would have startled at as I said And can any Man think but that our Saviour would have more particularly instructed them in so high and wonderful a Mystery as the Papists make of it before he had delivered them his real Body to eat he knew well the weakness of their Faith Nor do we find St. Paul when he instructed the Corinthians concerning this Sacrament say any thing which might give them any apprehension of so difficult and sublime a Mystery as the Bread to be changed into Christ's very Body and that all which they saw felt tasted were only meer accidents remaining no Man can conceive how and 't were giddiness to believe unless they had been particularly and fully exprest by divine Authority then I grant we ought to believe it without hearkning to our Sense or Reason as we do other Mysteries Let the Papists shew us in Scripture their Transubstantiation and accidents thus remaining and we will believe all as firmly as they I do not require their fine School-word Transubstantiation but to shew any expression which clearly imports it and that shall suffice But to believe contrary to all Sense to all Reason without divine Affirmation were sensless indeed not faithless no Scripture requiring this Faith And that Scripture in St. Iohn which seems to say most towards it the Papists themselves take as we do in a spiritual sence not literal What shall we say to these Will-worshippers Will-believers 'T is meer Will-godliness for gain This new-found Sacrifice with new-found Pargatory brings store of Mass-grist to their Mill. This we readily and with cause believe and so do they The Papists then taking that passage in St. Iohn in a spiritual sense as we do they have nothing in Scripture for their Transubstantiation but those words This is my Body which taken barely in themselves can signifie no more a substantial change than I am the Bread And if we add to the words the Circumstances of the Institution or the relation to the former Types or to our present Sacrament of Baptism in none of these we find the least Motive to a substantial change of the Bread but quite contrary as I have shewed you Yet I pray you let us see what strange stuff and confused kind of business the Papists make with this their Transubstantiation We will talk a little with them in their own Language Well my Friends let us hear how you order this your Transubstantiation Our Saviour takes Bread in his hand and says This is my Body I desire you to expound to me in a plain Catechistical way how you understand these words and to save you as much trouble as I can I will tell you my weak apprehension of them if right the Work is done if wrong I pray you instruct me better I humbly conceive when a Man takes a thing in his hand and says This if a Staff he means This Staff if a Stone he means This Stone And so when our Saviour took Bread in his hand and said This I conceive according to the literal sense he means This Bread is my Body how can I conceive otherwise No say the Papists Christ cannot mean so for this would Logically infer a direct contradiction for Bread whilst Bread cannot be Flesh and Bones Flesh is not Bread To say then This Bread is Flesh is the same as to say This Bread is not Bread a flat contradiction How my Friends do you stand upon your Logick-Inferences and deny the plain literal meaning of Christ's words because your Logick tells you it cannot be It seems you are now become the unbelieving Hereticks But how then do you understand This is What is What doth Christ here affirm is his Body The Papists answer He means no real determinate thing but something in imagination only The word This must here be taken as an Individuum vagum that is an imaginary Species of Bread in abstracto communi which is a meer School-conception that hath no other being than in the brain of Man This Individuum vagum we know not what is Christ's Body Good Reader Do you understand them I believe no more than I do that is not at all What strange Whimsies are these to enter into the heads of Men that would pass for learned and serious and in a matter of so great weight Beloved Beware lest any man spoil you through Philosophy and vain deceit after the tradition of men after the rudiments of the world and not after Christ Col. ii 8. Did Christ ever instruct the Apostles concerning this your Individuum vagum or of accidents of Bread appearing without the substance of Bread Not a tittle of iâ— How then should these abstruse School-notions come into such mens illiterate Heads They then must needs understand our Saviour according to the measure of their capacity Wherefore when our Saviour took Bread in his hand shewed it them and said This is my Body they having no notion of Individuum vagum nor of accidents of Bread hanging in the Air without the substance of Bread to support them things to be admired by all Men understood by no Man nor believed without express plain and divine revelation which they had not they must needs understand this Bread real Bread And all Mâ—n understanding that Bread could not be our Saviour's real carnal Body when our Saviour said This is my Body they must needs understand This represents my Body their Capacity could not understand it otherwise nor their Faith believe it otherwise unless our Saviour had before fully instructed them which he never did but quite contrary Ioh. vi told them The words that I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life surely then to be understood in a spiritual and not a carnal sence Had Christ said This Bread I will change into my Body that in a miraculous manner it may enter in at your mouthes and pass down into your breasts I hope the Apostles then would and we now should by God's Grace readily believe it I believe Christ to be God and can do what-ever he pleases And I humbly conceive Christ would have made some such necessary Paraphrase on his words to make the Apostles and us understand his meaning for certainly without some such divine Declaration no Man could ever have conceived much less have believed such a Mystery as the Papists make of it I am sure what-ever we find in Scripture relating to this Sacrament makes against the Papists St. Paul instructing the Corinthians concerning this Sacrament had likewise a fair opportunity yea as I humbly conceive I may say a necessary obligation to declare unto them this Papal hidden mystery had he believed as they do a real change of the Bread into Christ's Body I say a necessary obligation for St. Paul Acts xx 26. expresses it to be blood-guiltiness if he did not declare unto them all the Counsel of God That is all mysteries necessary for the Salvation of their Souls it was necessary then
Papists farther Object Many damnable Heresies may arise which the Fathers of that Council being no Prophets could not foresee I grant it What then why then it will be necessary to suppress them I grant this also and earnestly desire it Suppress whatever is new set up but set up no more new as necessary to be believed This is the Point we still hold to Men were saved and may still be saved without believing more Till they can confute me in this their talk is vain and without weight And thus all both Men and Women may be able to stop the mouth of Papists with their own Argument when they cry unto you in their absurd wonted manner Hear the Church You must believe as the Church believes answer Yes you do believe as the Church believes as the Church and Council of Nice believed you hold every Article of their Creed 'T is you Papists who believe not as the Church and Council of Nice believed you have altered the Faith and have built a great deal of Wood Hay Stubble upon the old foundation which can never abide the trial of Scripture From whence 't is evident you are the Hereticks for you have wilfully taken up to your selves several Opinions contrary to Scripture which you profess to be the Word of God and therefore you are according to St. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 condemned of your selves for you acknowledge the rule and yet go on in your will-worship contrary to the rule Yet notwithstanding all that I have said here I declare this When there are several Opinions and Disputes in a Nation about Matters in Religion the Supream Magistrates and Church-Governours may in Prudence think it necessary for the peace of Church and State to require all that are to enter into places of trust in Church or State to subscribe to such Articles as they conceive most conducing thereto and he that refuses they may refuse him no man is injured by this either in his Salvation or Life or Liberty or Estate he is as free as he was before I hold only to this That no man be required to believe any thing as necessary to Salvation but what is plainly contained in Scripture A Tract concerning the Holy Sacrament of the Lord's Supper which I promised in the Preface Good Reader YOu must first understand What it is to take a saying in a Literal or a Figurative sence For example If a Man take a Stick in his hand and say This is my Staff you take this in a Literal sence that is you take it according to the bare words and usual meaning of them that this Staff is his he is the owner of it But if he say This is my Horse you see that Stick is not a real Horse therefore you conceive he means not a real Horse but that as a Horse is used for a help to carry a Man on his way so this Stick helps to support his Body and carry him on his way This we call a Figurative sence that is signifying something otherwise than the bare words usually express For the word Horse is not here taken as usually for a real Horse but for another thing used as a Horse Now all Men that reade the Scripture find it necessary to take many things spoken there in a Figurative sence for it would be contrary to all Reason and Religion to take them in a Literal sence As when our Saviour said I am the Door no Man conceives Christ to be a real Door and therefore he takes it in a Figurative sence by way of comparison to a Door that as a Door is the entrance into a House so Christ tells us he is the Door the entrance for us into Heaven no Man can enter there but by him and his Merits So Christ said I am the Bread that came down from Heaven no Man takes this in a Literal sence according to the usual meaning of the word Bread for real Bread but by way of comparison as Bread nourishes our Bodies so Christ is come down from Heaven to nourish our Souls Again Christ taking Bread in his hand said This is my Body We know that Bread is not Christ's real Body we therefore conceive Christ means a comparison that as this Bread is broken and bruised under your teeth and so passes down into your breast to nourish your Body so my Body shall be broken bruised and killed that by my Sufferings and Death your Souls may be nourished to eternal Life In all reason we must conclude thus unless Christ had said something more to make us think otherwise for we have no other way to understand any thing Christ spoke but according to the Rule of Reason which God hath given us to speak and understand all things But the Papists who understand the former words I am the Bread in a Figurative sence meerly because their Sense and Reason tells them that Christ is not real Bread yet will needs understand these words This is my Body in a Literal sence That the Bread is made Christ's real substantial Body though their Sense and Reason tells them 't is still real Bread for which I desire them to give me a satisfying Reason for in all appearance both Affirmations are of the same nature Certainly then they must shew us some great Motive that induces them to take the two forms of speech so very differently being in themselves both alike First From Reason no Motive can possibly be found for by Reason 't is equally hard to understand Christ to be Bread as Bread to be Christ. Secondly If according to Religion we captivate our Reason in obedience to Faith 't is as easie to believe Bread to be Christ as Christ to be Bread And 't is very impertinent here to talk of God's infinite Power how that can effect things impossible to Reason for we most readily grant it And therefore the Papists do as falsly as foolishly accuse us of Unbelief and that we are wholly guided by our Reason and deny the Bread to be Christ's Body because our Reason cannot comprehend it Do not we believe God created all the World of nothing three Persons to be one God God and Man to be one Person Christ Sure these are harder to believe than that God can change Bread into his Body and we would more readily believe this than the former highest Mysteries had we this miraculous change as plainly set forth in Scripture as those Mysteries greater and harder to be believed Let them then plainly shew us in Scripture that Christ changed the Bread into his Body and we shall as readily believe it as they but they barely tell us Christ said of the Bread This is my Body and we again tell them Christ said I am the Bread They require us to believe the first to be a miraculous change and we likewise require them to believe the second to be as miraculous a change they refuse the second so we refuse the first why not This is
the-flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood ye have no life in you Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life and I will raise him up at the last day For my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I in him What can be more plainly exprest even to the meanest capacity of men Good Reader I suppose you conceive that here we are hard beset for these words certainly carry far more appearance for their transubstantiating the Bread into real Flesh than the bare saying This is my Body which as I shewed you is a common figurative way of speaking in Scripture But yet as our Saviour saith If ye have faith ye may say unto this mountain be thou removed and it shall be done So you shall see this their mountain of Objection presently removed Come then my Papist Doctors Will you have these words in St. Iohn literal down right literal without any figure I beseeeh you then tell me What becomes of all the Laity in your Church Will you send them into Hell Body and Soul for ever to make good this new-found Transubstantiation Doth not our Saviour here expresly declare That Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his bloud ye have no life in you Eat and Drink mark and Drink And do the Laity eat and drink literally no certainly How then shall they enter into life Must none but the Priests be saved Poor miserable Laity I am sure you must literally be damned for ever to save Transubstantiation a sad doctrine for you whatever becomes of your Priests I fear they will fare little better that thus blindly lead you into this fatal ditch of damnation Consider I beseech you how they delude and gull you They press these words of St. Iohn upon the ignorant Laity My flesh is meat indeed to perswade them 't is real flesh in the Sacrament but when we press them with those words Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his bloud ye have no life in you thereby shewing That 't is necessary for all to drink the blood as well as eat the flesh then they say all here is to be taken in a spiritual sence of eating and drinking by Faith Wherein they say truly but yet shew they deal falsly with you making you believe all here is to be taken literally whereas in truth all is to be taken spiritually and they compelled to acknowledge it so by their unlucky Decree of taking the Cup from the Laity Had it not been for this good God how would they have dunn'd our ears with this Chapter of St. Iohn there would have been no enduring their lowd clamors for their literal sence But now I beseech you calmly to consider this passage in St. Iohn Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his bloud ye have no life in you Who so eateth my flesh and drinketh my bloud hath eternal life and I will raise him up at the last day These words carry far more appearance of Christ's real Flesh in the Sacrament than those in St. Matthew This is my Body which as I said before is a figurative way of speaking very frequent in Scripture and no body startled at it but when our Saviour pronounced those words in St. Iohn most that heard them were very much startled and disordered at them yea many Disciples left following our Saviour upon them crying This is an hard saying who can bear it for really it sounds very hard if you take the bare words in themselves without our Saviour's Comment upon them whereof we shall speak by and by This then is the thing I pray you to consider if these words in St. Iohn which carry so much a greater appearance of real flesh in the Sacrament yet may and ought to be taken and are taken by the Papists themselves in a Spiritual sence Is it not a most unreasonable and senceless thing in the Papists to cry out upon us for taking those words in St. Matthew This is my Body in a spiritual sence It is just the same as for a man that refuses to take a guilded shilling for pure Gold 〈◊〉 out on me because I will not accept of a piece of plain brass for pure gold But setting aside the Papists who take all Scriptures right or wrong as they serve most for their turn and as they blasphemously call the Scripture a nose of wax so use it and shape all to their own â—ancy let us now see our Saviour's own Comment on his own words that is the sure way to have the right sence of them I pray you then observe how our Saviour in this Chapter v. 47. just before he began this discourse prepares his Disciples for the spiritual understanding of what follows by saving Verily verily I say unto you He that believeth on me hath everlasting life Which plainly shews that the words he was going to speak were to be apprehended by Faith and not in a carnal way for as he saith in this 47 Verse with a double asseveration Verily verily I say unto you He that believeth on me hath everlasting life So Verse 53. Verily verily I say unto you Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood ye have no life in you Here he affirms the very same of eating his flesh as before of believing in him shewing that our eating must be by Faith and not carnally And then again after our Saviour saw that many were offended at those words of Eating his flesh to take them off from any gross carnal apprehension he tells them The words that I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life After that our Saviour had thus instructed his Disciples in the true spiritual sence of his words we find it so rectified their Understandings as that when he administred to them this holy Sacrament and gave them that which figuratively he called his Body to eat not one of them in the least scrupled at it which doubtless some one or other would have done had they imagined our Saviour had given his real Flesh. They who startled at hearing it would much more at acting it for their Faith was not yet so strong as to believe such a miraculous Transubstantiation as the Papists fancy and that his whole Body should enter in at the narrow circle of their mouthes For we see how weakly they staggered at our Saviour's Resurrection though forewarned of it several times by him and they had seen him also raise several others from the dead yet would not believe his Resurrection till they saw him and scarce then All which plainly shews they took the Bread as real Bread according to Christ's Institution in remembrance of his Passion and Death and not as his very Body entring in at their mouthes into their breasts which doubtless some of them
whatsoever Wherefore I cannot but conclude that Saint Austin was of the same Faith with the Catholick Church of his time and that the Papists are of a very different Faith from him and them I know full well that the Papists do alledge another place of Saint Austin's where he seems to speak somewhat in conformity to their Faith as in his Explication or Paraphrase on the Thirty third Psalm Where discoursing of those words Ferebatur manibus suis He was carried in his own hands He applies those words unto Christ saying That they could not be literally meant of any body else because Christ only bare himself in his own hands when he deliver'd with his own hands his Body in the Sacrament to his Disciples To this I could answer That if St. Austin doth here seem to contradict what he had proved before it follows from hence that we cannot take the authority of any Father for our Faith because this learned and eminent Father as well as many others seems to contradict himself But I will not make so injurious an answer to so worthy a Father of the Church for in truth he doth not here contradict in the least what he said before as I shall now make appear Saint Austin in his Epistle to Dardanus doth professedly discourse the point in a Doctrinal way and doth not only give his Opinion but the reasons that so enforce it as that it can't be otherwise But it is quite another thing to discourse by way of Paraphrase as Saint Austin doth on that Psalm we may well affirm that he used the common paraphrastical liberty which is very frequent among the Fathers especially the more ancient and chiefly in Origen whom I may well call the origine of such Libertin discourse that great luxuriant Wit making flourishes upon every word often used Expressions too too light for the weighty sence of Holy Scripture but his great Wit and Learning having obtain'd great reverence these things passed pardonable in him and became too much imitated by succeeding Doctors And therefore 't is no wonder that Saint Austin not much unlike him in luxuriancy of Wit was somewhat like him in the way of Allegories and Paraphrases wherein men do not so much intend the clear positive Doctrine as flourishing circumlocutions and variety of Phansies But we may the better excuse Saint Austin in this if we take in Saint Austin's rule That it is no strange thing or false thing to affirm that of the signs which belong to the thing signified as he exemplifies in our Saviour himself Non dubitavit dicere hoc est corpus meum cùm signum daret corporis sui Our Saviour doubted not to affirm to his Disciples and say This is my body when he gave unto them the sign of his Body which was the Bread he blessed brake and gave unto them And so St. Austin doubted not to affirm and say That Christ bare his Body in his own hands when he bare Bread which was the sign of his Body And so those words He was carried in his own hands may be said to be literally verified of our Saviour secundùm quendum modum after a certain manner the Phrase St. Austin useth upon this very subject in another place not literally in the exact sence And the meaning is only this These words He was carried in his own hands cannot be so properly or so literally understood of David or any other man as of Christ for David in no sence can be said to carry himself in his own hands our Saviour may because he carried Bread the sign of his Body in his own hands And now for the clear conviction of the Papists and for the full satisfaction of every impartial man It is evident Saint Austin himself doth in this very place plainly declare He meant no otherwise than I have exprest him For after he had discoursed much of this business he concludes thus Ipse se portabat quodammodo cùm diceret Hoc est corpus meum He bare himself in his own hands after a certain manner when he said This is my body which as I said plainly shews he meant not our Saviour did really carry himself in his hands but as he saith Quodammodo after a certain manner which Quodammodo had been very improper had our Saviour really carried himself in his own hands But put the case Saint Austin had not here added this word Quodammodo after a certain manner yet any man that is the least verst in matters of Learning will certainly be far more moved in his Opinion by what Saint Austin Doctrinally and Demonstratively affirms than by what he Paraphrastically discourses which is the slightest way of discoursing in the world I will not here urge against the Papists that place of Saint Austin I mentioned but now That Christ doubted not to say to his Disciples This is my body when he gave them the sign of his Body because he doth not there purposely dispute this business but brings in that occasionally to prove somewhat else Yet from hence it is apparent enough that Saint Austin understood the Bread in the Lord's Supper to be only a sign of Christ's Body and not his real Body as the Papists believe But I return to the business in hand There is a passage in Scripture usually objected against this Argument of St. Austin's That our Saviour came into the Room where his Disciples were the doors being shut Which seems to imply That a glorified Body doth not require such spaces and dimensions of place as mortal Bodies because our Saviour's Body entred the Room passing through the material Body of Stone Wood or the like as they would have it This Objection is easily answered That no Man is able to affirm How our Saviour's Body entred the Room it being not expressed in Scripture but this is clear That our Saviour might divide the Walls or Doors or Roof or Floor and so make way for his Body to enter and yet his Disciples not perceive it As our Saviour passed through the midst of the Iews and they perceived it not when they carried him to the brow of the Hill to cast him down head long no Man supposes from hence That our Saviour passed through the Bodies of the Iews but by them unseen Wherefore it not being declared in Scripture how he entred how can any Argument be drawn from hence of our Saviour's Body passing through other Bodies and consequently how doth this confute or weaken St. Austin's Argument Certainly not at all I will set down one passage more of another memorable Father and Bishop Theodoret who disputing with an Heretick named Eranistes that denied our Saviour to have a real humane substantial Body after his Resurrection and affirmed That his Humanity was wholly swallowed up in the Divinity Theodoret arguing against him Dia◠2. Ch. 24. affirmeth That as the Bread after the Consecration in the Lord's Supper is not changed in form and substance but remains the very
for St. Paul to declare to the Corinthians this great and hidden mystery if there were any But he declares the contrary telling them it was Bread which they did eat 1 Cor. xi 26 As often as ye eat this bread and the Bread is eaten after the words of Consecration If then it be Bread when we eat there is no change at all And I pray you let us observe also St. Paul's manner of Consecration First he tells them that he delivered unto them what he had received of the Lord to shew his fidelity in the business then proceeds to the form of consecrating the Bread And when he comes to the Cup he saith This Cup is the new Testament in my blood Mark I pray you He doth not say This Wine but This Cup. I here ask the Papists is this a literal or a figurative Speech If literal then the Cup is changed into the Blood so saith the letter Wine is not here mentioned And if you talk of God's Power God can as easily change the Cup into his Blood as the Wine The Papists then will needs have a figure in this Consecration so we in that of the Bread for it were absurd to take one literally and the other figuratively And I presume the Papists will not dare to say that St. Paul here prevaricated in delivering what he received from the Lord yet St. Paul's words differ somewhat from Christ's but if we take them figuratively they are in effect the same which plainly shews all here is figurative The Papists then having no Scripture expressing any substantial change of the Bread and we having a Scripture clearly expressing that it remains Bread after Consecration I suppose their figment of Transubstantiation is sufficiently confuted For had we ten Scriptures declaring the same they were of no more force than one In Humane Evidences many are of more weight than one because Man may erre God cannot Yet there want not other Scriptures strongly implying a denial of Christ's Corporal presence in the Sacrament First Our Saviour at the Institution of this blessed Sacrament commands his Disciples to celebrate it in Remembrance of him and it seems very incongruous to desire men to remember that person who is present before them Secondly Acts iii. 21. St. Peter tells us That the heavens must receive Christ until the times of restitution of all things And therefore we see Acts vii 56. when he was pleased to shew himself unto that blessed Martyr St. Stephen he did not descend from Heaven but opened the Heavens and strengthened the eyes of Stephen to behold him at that great distance Thirdly Ioh. xvi Where our blessed Saviour discourses largely to his Disciples of going â—rom them and their great Sorrow caused thereby he uses several Arguments to allay it and in conclusion promises to send them the Holy Ghost the Comforter of whom they had then but a very obscure notion and could not receive any present comfort by it But had our Saviour promised to return again presently and be daily in the celebration of his last Supper which we find was daily celebrated by the Apostles this would doubtless have been the greatest comfort imaginable to them Who then can doubt but that our Saviour would have given them this great comfort by telling them so had he intended any such thing as the Papists groundlesly believe But of this we find not one tittle 'T is a common saying Facilè credimus quod volumus We easily believe the thing we desire Wherefore were there I do not say a clear expression but any good intimation of that the Papists would have us believe what Christian would not most gladly and readily catch at it and believe it with all his heart For sure it would be a great and daily comfort to us to go to the Altar of our blessed Saviour Jesus that died for us there corporally present as they believe and there with Mary Magdalen adore him kiss those blessed feet that were pierced for us wash them with our tears and receive them and his whole Body into our breasts If it be said All this may as well be done now by Faith I grant a lively Faith of this affords great comfort to the Soul but whil'st our Soul is united to the Body we cannot so refine and spiritualize the affections of it but that we shall still hanker after some bodily comfort And I verily believe the bodily part of the Papists Devotions to this Sacrament as also to the worshipping of Saints with their Shrines Reliques Pictures and such like is a great means to gain People to their Religion To worship God in Spirit and Truth only though it be the only true Christian Worship yet it is a sublime and difficult thing and requires the Spiritual sublimation of Hearts by Grace And this is the reason of the Jews so often and so easily falling away to the gross Idolatry of the Heathens And in a great measure operates in like manner on the Papists And could we find any warrant in Scripture to save our Souls with such bodily worship I believe very few of us would be found so spiritual as not to encline to it Wherefore Let him that standeth take heed lest he fall All this while I have said nothing of their Idolatrous adoring their consecrated Wafer which they will needs have to be Christ's real Body But if it be not then they themselves confess an evident truth without their Confession That they are as great Idolaters as any Heathens adoring a dead Wafer for the ever-living God And I desire them also to remember the Determination of their Council of Constance mentioned before in the Supplement That the intention of the Priest in Consecration of the Host is requisite to effect their supposed Transubstantiation wherein if he fail they grant that there is no substantial change in the Bread nor any Consecration at all Now considering how many careless dissolute yea and villainous Priests are amongst them 't is more than probable that many of them intend not at all this business when they are about it and some as I said before in their Hearts laugh at it as a meer Mock shew to gull the Spectators who notwithstanding with all reverence adore the unconsecrated Wafers of those villainous Priests All which makes their case so dangerous that no man of any tolerable Reason or Conscience would venture without clear Scripture-warrant for it Wherefore I beseech them to consider that we have a plain text of Scripture against Transubstantiation viz. That it is Bread which we eat in this Sacrament after the Consecration of it besides many other Scriptures intimating the same we have both Reason and Sence also on our side which two latter we are bound to follow unless forbidden by some plain text of Scripture which they can never shew bringing only one figurative speech viz. This is my body which they will needs have to be literally spoken whereas there are many more the like
which they themselves take in a figurative sence And our Saviour's own comment upon this matter Ioh. vi declares it ought to be taken spiritually and figuratively But notwithstanding all this put the case that we were mistaken and they were in the right as to this yet certainly our case is far safer than theirs for they cannot deny that we have great probability of Scripture for us nothing directly against us so that we have a fair plea to God for our belief though erroneous whereas they have no plea not one tittle of Scripture or Reason for their erroneous Sacrilegious dismembring this Holy Sacrament flatly against Christ's Institution and Command reiterated again by St. Paul Their case then is apparently damnable If they answer They have the Command of their Pope and Church I reply That if their Pope and Church have power to reverse any one part of Scripture the same power may reverse another and another and in sum All. This is such high Phanaticism as it were as great madness in us as in them to discourse longer with them But I hope they are not all so mad and therefore I shall proceed farther to gain such and knowing that they are great admirers of the Doctors and Fathers of the Church especially the more ancient though our Faith is built wholly on Scripture without them and therefore I did not intend to make use of their Authority at all yet I shall here produce enough to give any moderate Papist full satisfaction That their Transubstantiation is against the belief of the Ancient Fathers of the true Catholick Church First then I lay this ground Their Transubstantiation plainly and necessarily infers Christ's Body to be really and corporally present in many thousand places at once in all Parts of the World where they celebrate Mass. Now if I can bring clear proof from any one eminent Father of the true Catholick Church that Christ's Body cannot be in many distinct places at once this Father clearly proves Transubstantiation cannot be St. Austin an eminent Bishop and Father was always held not only Orthodox but of great authority in the Church cited frequently in the Papists Schools to this very day And his great Piety and Modesty was a great cause of his great Authority for he bore a singular Reverence and Submission to Scripture still captivating his understanding to that nor was ever known to begin or countenance Novelty but always reverenced the Doctrine of the Primitive Church and therefore most worthy to be hearkened to This famous Bishop and Doctor of the Church in his 57 Epistle to Dardanus discourseth at large of this point An quia ubique Deus sit hominem quoque illum qui in Deo sit ubique diffusum dicere possumus Whether or no we may affirm that God being every where so the Man Christ being in God is also every where or confin'd to a certain place So that the Man Christ cannot be affirm'd to be both in Heaven and on Earth at the same time And in the discussion of this matter he sets down this for a rule Cavendum est nè ita divinitatem adstruamus hominis ut veritatem corporis auferamus We must take heed that we do not so establish the Divinity of the Man Christ as to destroy the truth and reality of his Body which cannot be in several places at once nor so much as in two places at once in Paradise and on Earth though his Divinity fill all places at once and is every where and therefore concludes thus Christum ubique totum praesentem esse non dubites tanquam Deum in loco aliquo coeli propter veri corporis modum Doubt not but that Christ is wholly present every where as God but yet is in some certain place in Heaven by reason of the reality of his Body And as Saint Austin denies that the Body of Christ being a real humane Body can be in several places at once so doth he affirm that the Body of Christ must possess a place suitable to the largeness and dimensions of the Body with length and breadth in proportion to every limb Cum corpus sit aliqua substantia quantitas ejus est in magnitudine molis ejus distantibus partibus quae simul esse non possunt quoniam suum quaeque spatium locorum tenent minores minora majores majora A Body being a substance with quantity this quantity consists in the bulk of it with parts distant one from the other and not confusedly all together but each one possesseth a proper place to it self the lesser parts a lesser space the greater a greater because amplior est quantitas in amplioribus partibus brevior in brevioribus in nulla parte tanta quanta per totum Because the quantity of the longer parts is longer of the shorter parts shorter so that the bigness of the whole must needs exceed the bigness of any part and consequently the space which the whole Body possesseth must needs be greater than the space of any one part Spatia locorum tolle corporibus nusquam erunt quae nusquam erunt nec erunt The proportion and bigness of space is so necessary to the proportion and bigness of a Body with its parts that if you take away this just space from Bodies they cannot be said to be in any place and to say a Body is not in any place is in effect to say it is not at all Now you must understand that all this discourse of Saint Austin in this place is concerning immortal Bodies and even Christ's Body now glorious in Heaven For the Question which Dardanus made and to which Saint Austin answers was concerning the being of Christ's Body now immortal Whether that could be in several places at once or is confin'd to one certain place And to shew that Saint Austin thus understands this Question his words declare saying Nam ipsum immortale corpus minus est in parte quà m in toto c. For that immortal Body is less in a part than in the whole c. and gives his reason Cùm corpus sit aliqua substantia c. as before I shall endeavour to make all this a little plainer to lower Capacities The difference between a Body and a Spirit is this A Body possesses a space according to the quantity and bigness of the Body each part of the Body filling a space sutable to the proportion of it A Body of five foot long and a foot broad takes up the room of five foot in length and a foot in breadth and cannot be contain'd in a less space each limb of this Body filling its proper place the Head in one place the Arm in another the Leg in another and so the rest so that two Bodies can't be in the same place nor two parts of the same Body in one place But a Body having many hollow parts in it as the Belly and the Head and in the most fleshy parts