understood the Fathers themselves teach clearly enough when they come to interpret them 9. Lastly Being the same holy Fathers who as the manner is to discourse of Sacraments speak sometimes of the Bread and Wine in the Lords Supper as if they were the very Body and Bloud of Christ do also very often call them Types Elements Signs the Figure of the Body and Bloud of Christ from hence it appears most manifestly that they were of the Protestants and not of the Papists opinion For we can without prejudice to what we believe of the Sacraments use those former expressions which the Papists believe do most favour them if they be understood as they ought to be Sacramentally But the latter none can use but he must thereby overthrow the groundless Doctrine of Transubstantiation these two the Bread is Transubstantiated into the Body and the Bread also is the Type the Sign the Figure of the body of Christ being wholly inconsistent For it is impossible that a thing that loseth its being should yet be the sign and representation of another neither can any thing be the Type and the Sign of it self 10. But if without admitting of a Sacramental sense the words be used too rigorously nothing but this will follow that the Bread and Wine are really and properly the very Body and Bloud of Christ which they themselves disown that hold Transubstantiation Therefore in this change it is not a newness of substance but of use and vertue that is produced which yet the Fathers acknowledged with us to be wonderful supernatural and proper only to Gods Omnipotency For that earthly and corruptible meat cannot become to us a spiritual and heavenly the Communion of the Body and Bloud of Christ without Gods especial power and operation And whereas it is far above Philosophy and Humane Reason that Christ from Heaven where alone he is locally should reach down to us the divine vertue of his Flesh so that we are made one body with him therefore it is as necessary as it is reasonable that the Fathers should tell us that we ought with singleness of heart to believe the Son of God when he saith This is my body and that we ought not to measure this high and holy Mystery by our narrow conceptions or by the course of nature For it is more acceptable to God with an humble simplicity of faith to reverence and embrace the words of Christ than to wrest them violently to a strange and improper sense and with curiosity and presumption to determine what exceeds the capacity of Men and Angels Thus much in general may suffice to answer those places of the Fathers which are usually brought in the behalf of Transubstantiation He that would have a larger refutation of those objections fetcht from Antiquity may read Hospinianus his History of the Sacrament and Antonius de Dominis in his Fifth Book of the Christian Commonwealth Chap. 6. and in his detection of the errors of Suarez Chap. 2. 11. That place of Ignatius cited by Theodoret out of the Epistle to the Smyrnenses where now it is not to be found and objected by some of the Romish Faith That the Hereticks Simoniani and Menandriani would have no Eucharistical Oblations because they denied the Sacrament to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ makes nothing for Transubstantiation as Bellarmine himself confesseth For saith he those Hereticks did not oppose the Sacrament of the Eucharist so much as the mystery of the Incarnation and therefore as Ignatius shews in that place they would deny that the Eucharist is the flesh of Christ that is as Theodoret interprets it that the divine Mysteries of Bread and Wine should be the signs of a real Body of Christ truly existing because they would not own that Christ had taken flesh And so lest they should be forced to acknowledge the reality of the flesh of Christ they would wholly reject the Signs and Sacraments of it for the signs of the body being given the true body is given also because the substance and the type infer one another and a Phantasm or Illusion is not capable of a sign or representation 12. The words out of Justin Martyr whereby they would prove Transubstantiation do strongly disprove it For saith he as by the word of God our Saviour was incarnate so by the Prayers of Gods word the Eucharist is made whereby our bodies are nourished the Body and Bloud of Christ Now when Christ took humane flesh none could say without Heresie that he was Transubstantiated 13. Neither is that against the Protestants which is brought out of St. Cyprian though it be none of his of the bread changed not in appearance but in nature For he whoever it was took not the word nature in a strict sense or else he was contrary to Theodoret Gelasius and others above-mentioned who expresly deny that the bread should be thus changed But at large as nature is taken for use qualities and condition For by the infinite power of the Word the nature of the bread is so changed that what was before a bare Element becomes now a divine Sacrament but without any Transubstantiation as appears by what follows in the same period of the Humane and Divine Natures of Christ where the Manhood is not substantially changed into the Godhead except we will follow Eutyches the Heretick 14. The words of Cyril as the Roman Doctors fay are so clear for them that they admit
Christ 17. Let the Champions of Transubstantiation strut and vapour now with their two and thirty stout Seconds who have stood for them as they say before the time of Pope Innocent the Third For what Innocent the Third decreed and the Council of Trent defined that it was ever the perswasion of the Catholick Church that the Bread is so changed into the Body of Christ that the substance of the bread vanishing away only the flesh of Christ should remain under the accidents of the bread is so far from being true that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation not only as to the name but as to the thing it self is wholly destitute of the Patronage of Antiquity and left to shift for it self Alphonsus à Castro said that in ancient Writers mention was made very seldom of Transubstantiation had he said never it had been more true For so our Jesuites in England confessed That the business of Transubstantiation was not so much as toucht by the ancient Fathers which is very true as will appear more at large in the following Chapter CHAP. VII Of the Writers of the Eleventh and Twelfth Century from whom we may easily deduce and trace the History of Papal Transubstantiation 1. What manner of Popes they were in those times 2. The unhappy Age wherein Divines were divided about the Point of the Eucharist 3. The opinion of Fulbertus 4. Followed by his Disciple Berengarius who is opposed by others 5 6. The Doctrine of Berengarius defended 7. The roaring of Leo the Ninth against Berengarius 8. The Synod of Tours under Victor the Second which cleared Berengarius as free from Error 9. Pope Nicolas the Second gathers another Synod against Berengarius who is forced to make a wondrous kind of Recantation 10. The Authors of the ordinary Gloss censure the Recantation imposed on Berengarius 11. He saith that he was violently compelled to make it for fear of being put to death Lanfrancus and Guitmundus write against him 12. Of Pope Hildebrand and his Roman Council wherein Berengarius was again cited and condemned in vain 13. The Doctrine of St. Bernard approved 14. The Opinion of Rupertus 15. Lombard could define nothing of the Transubstantiation of the Bread and reasons poorly upon the independency of the accidents 16. Otho Frisingensis and those of his time confest that the Bread and Wine remain in the Eucharist 17. P. Blesensis and St. Eduensis were the first that used the word of Transubstantiation 18. Of the thirteenth Century wherein Pope Innocent the Third published his Decree of the Transubstantiation of the Bread and Wine into the Body and Bloud of Christ 19 and 20. The wonderful pride of Innocent the Third The Lateran Council determined nothing concerning that Point 21. The cruelty of the same Innocent who by the Rack and the Fire sought to establish his new Doctrine 22. What Gerson said of the Roman Church in his time Many more Inventions proceed from Transubstantiation Inextricable and unheard of questions 23. New Orders of Monks and of the School-men 24. Of their fine wrangling and disputing 25. The Sacrament abused most grosly by the Patrons of Transubstantiation 26 and 27. Holkot Aquinas Albertus Magnus and other Schoolmen though sometimes they be not for Transubstantiation yet they wholly submit to the Judgment of the Pope 28. Of the Council of Constance which took the Cup from the Laity 29. Cardinal Cameracensis denies that Transubstantiation can be proved by holy Scripture 30. Of the Council of Florence and the Instruction of the Armenians by Pope Eugenius the Fourth 31. The Papal Curse in the Council of Trent not to be feared The Conclusion of the Book 1. WE have proved it before that the Leprosie of Transubstantiation did not begin to spread over the body of the Church in a thousand years after Christ But at last the thousand years being expired and Satan loosed out of his Prison to go and deceive the Nations and compass the Camp of the Saints about then to the great damage of Christian Peace and Religion they began here and there to dispute against the clear constant and universal consent of the Fathers and to maintain the new-started opinion It is known to them that understand History what manner of times were then and what were those Bishops who then governed the Church of Rome Sylvester II John XIX and XX Sergius IV Benedictus VIII John XXI Benedict IX Sylvester III Gregory VI Damasus II Leo IX Nicolas II Gregory VII or Hildebrand who tore to pieces the Church of Rome with grievous Schisms cruel Wars and great Slaughters For the Roman Pontificat was come to that pass that good men being put by they whose Life and Doctrine was pious being oppressed none could obtain that dignity but they that could bribe best and were most ambitious 2. In that unhappy Age the Learned were at odds about the presence of the Body of Christ in the Sacrament some defending the ancient Doctrine of the Church and some the new-sprung up opinion 3. Fulbert Bishop of Chartres was Tutor to Berengarius whom we shall soon have occasion to speak of and his Doctrine was altogether conformable to that of the Primitive Church as appears clearly out of his Epistle to Adeodatus wherein he teacheth That the Mystery of Faith in the Eucharist is not to be lookt on with our bodily eyes but with the eyes of our mind For what appears outwardly Bread and Wine is made inwardly the Body and Bloud of Christ not that which is tasted with the mouth but that which is relish'd by the hearts affection Therefore saith he prepare the palate of thy Faith open the throat of thy Hope and inlarge the bowels of thy Charity and take that Bread of life which is the food of the inward man Again The perception of a divine taste proceeds from the faith of the inward man whilst by receiving the saving Sacrament Christ is received into the soul All this is against those who teach in too gross a manner that Christ in this Mystery enters carnally the mouth and stomach of the Receivers 4. Fulbert was followed by Berengarius his Scholar Archdeacon of Anger 's in France a man of great worth by the holiness both of his life and doctrine as Platina Vincentius Bergomensis and many more Witness this Encomium writ soon after his death by Hildebert Bishop of Mans a most learned man is thus recorded by our William of Malmsbury That Berengarius who was so admired Although his name yet lives is now expired H' out-lives himself yet a sad fatal day Him from the Church and State did snatch away O dreadful day why didst thou play the Thief And fill the world with ruine and with grief For by his death the Church the Laws and all The Clergies glory do receive a fall His sacred wisdom was too great for fame And the whole World 's too little for his name Which to its
reason that they are inseparable one from the other meer nonsense for as long as the accidents of the Bread i. e. the shaâ—â— and taste and colour c. remain in their proper being so long is the Body of Christ inseparably joyned with them wherefore if the accidents in their nature pass into the belly or are cast out by vomiting the Body of Christ it self must of necessity go along with them and for this cause pious souls I repeat their own words do frequently eat again with great reverence the parts of the Host cast out by vomiting Others answer also That a beast eats not the Body of Christ Sacramentally but accidentally as a man that should eat a Consecrated Host not knowing that it was consecrated 3. They inquire about musty and rotten Hosts and because the Body of Christ is incorruptible and not subject to putrefaction therefore they answer That the Hosts are never so and that though they appear as if they were yet in reallity they are not as Christ appeared as a Gardener though he was no Gardener 4. They demand concerning indigested Hosts which passing through the belly are cast into the draught or concerning those that are cast into the worst of sinks or into the dirt Whether such Hosts cease to be the Body of Christ And answer That whether they be cast into the Sink or the Privy as long as the appearances remain the Body of Christ is inseparable from tâ—â—â— And for the contrary opinion they say that it is not tenable and that it is not safe for any to hold it because the Pope hath forbid it should be maintained under pain of Excommunication Therefore the Modern Schoolmen add That if any should hold the contrary after the Popes determination he should be condemned by the Church of Rome that is Nay they hold it to be a Point of Faith which none may doubt of because the contrary Doctrine hath been condemned by Pope Gregory the Eleventh 5. They ask concerning the accidents whether the Body of Christ be under them when they are abstracted from their subject This is against Logick Or whether Worms be gendred or Mice nourished of accidents And this against Physick 6. Whether the Body of Christ can at the very same time move both upwards and downwards one Priest lifting up the Host and another setting it down And I know not how many more such thorny questions have wearied and non-plust them and all their School and brought them to such straights and extremities that they know not what to resolve nor what shifts to make And truly it had been very happy for Religion if as the Ancients never touched or mentioned Transubstantiation so latter times had never so much as heard of its name For God made his Sacrament upright as he did Man but about it they have sought out many inventions 25. Likewise this Transubstantiation hath given occasion to some most wicked and impious Wretches to abuse and profane most unworthily what they thought to be the Body of Christ For instances may be brought of some wicked Priests who for filthy lucre have sold some Consecrated Hosts to Jews and Sorcerers who have stabb'd and burnt them and used them for Witchcraft and Inchantments Nay we read that St. Lewis himself very ill advised in that gave once to the Turks and Saracens a consecrated Host as a pledge of his Promise and an assurance of Peace Now can any one who counts these things abominable perswade himself that our Blessed Saviour would have appointed that his most holy Body should be present in his Church in such a manner as that it should come into the hands of his greatest Enemies and the worst of Infidels and be eaten by Dogs and Rats and be vomited up burnt cast into Sinks and used for Magical Poysons and Witchcraft I mention these with horror and trembling and therefore abstain from raking any more in this dunghill 26. No wonder therefore if this new Doctrine of Innocent the Third being liable to such foul absurdities and detestable abuses few men could be perswaded in the fourteenth Century that the Body of Christ is really or by Transubstantiation in the Sacrament of the Altar as it is recorded by our Country-man Robert Holkot who lived about the middle of that Century As also Thomas Aquinas reports of some in his time who believed that after Consecration not only the accidents of the Bread but its substantial form remained And Albertus Magnus himself who was Thomas his his Tutor and writ not long after Innocent the Third speaks of Transubstantiation as of a doubtful question only Nay that it was absolutely rejected and opposed by many is generally known for the Anathema of Trent had not yet backt the Lateran Decree 27. As for the rest of the Schoolmen especially the modern who are as it were sworn to Pope Innocent's determination they use to express their belief in this matter with great words but neither pious nor solid in this manner The common opinion is to be embraced not because reason requires it but because it is determined by the Bishop of Rome Item That ought to be of greatest weight that we must hold with the holy Church of Rome about the Sacraments now it holds that the Bread is Transubstantiated into the Body and the Wine into the Bloud as it is clearly said Extra De fide summa Trinitate Cap. firmiter Again I prove that of necessity the Bread is changed into the Body of Christ for we must hold that declaration of faith which the Pope declares must be held Thus among the Papists if it be the pleasure of an imperious Pope as was Innocent the Third Doctrines of Faith shall now and then increase in bulk and number though they be such as are most contrary to holy Scripture though they were never heard of in the Primitive Church and though from them such consequences necessarily follow as are most injurious to Christ and his holy Religion For after Innocent the Third the Roman Faith was thus much increased by the determination of Pope Gregory the Eleventh that if it so happens the Body of Christ in the Consecrated Host may descend into a Rats belly or into a Privy or any such foul place 28. In the fifteenth Century the Council of Constance which by a Sacrilegious attempt took away the Sacramental Cup from the People and from the Priests when they do not officiate did wrongfully condemn Wiclif who was already dead because amongst other things he had taught with the Ancients That the substance of the Bread and wine remains materially in the Sacrament of the Altar and that in the same Sacrament no accidents of Bread and Wine remain without a substance Which two Assertions are most true 29. Cardinal Cameracencis who lived about the time of the Council of Constance doth not seem to own the Decree of Pope Innocent as