and also animates us to persist in it since those who have quitted our communion and relinquished our faith in other matters discern so strong Motives to retain this that tho very willing they cannot without violence to their consciences renounce it Pag. 117. l. 20. It is confessed by the greatest men of their Church c. A forgery Our great men make the contrary confession and if any of them seems to speak towards what this Minister feigns it is with respect to Transubstantiation not a corporal presence particularly Scotus misquoted Praef. p. 6. That most subtle Doctor as has bin often answered to this most impudent objection lays it down That the Points discuss'd by him in his 4ti Dist 11. q. 3. do all intend to maintain That the Body of Christ is truly in the Eucharist because to deny that is plainly against Faith for it was expresly from the beginning of the Institution of the truth of Faith that the Body of Christ is contain'd there truly and really And afterwards in his Reply to Objections fixing on Transubstantiation as the manner of the substantial presence he adds And if you demand why the Church chose this so difficult a sense i. e. of Transubstantiation being the manner of this Article when the words of Scripture may be rendred in a sense easy and as to appearance truer concerning this Article To this Objection he returns I say that the Scriptures are expounded by the direction of that Spirit by which they were composed And so it is to be supposed that the Catholick Church hath interpreted by the same Spirit by which the Faith was delivered to us viz. taught by the Spirit of truth and therefore she chose this sense because it is true For it is not in the power of the Church to make that true or not true but of God the Institutor but the Church directed herein as t is believed by the Spirit of truth hath explicated the sense delivered to Her by God. Now t is evident that the Schoolman is here speaking of Transubstantiation not of the corporal presence next that he says not the facility or appearance of a sense to be that designed in Scripture is to be regarded in Faith but the declaration of the Church in whose custody the traditive sense of Scripture i.e. what God intended not what we surmise is deposited and by whose mouth the Holy Spirit speaks Lastly that the Declaration of the Church is for Transubstantiation therefore this must be concluded to be the proper sense of Scripture tho that Scripture sound never so plausibly for some other sense Our Adversaries persevering in an imposture with so much pertinacy and immodesty extorts this tedious Repetition All we shall further remark upon it is that it yeilds this Minister a very wholsom Instruction how to interpret Scripture not by Jewish customs nor Rabbinical Deliriums not by the superficial notices of sense or vain Maxims and cheating suggestions of Science falsly so called but by the Guidance of the Church assisted with the Holy Spirit for of these two Directors in expounding Scripture this Mâ—nister seldom has regard whilst Catholicks enquire of the Church what sense the Holy Spirit chiefly design'd and without hesitancy adhere to that she gives whether it be literal or mystical because our Lord's promise of assisting the Church and leading her into all truth is so absolute that we think we may as justly distrust his being the Messiah as be jealous of his Fidelity or Providence in acquitting himself of this engagement Should we not be suspicious if without apprehension nay with perfect firmness and security we did not acquiesce in her expositions And how many of those who have leap'd from this Rock and committed themselves to the conduct of a Private spirit are now carried away by the wind of Socinianism Judaism Mahomatism or irreligion whilst we that stand on it have not only the same Faith still but cannot possibly fail by misbelief Pag. 118. l. 7. It is undeniable that their Interpretation of those words of Institution destroys the certainty of sense c. If he mean our interpretation of a corporal presence then he contradicts what he thrice told us that the Lutherans do no violence to sense but if he mean the Interpretation of Transubstantiation his observation is wide of the point contested But in both meanings t is false for we derogate from sense not in the least and if we did in one-case in obedience to Faith whereto we think sense may as justly be captivated as the understanding that will not infer we may in another destitute of such a revelation till a particular premise can support an universal conclusion The Fallacy and Ignorance of this importunate Argument so often brought and so often bafled and exposed must certainly be used by these men merely to deceive the People As to the Paradox of Miracles being discoverable by sense only we refer this Minister to Calvin Bishop Forbes and many other Classic Reformers for correction who esteem them stupid that disclaim the Eucharistical Miracles and truly by sense we discern none there How then by your favour came they to discern Miracles in the Eucharist But what Was there no miracle in the conception of our Lord What sense acquaints men with it That he was a Man we might know by sense but that he was miraculously conceived only Revelation not Experience assures all besides his Mother To pass this how comes it to be collected that if one of the evidences of the truth of Christianity cannot be had strait our certainty of the truth of Christianity is destroy'd Tell me I pray were Miracles its sole evidence Were accomplishments of Old Testament-prophecies none or uncertain Had all Believer's miracles before they assented Did none believe with certainty but such as had Miracles to attest what was tendred to them What 's become of the Beatitude Blessed are those that have not seen a miracle Christ risen and yet have believed on the credible relation of others and because it was foretold he should rise c. If the performance of something in Nature otherwise than any created Power uses or can do I say the performance of it by Power Divine be a Miracle and that such a performance may be effected in spiritual as well as sensible affairs the knowledg of which may and must be attain'd if it be had by an information not sensible then the confining of Miracles to be objects of Sense is exploded Having thus overturn'd two of his Observations his Arguings from them vanish as do all other Bubbles Pag. 119. l. 4. No Papist can have any Reason to believe Transubstantiation to be true but because he reads those words of holy Scripture c. A Papist has the same Reason to believe Transubstantiation tho he cannot read at all as the first Christians had before the Gospels were written or a blind man has now The mistake of Dr. Stillingfleet Tillotson Tenison this
in the Sacrament must pass for a private opinion not a Catholick assertion Where does the Discourser seem to grant the Church's expression improper Does he not on the contrary tell you that Soave and all humble Sons of the Church are obliged to take Ecclesiastical language as well as Christian sense from her i. e. that her expressions with her interpretations are proper tho in your mouth attended with your perversions they become a snare How many Ecclesiastical phrases has the Church bin constrain'd to proscribe thro this pravity of seducers that imploy her orthodox terms to maintain or convey their impieties That the Word is of like substance to his Father that our B. Lady is the Mother of Christ are sentences capable of a sound sense and might be used without suspicion or offence till the Arians and Nestorians mis-imploy'd them Thus it is with adoring the Sacrament or Host the Church and Catholick Doctors have rightly used these expressions and we all understand them accordingly but in England where they are wrested to purposes the Church never dream't of we justly except against them and choose to deliver our selves so as shall be most secure from calumny When therefore you contest with us either take our terms in our sense or you beat the air As to Cardinal Palavicini's words they amount to this only that we are not to withold Adoration to a while whereof onely out part is sovereignly adorable till the several parts exist separately for if so we shall never adore our Lord they do not import that in adoring the whole we give sovereign worship to the species or own them to have any motive for or to be the end of such Adoration for we do not allow so much to our Lord's Humanity abstractedly considered much less to his Garments or the Sacramental veils Wherefore if by Sacrament and Host this Answerer would mean what the Church does the res Sacramenti our Lord sacramentally existing we joyn issue with him that t is our undoubted Doctrine That the Sacrament or Host is adorable but if he intends otherwise as we have too much occasion to conclude he does the Council in the very chapter cited by him corrects his corruption of our Doctrine in adding to this purpose for her reason of adoring the Sacrament in the Sacrament That is adored wherein there is an innate motive or excellence why we should worship it and which therefore alone can be the object and end of our worship for at this it aims in adding For we believe the very same God present in the Sacrament of whom at his introducing into the world the Father saith Let all the Angels adore him So that this wise and ever to be received Synod as it were foreseeing that men would arise speaking perverse things prudently acquaints us with its sense of adoring the Sacrament as soon as it had declared that it may be done strait pointing to whom the worship is directed and on whom terminated on him that is in it non on it that signifies and conceals him Pag. 93. l. 28. I have fully shewn this new fancy to be neither the Doctrine of the Church of England nor c. Having granted the first three Protestant concessions he stands at the fourth upon a pretence that he has already refuted the Authorities whereon it is founded which is untrue as is manifest above where this Champion's atchievements are displayed and revers'd and besides to back this fourth Proposition new Authorities are annex'd from Bishop Cosins Archbishop Bramhal and Monsieur Daille to which he is mute retiring from them without the least notice or reflection Pag. 94. l. 32. So that then with this limitation his 5th Proposition that the Lutherans adore I presume may be admitted c. If the Answerer adhere to what he concedes p. 87.93 i.e. in the first Supposition and third Protestant concession in consequence of their opinion they all ought to adore if they do not and Chemnitius agrees as much saying No man denies it adoration but such as with the Sacramentaries deny or doubt of the Presence of Christ in the Supper Pag. 95. l. 12. We are ready to admit it the 6th Concession That the belief of a Real presence is not so criminal as to oblige them to break communion always supposing that the belief of it had not bin pressed c. Then the Protestants have generally mistaken their business in spending their raillery hitherto not on the mischief of imposition but chiefly on the erroneousness of our tenets and enormity of our practices as both very destructive to salvation and Dissenters do well to insist on the heinousness of injoyning as a term of communion what they can discern to be no better than humane inventions If the belief of a Real presence be no such pernicious corruption neither can Adoration that follows upon it how then can the imposition of such inconsiderable things outweigh in guilt a rupture of Catholick communion and a violation of charity together with all the deadly sins of Fanaticisin and enmity springing from division and loosness The points are almost harmless and indifferent our Adversaries confess but if imposed as a necessary Article of communion and the disobedient anathematized then the Church may be defied and the belief and practice become so criminal as to justify a separation suppose of one Minister from all Christians So that when the Faith and customs of the Catholick Church give no colour for a Schism the exercise of her Authority may and she becomes as an heathen or a publican for requiring such to hear her whom our Lord hath declared shall be accounted so for not hearing her and she must either relax her Discipline enlarge or contract the conditions of her Society as every individual shall demand tho they neither think nor live as she prescribes or become schismatical If private Christians must be Arbiters what shall or shall not be terms of Catholick communion why may not some as justly recede from the Church because she does not as others because she does impose terms whereat these have a pique and wherewith those are pleased the Novatian Donatist and Luciferian charge against the Church was That its communion was promiscuous and Latitudinarian The Accusation was false yet they were right in this that there are certain terms of Christian communion which are indispensably to be submitted to by all that will be members of the Catholick Church tho all the terms they accounted such were not so and not themselves but the Church was to distinguish But here the strictness of communion is our sault and comprehension would make either no Sectaries or them mexcusable However from Daille's granting that if the Church of Rome had obliged her children to worship Christ in the Sacrament she had not obliged them to worship a creature we conclude she did not impose Idolatry because t is certain she never obliged them to worship any thing in the Sacrament but
Christ so that neither for her Faith nor the imposition of it was her communion to have bin broken unless it were unlawful for her to impose the worshipping of What is no creature which is God. Ibid. l. 32. I cannot see what his cause would gain by it the certainty of the six Concessions The advantage gain'd by these concessions is considerable because thereby the Dispute is reduced to narrower and certain bounds and so many Objections prevented as also Opponents silenced such as hold a substantial presence surely that I see not what the Conceders have further to alledge against Adoration Can they plead we want a due object occasion precept or president to adore All then but Zuinglians a few of the latter brood of Protestants are on our side and these by the so much greater suffrage of Christendom are convicted of obstinacy in resisting so credible a judgment Pag. 96. l. 14. This t is true the Papists affirm c. In a kind fit we are allowed by this liberal man to affirm a sign to remain in the Eucharist after consecration distinct from the thing signified but then he speedily retracts so much as will make his concession a cypher For tho we affirm That nothing can outwardly and visibly signify in any Sacrament but what is perceivable by some sense or other and next That whatever is perceivable by any sense together with all the natural properties remains unchanged in the Eucharist And 3ly That we consecrate in the same elements wherein our 0203 069 Lord instituted the Sacrament yet because in defiance to Tradition Reason Revelation and the universal profession of all times and Churches till Luther arose we cannot believe that the same thing can be substantially Bread and Flesh and because we cannot think that substance to be there which sense cannot tell us is there and Scripture c assures us is not there therefore this Minister denies ours to be such a symbol as our Lord instituted and to be brief declares it really nothing Thus nothing must be an object of sense and all that is symbolical in the Eucharist must be the substance of the Elements which no sense can immediately perceive Pag. 97. l. 32. This is indeed a sort of new Divinity I always thought c. Alass That People should be so disrespectful as not to conform their Notions to this Answerers and so rude as to write Divinity wherein he is not vers'd But Old Divines reply The incivility or oversight is not in them but in this Minister who mounts the chair when he should be in a lower Form and will needs be scribling controversie before he has stay'd a due season in his Study For to their knowledg the word Sacrament has a manifold sense and is a complex term used therefore variously with respect to the subject of which Authors treat just as they do Christ Emanuel c. sometimes signifying by them God alone sometimes Man sometimes both Whereupon Bishop Bramhall and Mr. Thorndike tho more knowing are less nice than this Minister and without scruple admit the word Sacrament to be capable of more than one sense which might have protected the former part of the Assertion from derision as the 6th Canon of the 13th Sess of the Council of Trent does advance the other part viz. that by worshiping the Sacrament Catholicks understand worshipping Christ in the Sacrament beyond a private which the Man concedes to a Catholick Assertion which he is loath to yeild How shall we assure Protestants concerning our Faith if a Canon of the Council of Trent so sacred and authentick amongst us in matters of Faith be refused Here 's a Canon accurately publishing what all the Members of the Catholick Church must assent-to and profess and yet lest he be depriv'd of the opportunity of slandring us this Minister will not resolve that we believe as it prescribes Hard is our case since neither our selves nor our Divines nor yet our Councils must be regarded but any silly conceited Sectary shall be better able to tell what we believe than we our selves or those that guide our Souls What we do not hold that is our Faith and what we do believe that is not our Faith according to our Adversaries and why so if not that their false Accusations may continue and improve an odium on us and delusion amongst the Multitude Pag. 100. l. 6. I must then deny his Assertion viz. That the ground of our Adoration is Christ present not present after this or that manner The Answerer will have the 3d Assertion capable of being taken two ways passing the one and opposing the other But what if they be coincident If Christ be the object of our worship as seems tho saintly to be granted under the 2d Assertion then a Real presence of him and not the manner of that presence is the ground and occasion of our adoration without any regard whether He be solitary or attended by another substance Christ we say not the manner of existence in the Virgin 's womb in a Manger on the Cross in the Grave in Glory or in the Eucharist is the motive and object of our worship For if any one manner of existence were our inducement to adore when that ceases we should owe no adoration whereupon it must necessarily follow that we should as much adore if Consubstantiation were as now Transubstantiation is the mode of Presence we believe because this is not the presence it self but a circumstance of it not at all considered in the act of adoring neither as object which nor as reason why we adore Or thus to Jesus Christ existing substantially in the Eucharist we direct our adoration without respect to the coexistence or absence of any other substance for if we worship'd him upon the account that another substance is or is not coexistent we must condemn worshiping in either our selves or the Lutherans which we do not they worshiping with a belief that another substance is we that no other is there Whereupon as if no substance of the elements remains after consecration they are only mistaken in their faith not in their worship only misbelieve do not commit Idolatry so if the substance do remain this will only affect our perswasion not impair our adoration we err about a creature we do not idolize it Nay were our worship directed to Jesus Christ as alone and so confusedly or in general to the whole substance of the Eucharist and it should chance to be true that our Lord is not the only substance present under the species yet hence a just charge of Idolatry could not be drawn against us because the precise object of our worship is not any created substance but the divine person of our Redeemer and the other concomitant substance whatever it may by accident does intentionally no more share in the honor we pay than would the Scarlet Robe should our Lord have bin adored instead of derided therein He that adored him at
substance of the Bread and Wine is turn'd into that of Christ's Body and Blood and only the manner of that substantial conversion is in question with him as also with his commentators Scotus Durand and many others mis-quoted Pref. p. 7. of which falsities ignorance if it were in fault cannot excuse him since either the Authors themselves or the Letter printed 1665 discovering these amongst 150 false or wrested quotations in Dr. Taylor 's Disswasive might so easily have informed him As to the irreverent Descants on the Great Council celebrated at Lateran by the most learned and prudent Innocent 3. it is observed That when the deposing Power must be imputed to us as an Article of our Creed then that Council is obligatory and Mr. Dodwel has proved it so but when it defines Transubstantiation then the Canons are surreptitious and a Papal contrivance and Du Pin may be found in the Margen One while that Council enters the Stage conferring power on the Pope to dethrone Kings and on Priests as if there had bin no Priesthood before that Council to make God. Another while all this was forced upon the Fathers of that Synod or publisht as their Act without their privity by a pragmatical and intriguing Pope What would the man be at Is his Arrogance content with no less than confirming and rescinding General Councils arbitrarily Pag. 113. l. 23. As to the point of Antiquity I have already fully discuss'd it above c. I suppose he means from p. 24. to 32 where we may find indeed much passion against Transubstantiation but we are not so short-sighted as to confound it with corporal presence the thing here in discussing And for the Fathers referr'd to by the Discourser where shall we find the Protestant Answers to St. Ambrose de iis qui init Myst c. 9. to St. Hilary St. Cyril Alex Are these spurious too Are not those ascribed to St. Ambrose Eusebius Emisenus sermo de coena Domini the Epist of the Presbyt of Achaia concerning St. Andrew's passion much more ancient than either Paschasius in the West or Anastasius Sinaita in the East Were they ever excepted against as containing Doctrine disagreeable to that of the Church tho thro the negligence of Transcribers the true Authors of them be not very certain It is not a Book 's being attributed by a mistake to a wrong Author but its containing suspicious Doctrine or false Relations and being fathered on eminent Names to pass it with authority in the world that chiefly subjects it to the censure of Apocryphal But why should a doubt concerning the Author of such Books elude the testimony fetcht from them when St. Ambrose in a Book unquestioned and others more ancient coeval or not much juniors to the questioned pieces as St. Gandentius St. Remigius c write as fully for not only a corporal presence but also Transubstantiation Pag. 114 l. 9. This Ground the universal Doctrine and Practice of the later both Eastern and Western Churches till Luther's time is not certainly true and if it were yet certainly it is nothing to the purpose T is certainly true if the whole may be determined to be on that side where all the members of the Church are for whosoever denied this Faith of a corporal presence was ipso facto an Heretick in opposing an Article so weighty and so solemnly declared and required of all the faithful in at least ten Councils before Zuinglius dreamed But the Apostates from a corporal presence were indeed very few before and of those few scarce one was in being at Luther's revolt he also continuing a bitter enemy to the Sect that soon grew upon him If true t is certainly to the purpose whilst this is true That all Christians to a man cannot miscarry in such a considerable part of Religion as the Eucharist is which they daily frequented and the belief of which real Presence in it was by many ways continually inculcated and confirmed to them Such an unanimous and comprehensive Tradition does at least demonstrate the novelty and falshood of Zuinglianism What Article in our Creed can have a stronger external motive than universal consent And as to the perpetuity of it other Articles have bin sooner and longer and by more numerous Factions opposed than it For of those who have raised debates about the Eucharist the least part are they who denied a substantial Presence the other quarrelling either about Transubstantiation or Communion in both kinds or some other matter yet all the while confessing a real Presence Well to let the Reader understand more fully the seriousness and judgment of this Minister the Argument esteemed impertinent and ridiculed by him here is this The Authority equi-valent to that of any General Council is a solid Ground of Faith but the unanimous profession of all Christians in the last Ages is an Authority equivalent to that of a General Council therefore that unanimous profession is a solid Ground of Faith. The Major is own'd by all such Protestants as submit their judgments to the Authority of such Councils as condemned Arius Macedonius Nestorius Eutyches Origen and the Monothelites assenting to their Definitions as the true sense of Divine Revelations and reciting some of them even in their Creeds The Minor is founded on not only Protestant concessions but also their Definition of a true Church that it has the Word of God rightly preacht and the Sacraments duly administred according to this character then if all preach'd corporal presence it could not be an error in all and so not in any unless there were no true preachers and consequently no Church in some times extant Now if an unanimous profession cannot be erroneous t is doubtless equal to the Authority of any General Council and also very pertinently pleaded as a solid ground of Faith for whatever can declare a Divine Revelation infallibly is so Pag. 115. l. 30. If we did acknowledge this 5th Ground That since Luther's time no small number of Protestants c acknowledge a real and adorable Presence c yet it seems we are mistaken c. It seems rather that you are extremely conceited who contend against as well the first chiefest and best Protestants and the genuine Sons and eminentest Superiors in your own Church as the Catholick Church and all thro that proud pretence that your Sense Reason and expositions of Scripture and Antiquity how wild and unsound soever are absolutely certain and not as we know them to be meer presumptions Is not this an advancing of your self as a standard of truth and science and a requiring what you so vehemently decry in the Catholick Church and shun in your self submission of all judgments to your Fancies The Protestant owning of a substantial Presence is not said to be a ground for our believing Transubstantiation but yet it is an argument against other Protestants for that Faith of a corporal presence which is common to some of their party with us
Answerer and others insisting so eagerly and obstinately on the Authority of Sense grows if it be not an Artifice perhaps from their taking the Maxim Nothing is in the Intellect which was not before in the Senses absolutely as if the only Conveyer of Notices to the Mind were the Senses or no thought had its birth there without an external promter whenas to omit the ill consequences c. of the later there are other means of acquainting the Intellect without the concurrence of the Senses as by Good and Bad Spirits c. Now these either convey always the same Notices as the Senses or they do not if they do then the Mind must ever judg with the Senses which is against experience If they do not how comes the Intellect to determine against the Notices of Sense e. g. in the Magnitude of the Sun Surely it neglects the information of Sense either upon some other more powerful motive and overruling remonstrance than Sense has given or arbitrarily but whether way soever it goes the Maxim is rejected and the Mind 't is clear does not find it self obliged to determine in all cases as Sense deposes Sense then is no Judg but only a conveyer of Intelligence to the Judg according to which Intelligence we confess that Judg is to censure and resolve except when better Intelligence from Reason or Revelation be interposed and arrest such a Judgment Now Sense informs a Catholick Mind that hath so much Learning as to read which Protestants think few have they are so ignorantly educated that the words of Institution are in that Book the Church tells him are the Gospels and neither Reason nor Revelation countervening this Notice a Papist judges with certainty according to the deposition of the Senses but when a Papist desires to proceed further and would understand not only that there are such words but also what is that very meaning not which may be put upon them wherein his sense and reason may assist him but which the Holy Ghost intended and the Church holds then he relies not on his senses or reason only because he knows the sentiments of Men to be very different as amongst themselves so from the Church's and Holy Spirit 's and if he might rely on his own so might others and consequently collect opposite truths from their discordant conceptions Wherefore he resorts to that hand which reacht out to him the words of Institution as Gods word to give him also their true meaning which he receives and professes without demur or fear And thus Papists arrive at all saving-truth thus they attain Unanimity and learn not only to think but speak the same thing whilst the minds and language of all Sectaries who pretend to follow sense and reason only in their Interpretation of Scripture are at wars and Babilonish For private Spirits are many and are Dissenters but the Church the Holy Spirit is but One and at Unity with it self And thus I suppose not our but the Minister's culpable ignorance is apparent Ibid. l 28. But let us quit this Reflection c. Content If he would not hasten to new untruths Where is it confess'd that we have neither command nor example in Holy Scripture for Adoring our Lord in the Eucharist If there he any command for Adoring our Lord at all there is for Adoring him in the Eucharist For once Adorable and he is always and every-where Adorable in what condition or circumstances soever and special injunctions or instances are not of necessity to warrant or oblige us to Adore St. Austin knew there was a command or he would not have said in Psal 98. Peccemus non Adorando Again tho we confess that Defects may possibly happen yet who grants them to be infinite or difficultly avoidable Is it not rather difficult considering the Caution of the Church that any defects should chance which are destructive to the Eucharist Can we not have a moral certainty the Priest has the Orders to which he pretends Do not our Senses inform us as to both the matter and Form of the Sacrament and the serious application of the one to the other As to the intention 't is true it is deem'd necessary will the Minister profess that none is needful to the performance of a Religious Action but what degree or sort of intention is a Question in the Schools some Divines requiring more some less Of the later kind if he please the Reader may view what Contenson writes of it Theolog. Mentis Cordis l. 11. p. 1. Diss 2. Append. § 2. c. It is undoubtlingly to be asserted says this Modern Divine that an Intention of seriously performing the External Rites amongst Christians counted Religious suffices for the validity of a Sacrament and that being observed no retention nor perverseness of the Minister's Intention doth void a Sacrament This Position he confirms by many Authorities and concludes them with that of the Council of Trent Sess 14. Cap. 6. Can. 9. where that Holy Synod declares the Sacrament not to be performed if a Priest act in Jest c. inferring thereupon that the Council understood by an Intention of doing what the Church does not as this Minister of doing what the Church intends but a doing with external seriousness what the Church prescribes Which inference he inforces by Cardinal Palavicini's Reflection on that Passage of the Council par 2. l. 12. c. 10. From these last words any one reading them may conjecture that the Opinion of Catherine and other Divines thinking a Will in the Minister to act seriously suffices for and that only Jesting which the Receiver of the Sacrament may discover does obstruct the accomplishment of a Sacrament was not expunged According to this Doctrine then the Consecration of the Eucharist does not depend on the Priest's believing Transubstantiation or secretly intending to Consecrate c. but only on an external intention to do seriously what the Church injoins which is very discernable to the Attendants by the Priest's exterior actions and deportment How many therefore of the Answerer's Dangers and Defects are blown away And if Adoration may at any time be paid to our Lord in the Eucharist it may ordinarily be so without any scruple by Catholicks Appendix II. ANIMADVERSIONS upon the Reply to the two Discourses concerning the Adoration of our B. Saviour in the Holy Eucharist SOME time ago were printed in OXFORD Two Discourses the one concerning the Alterations in the Church-Service of the Church of England the second concerning the Adoration of our Blessed Saviour in the Sacrament of the Eucharist The Design whereof was to shew the incertitude and inconstancy of the Church of England in her Doctrine and Practices Whence it will follow That none can trust or rely upon her Authority nor safely either believe or practise according to her directions Of both these the Author took these two Articles as a manifest and sufficient instance But because there is nothing so true against which
the nourished it makes us partakers of his Life which being immortal and glorious renders ours such also And 3. Other Food being either inanimate or having a Life inferior unto and differing from ours this Body of his is become superior more Divine than ours and is a quickning Spirit And therefore we should receive his Body and Blood after the manner of natural bodies which the Capernaites and our sensual Doctors can apprehend it would profit us nothing as to the great effects promised by our Receiving in the Eucharist And these effects are true and real not notional or imaginary or by Faith only apprehended yea much more than the Manna Faith being an assent in the understanding is quite different from enjoyment in the will and affections And Faith i. e. a believing either that our Lord was the true Messias or Messenger from the Father for else he could not be the true Bread which came down from Heaven or that this which is given us is the real Body of our Saviour for else it would be only common Bread precedes the Receiving yet is not any part of it much less the enjoyment of any of the effects of it Again If eating by Faith whatever it signifies be all that is meant in the Eucharist how comes it to be preferr'd before the Manna which was a continual Miracle and daily exercise of their Faith And why would our Lord suffer so many of his Followers to go away from him when he might in so few words have inform'd them of the Truth without a Metaphor Why should he use such sublime and spiritual expressions repeating it to be his body and blood that it came down from Heaven that he would give it for the life of the world c. and not once explain the meaning of those to them obscure phrases And if the Church Catholick and even the Church of England till the last of King Edward VI. had not conceiv'd some great Mystery why would she keep the words so obscure and really as they suppose improper of the Institution so precisely even till the Church of England made the breach and by the Expressions different from the whole Church profess'd her self not to be a Member of it But of this sufficient is said before and in the Reformation of the Church of England from § 148. Wherefore the Catholicks speaking of the real presence of our Lord mean◠the very essence substance the very thing it self is there present taken and eaten by us and not only the benefits of his Passion believ'd by us And in the Church's sense we use in this Discourse the words really really present c. and yet not naturally locally or any other manner of its being according to the qualities of a natural body § 2 And note secondly That these Writers and others pretending to be of the Church of England by their spiritual by Faith mystical eating which they sometimes also call Sacramental intend a sense contrary and opposite to eating the natural body of our Lord spiritualiz'd and that is all the eating they acknowledg The Catholick Church also useth the same word spiritual in opposition to real or sacramental meaning thereby the reception of some spiritual grace or encrease of it As the Fathers in the Wilderness did eat the same meat Manna and the Rock-water spiritually in as much as these were Types of spiritual things under the Gospel by receiving whereof they also obtain'd the graces of Gods Spirit And this spiritual reception of Grace is not only in the Eucharist but in all the other Sacraments in all actions of Devotion and Piety and all manner of well-using Grace once given But this is not all the Sacramental receiving tho contain'd in it So that there are two manners of receiving Grace and our Saviour 1. Spiritual only which our Replier says is all 2. Spiritual and real or Sacramental because proper to the Eucharist The real without the spiritual profiteth nothing yea it is also damnable For except a man come to the Eucharist well prepar'd i. e. by Mortifications Devotions Acts of Religion i. e. in a state of Grace he eats and drinks condemnation to himself The spiritual receiving without the real profiteth indeed but neither so much nor in such manner as when they are join'd both together For spiritual receiving is of more Grace upon well-using the former is only in general and in the inner man therefore difficultly discern'd and more subject are we to be deceiv'd in it But real receiving as all other Sacraments is instituted to help the weakness and imperfect discernment of our spiritual and internal condition by the visible signs of invisible Grace therein bestow'd The spiritual eating gives us a right and title to Grace but the other is the very instrument of conveying it Also in that Grace is given according to the measure of the Receiver's disposition and that Grace also which is of the same nature with those dispositions But in the Sacraments are given new and peculiar Graces as in Baptism the forgiveness of all sins already committed and admission into the Church of Christ and all the rights and benefits thereof So in the holy Eucharist there is conferr'd also forgiveness of sins and a nearer incorporating us into our Lord himself more intimately and consequently a more certain hope and confidence of eternal life by receiving himself into us who is now become a quickning Spirit unto us working by his body receiv'd the seed of immortality all things necessary or useful to our happy progress thither Be pleased therefore to consider Whether they who acknowledg no other than a spiritual receiving do not either quite evacuate the power and efficacy or at least diminish much and weaken the force of this divine Sacrament And also that whoever they are who endeavour to subject or reduce Religion to the Rule of Reason do not in effect deny and despise the wisdom of God declar'd in the mystery of our holy Religion § 3 Note Thirdly That Catholicks trouble not themselves to reconcile Religion to Philosophy Their endeavour is to understand the true sense of what God hath revealed and to this purpose they make use of all the helps which others do but principally depend upon what the Church Catholick and her Doctors from time to time have receiv'd and declar'd i. e. how they to whom our Lord committed his Mysteries have from the beginning believ'd and deliver'd that charge deliver'd unto them how the practice hath interpreted the Law and how the Holy Spirit by his Instruments the Clergy of the Catholick Church hath continued it down to their time Nor do they regard what either private interpretation or what Philosophy or Principles fram'd by men's understandings out of their experience or frame of Languages suggest They leave these to them who affect to diminish the unfathomable knowledg communicated to us by God in his Revelations to Arians Socinians Latitudinarians and other Doctors of Sensuality But
the pillar stript and in the common Hall arrayed in 's Mock Regalia without an actual distinction of his garments from himself had the same object of his piety Ibid. l. 18. I must tell him that the adoration of those among the Lutherans is infinitely more excusable than theirs the Catholicks And this Good Man he is forced to assert not out of prejudice but by the cogency of some reasons The Reader will admire his assurance if he weighs his arguments As first because we Catholicks violate sense which the Lutherans preserve entire Now to wave both the impertinence and falshood of this leading Reason as intimating that we violate sense and that either the nature or heinousness of Idolatry depends thereon t is enough to quash it to affirm that the Lutherans violate sense as much as we Do they not believe the Body of our Lord present with the Bread Do not our senses tell us as experimentally there is no flesh present as they do that Bread is there He that says there are ten men in a Room where sense informs there are but five must needs treat sense with as much violence as he that says there are but five when ten are seen The violence done to sense therefore if any be done and so the inexcusableness is equal on the Lutheran to that on our side We descend to his next Reason the former part of it viz. that the Lutherans are right in their Object himself has overthrown in 's 89th pag. if he approve what he cites out of Dr. Taylor For the Lutheran object is a non Ens if Jesus Christ be not substantially present and if He be not in ours how can He be in their Eucharist since our Priesthood whereon all grant his being there in some sort depends is more undoubted valid and canonical than theirs they deriving Sacerdotal Orders from a Presbyter's Ordination which all Antiquity and Prelatick Protestants in their seuds with Presbytery and by their present practice in ordaining such Ministers anew damn not only as spurious but as null we from Episcopal legitimately communicated If then the Lutherans be right in their object much more are we Have we not more assurance that our Lord is there and He only is there We run therefore a less risque of missing him than they The other part of his 2d Reason seems to be an Ignoratio Elenchi the common Fallacy imploy'd by Protestants and this Minister especially in this dispute to amuse and deceive his Reader for if I comprehend him he proceeds on this ground that we hold the substance of the Bread to be the material of which the Body of Christ is made whenas we believe nothing like it Our Doctrine is that by Sacerdotal consecration the substance of our Lord's Body which now resides in Heaven and shall enjoy that glorious condition till his second Advent becomes however existent also under the species of Bread and Wine in a Spiritual manner and that the substance of Bread and Wine wholly ceases to he under those species as before consecration it was but further notice our faith takes not of the Breaden substance whether it be annihilated or how it ceases If the Breaden substance be absent then we do not adore that substance for Christ's body which is not his and if it be present we do not adore it unless we can be supposed to adore what we think not of or what we think to be nothing or to believe and adore two substances of one Body and be said to direct our devotion another way at the same time we with the strictest abstraction aim at the substance assumed by the eternal Word in the Virgin 's womb and now and ever personally united to it If we should worship the Eucharist whether there be a Substantial presence or no then we might well pass for Bread-worshippers if our Lord were not substantially present but worshiping not so loosly at random nor without a solid supposition of a substantial presence demonstrates we do direct our piety to our Saviour only never reflecting on what either ceases or remains of the elements so as to make them partners or rivals with him in our Duty The truth of the 5th Catholick Assertion is then evinced our worship is as excusable as the Lutherans and the new auxiliary Reasons drawn up p. 102. l. ult to oppose it afresh are indeed nothing to the purpose and moreover the former of them is false too We can be sufficiently sure of due consecration and anathematizing Dissenters does not alter the excusableness of our worship If our worship be of the same nature with the Lutheran and have as good grounds the imposing of it adds not one jot of guilt to it whatever it do to the imposers The Answerer then ought to have totally assented to the 6th Catholick Assertion for the same sound reason which moved him to grant it true of the Lutherans that their Object is right ours being certainly as true or the same with theirs and if we mistake the substance of Bread they worship nothing for Christ We worship no Host i.e. neither any substance that ever was or is a breaden substance nor yet the symbols but only Christ sacramentally existing who never was nor can be a Wafer nor made of either the substance or accidents of Bread. How then can we possibly mistake what is not Christ for Him unless the Christ born of the ever-blessed Virgin be not Christ Perverse therefore is the parallel of our worship to that of a Manichee's fancying Christ to be made of the Sun's substance this in that Heretick was both groundless and impossible whenas ours is quite another sentiment and founded on motives clear and infallible so far different in the thing as the substance born of our Lady is from that of the Bread or the Sun so far unlike in the ground as the fiction of a single Persian impostor is less credible than express Revelation and the constant Tradition of the Catholick Church Much-what the same Chaff is served up p. 106. to shew more difference between Us and the Lutherans than a Trans and Con amount to So zealous is this Polemic Divine to reduce Christians to an amicable temper that he exceeds the bounds of discretion and reverence not only to his own Party and the Noblest Nations of Christendom but also to his Prince For whilst He and others labour for Peace this man like seditious Love represents them irreconcilable His first reason here is already exposed There is either no or an equal violence done to Sense by Us and the Lutherans His second Reason is as faulty as his first if we are at defiance with any Texts that call the Eucharist Bread are not the Lutherans at as much defiance with those that call it Flesh and our Lord's Body for both it cannot be substantially Flesh and substantially Bread. To his third Reason viz. That the words of Institution afford occasion of inferring a Presence of
Christ's Body in the Eucharist we reply and as plain an one That the Eucharist is Christ's Body and that Bread is substantially absent and other thoughts cannot enter our minds till it appear to us possible and revealed that the same thing can remain perfect Bread and yet be truly the Flesh of Christ which resolves into being Bread and not being Bread at the same time His last Reason of the Symbols is of the same worth with the rest and the impertinent application of his own mistakes refuted in our note on p. 96. No Sacrament no substantial presence of Christ no sacerdotal Consecration are after all left to the Papists as He in his fret will needs interpose instead of Catholics To what straits does his petulant acuteness drive us In what a poor condition are we left by this meek and compassionate Minister What does he omit tho trifling foreign indecent false or impious that may detract from the excellence of our Religion and represent us inexcusably erroneous and wicked Pag. 108. l. 7. Does he believe the Corporal Presence in the way of Transubstantiation c. He does What then O then they must with him stand and fall together A terrible case For then he cannot Adore on the account of the Corporal Presence but he does on the account of Transubstantiation Wisely concluded His Argument runs thus If with Catholicks Transubstantiation and Corporal Presence stand and fall together then they Adore on the account of both But with Catholicks these stand and fall together Therefore they Adore on the account of both The Consequence is deny'd Ibid. l. 27. The first Ground why Catholicks believe Christ substantially present and Adorable in the Eucharist is Divine Revelation for which our Author offers the two usual Instances c. The same Instances are offer'd for Ours as the Lutherans produce for their corporal presence If they be not so defeated of them by Zuinglian Expositions as to be inexcusably culpable in their Faith and Worship no more are we were this first our only ground And did not this Minister confess p. 107 to this effect that the Lutheran Doctrine was deducible from our Lord's words Now their Faith and Ours is only circumstantially different that Text therefore that tells them must needs inform us of a substantial presence tho of both Consubstantiation and Transubstantiation it cannot As to his vapour That he has shewn above how false a foundation both the words of Institution and the 6th of St. John are to a corporal presence reviewing his first Chapter Part 1. I find him there raving against Transubstantiation as if those Scriptures did not countenance it and withall laying about him as such do who are in an Error with so much confusion impertinence rudeness absurdity and prevarication as if Pryn were transmigrated into him But as his performance against Transubstantiation is ridiculously weak and an often refuted Plea publish'd to swell a Pamphlet so t is either nothing at all to a corporal presence and Adoration or fights as fiercely against all Christians but the Sacramentaries as against us To what he adds about sense and reason certain contradictions Principles of Nature and Universal Sentiments of all Mankind 'T is an absurd cant and a detestable insolence for him to exclude us the most of Christians who preserved and propagated all Law and Learning for many Centuries from sense and reason from all skill in contradictions and principles of Nature and from the universal sentiments of Humanity What an amazing infatuation and transcendent pride possess this man He had had nor Letters nor Religion nor Liberty nor yet Being but for the Professors of our Faith and yet the ungrateful man repines even that we have the last and meanest of these Pag. 109. l. 30. These are great words indeed but I wonder who ever heard before that a few miserable Synods c. With such impotence and revilings are Councils treated by a Minister and thus the second Ground of our Faith and Service whereon the first also in some sort depends both as to which is a Revelation and what it is She being both the Promulger and Expositor of Revelations the Church's Conciliary Definition and Command is lighter than Air and as contemptible with this Protestant as is the most trivial act of the smallest Corporation The Dignities which he is not afraid to vilifie are Councils so numerous and comprehensive so lawful and accepted that for many Ages not one Bishop dissented from them in this case Was not the Doctrine of the 2d Council at Nice profest by that at Frankfort Went not the Nicene Fathers so far that the Answerer says they carried-on Transubstantiation Surely then they held a Real presence Pref. p. 6. Here we have then above six hundred Eastern and Western Bishops concurring in the Belief of a Corporal presence and Adoration in the Eighth Age And the Occasion of their declaring the Doctrine of the Church at that time was not that any one did really question that Faith for Erigena was then unborn but some new language had been used by the Iconoclasts in their discourses of the Adoration of the Eucharist that was both suspicious and dangerous Nor can one Prelate be nam'd who did not accept of the Declarations of these two Councils in this matter All Christians then believ'd a Real presence and all Adored What our Answerer means by particular Prelates I cannot penetrate for no Council consists of other Unless he would insinuate that there wanted Delegates from some National Churches or that some Patriarch or Pope did not concur with these two or the other held in the Eleventh Age against Berengarius all which yet were held by either the Pope in Person or by his Legates and were receiv'd by the whole Western Church and at length by Berengarius himself Councils these later were far greater than any Protestant Synod ever was or can be unless it were that at Dort consisting of at least two Bishops When ever did an Hundred Protestant Bishops convene in One Assembly as there did Catholicks against Berengarins A Convocation of a matter of Twenty-six at the most deserves certainly the character of a Miserable Synod better than a Council so much greater and wherein the Bishops not only of two 〈◊〉 but of many Kingdoms appear'd Nor were these 〈◊〉 any more Parties than was the First at Nice or the Apostolical One at Jerusalem To say they were is as gratis said as if Eutyches had spoken so of that at Chalcedon And whatever reason this Minister can give why the Councils against Berengar shall be esteemed Parties the very same shall the Judaizers Nestorius and Socinus as strongly urge to shew the Synods condemning their Opinions to be Parties also So he may seem to say something this Man heeds not what he writes tho what he publishes instead of enervating the authority of the Councils concern'd about a Corporal presence alone does as vigorously attack that of Councils in general
indeed our Replier's Opinion seems to dislike the word this and thinks it should rather be these Benefits which neither can be eaten nor consecrated nor require any symbols But he saith these Ceremonies were practis'd by divers but he instanceth only in Bishop Jewel Mr. Rastal's testimony he groundlesly denies For we know that in the late times till it was re-commanded by the Rubric few practis'd it or indeed regarded it as a thing of Consequence Which doubtless was the reason of that Command in the Margin it was recall'd into use because disused and the Replier's Reason insufficient P. 6. Gloria in Excelsis Deo and Benedictus qui venit are two Hymns the first plac'd in this part of the Mass as is commonly said by St. Telesphorus the Ninth Bishop of Rome from St. Peter and was the Congratulation of the Angels for the Lord 's coming into the world as the Benedictus was for his Triumphant Entry into Jerusalem both most properly applied to the beginning of this Office as rejoicing for his coming to be present upon the Altar Such universal ancient solemn parts of God's Service were not omitted by chance nor would they have been so had they not contain'd an Argument against the new-devised Absence of the Lord from his people The Sanctus Sanctus Sanctus was not anciently call'd the Trisagium but Hymnus Angelicus Victorialis The Trisagium was Sanctus Deus Sanctus fortis Sanctus immortalis not so much used in the Western as in the Eastern Church which was sung when the Priest approached the Quire v. Menardum To which some add after fortis some after immortalis Qui Crucifixus es pro nobis And they as most of the Asiaticks who apply'd the Hymn to our Saviour meant no harm but they who attributed it to the Trinity as the Constantinopolitans and the West generally condemned it But this only obiter as also that concerning the Receiver's answering Amen which as our Author proves by irrefragable testimonies were it worth the pains to vindicate them not to have been an answer to a Prayer but an acknowledgment of our Lord's Presence there We will add notwithstanding what we find in St. Ambrose's Works l. 4. c. 5. de Sacramentis Non otiose cum accipis dicis Amen Jam in Spiritu confiteris quod accipias corpus Christi Dicit Sacerdos corpus Christi tu dicis Amen i. e. verum est Quod confitetur lingua teneat affectus The omission of these words these Holy Mysteries might be purely accidental And might not be so For they have a signification contrary to the Opinion of the Reformers and all other deniers of the real presence of our Lord nor can they find any mystery in taking eating a Morsel of Bread and a Sup of Wine and remembring our Lord's death and sufferings and then by faith feeding upon him not receiv'd This perhaps is a mystery for I do not understand it P. 7. No fault with the second Form Faulty enough certainly because contrary to the former Book which to prove was the Author's chief intention and consequently from that of the Church of Christ 2. Because either non-sense or to most unintelligible either what is meant by this or by feeding on our Saviour's benefits by Faith. P. 8. These words that these thy Gifts and Creatures of Bread and Wine may be to us the Body and Blood of thy dear Son in the Reformation of the Liturgy were left out because manifestly owning a real change and were not restor'd in Qu. Elizabeth's Liturgy For She probably could not examine all the Alterations by her own self and her Bishops being inclin'd to Zuinglianism did not willingly restore any thing against their own Opinion Afterward Archbishop Laud restor'd it in the Scottish Liturgy For which he was severely censur'd by Baily's Laudensium Autocatacrisis This being as he saith a notable Argument for Transubstantiation at least for the real presence to the Receiver it was Tho it is most certain the Archbishop did not incline to defend Transubstantiation but only the real presence to the Receiver according to the Doctrine of the Church of England mis-understood by that Puritan Pag. 10. Dishonestly or ignorantly worded False They are natural Deductions or rather Propositions almost verbatim taken out of the Declaration whereas those the Replier after his new way of answering would rather have them modell'd into are Nonsense Pag. 11. Calvin and Beza are mentioned because by them were the English Reformers much directed tho our Author doth not ty himself up to speak only of the Church of England-men The Author makes use of Conciliators as being less biassed and therefore better disposed to understand the truth and obliged by their design to a more accurate examination of the Doctrines of both parties and a more strict declaration of them as being assur'd to be opposed by both parties Mr. Thorndike he saith had in this matter opinions of his own agreeable neither to the Catholick nor Church of England The like he saith of our Author p. 1. I am afraid the fault is not in the object but the organ his endeavour to blast so learned a person shews him to have bin rightly quoted by our Author But why should I spend more pains to vindicate the opinions of the Doctors of the English Church which is sufficiently performed in the discourse in the History of the English Reformation from § 148 and by the Discourse here newly printed and the first Appendix to it Pag. 12. The quotations out of Dr. Taylor are most true but if that Doctor was not constant to himself or his own opinion or if by forget fulness he speaks one thing in one place and otherwise â—n another or if he did not throughly understand the difference and therefore vented many undigested and incoherent notions as he seems to most men to have done what is that to us May not we make use of the good wheat because tares are mingled with it Yet I do not remember that he any where sustains as our Replier doth that the Protestants may use the same terms as the Catholicks and yet in a quite different sense But are we come in this great question to may use the terms of the Church in a quite different notion than Antiquity and the Church hath and doth still use them but let them use them as they please only they should give notice of their meaning and tell the world that their words are like Jacob's but their intention like Esau and so plainly confess their heresy and not seek to coyer it with such sorry fig-leaves Pag. 13. Of those to say no worse irreverent expressions of our receiving the dead body and dead blood of our Lord let the Replier and his Capernaits enjoy the honour we content our selves to believe and know that our Lord in this Sacrament is become to us a quickning Spirit How our Lord's body now glorified is received by us as representing his death and sufferings