measure to us all and Protestations against Popery Now 't is true for what concerns the latter of these we allow Popery to have the advantage of us as to the Point of Antiquity nor are we ashamed to own it It being necessary that they should have fallen into Errors before we could protest against them but as to the present matter our Author in his * Disc 1. p. 55. §. lvii Guide to which he refers us confesses that Berengarius against whom these little Synods were called proceeded upon Protestant Grounds i. e. in effect was a Protestant as to this Point And therefore 't is false in him now to say that these Councils were assembled long before the birth of Protestantism But I return to his Church Authority and answer 1. If this Doctrine be certainly contrary to Sense and Reason as was before said then he has told us before that no Motive whatever no Revelation tho never so plain can be sufficient to engage us to believe it 2. For his Councils the eldest of them was above a thousand Years after Christ when by our own Confession the Error tho not of Transubstantiation yet of the Corporal Presence was creeping into the Church 3. These Councils were themselves a Party against Berengarius and therefore no wonder if they condemned him 4. They were neither universal of the whole Church or even of the Western Patriachate in which they assembled and therefore we can have no security that they did not err tho we should grant this Priviledg to a truly General Council that it could not 5. 'T is evident that some of them did err forasmuch as the very * In the first Formulary prescribed him by P. Nicholas 2. in the Siynod of Rome 1059. He thus declares Panem Vinum quae in altari ponuntur post consecrationem non solum Sacramentum sed etiam verum Corpus Sanguinem D. N. J. Christi esse sensualiter non solùm SACRAMENTO sed in Veritate manibus Sacerdotum tractari frangi fidelium dentibus atteri The former Part of which Confession is Lutheran the latter utterly deny'd by the C. of R. at this day In the second Formulary prescribed him by Gregory viith 1078. Confiteor Panem Vinum converti in veram ac propriam Carnem Sanguinem J. C. D. N. Et post consecrationem esse verum Corpus Christi non tantùm per signum virtutem Sacramenti sed in proprietate naturae veritate substantiae This speakes of a Conversion but of what kind it says not and Lombard and the other Schoolmen to the very time of the Council of Lateran were not agreed about it and P. Gregory himself in his MS. Work upon St. Ma◠knew not what to think of it Formularies of Recantation prescribed to Berengarius do not agree the one with the other and one of them was such that their own †Jo. Semeca ad Can. Ego Berengar not ad Jus Canon Nisi sanè intelligas verba Berengarii in majorem incides Haeresim quam ipse habuit ideò onmia referas ad species ipsas nam de Christi Corpore partes non facimus So Hervaeus in 4. dist qu. 1. art 1. says that to speake the more expressly against the Hereticks be declined a little too much to the opposite side So Ricardus de Media Villa in 4. dist princip 1. qu. 1. Berengarius suerat infamatus quòd non credebat-Corpus Christi realiter contineri sub pane ideò ad sui purgationem per verba excessiva contrarium Asseruit Authors tell us it must be very favourably interpreted or it will lead us into a worser Error than that which it condemn'd 6. Were they never so infallible yet they none of them defined Transubstantiation but only a Corporal Presence and so whatever Authority they have it is for the Lutherans not the Papists 7. And this their own Writers seem to own forasmuch as none of them pretend to any definition of Transubstantiation before the Council of Lateran and till which time they freely confess it was no Article of Faith. Such is the Church Authority which this Discourser would put upon us But now that I have mentioned the Council of Lateran as I have before observed Pag. 28. that it was the same Council which establish'd this Error that also gave power to the Pope to depose Princes and absolve their Subjects from their Obedience so I cannot but remak further in this place the Zeal of our Author in the defence of its Authority It is but a very little while since another of their Church ‖ Lond. 1616. Pag. 362 c. Father Walsh in his Letter to the Bishop of Lincoln did not think that the * Mr. Dodwel Consid of present Concernment §. 31. Learned Person of our Church to whom he refers us had so clearly proved these Canons to have been the genuine †Monsieur du Pin utterly denies these Canons to have been the Decrees of the Council Dissert vii c. iii. §. 4. Acts either of the Council or even of the Papist himself but that a Man might still have reason to doubt of both But indeed tho that Father be of another mould yet there are still some in the World and I believe of this Author's acquaintance who like this Council never the worse for such a decision but think the third Canon as necessary to keep Princes in a due Obedience to the Church as the first de Fide Catholià to help out the obscurity of the Text in favour of Transubstantiation But he goes on Pag. 28 29. §. xxv and upon these Premises Ask us What more reasonable or secure course in matters of Religion can a private and truly humble Christian take than where the sense of a Divine Revelation is disputed to submit to that Interpretation thereof which the Supreamest Authority in the Church that hath heretofore been convened about such matters hath so often and always in the same manner decided to him and so to act according to its Injunction Now not to say any more as to his Expression of the Supremest Church Authority which it may be he will interpret not absolutely but with this Reserve that hath been convened about such matters I answer from himself 1. It is a more reasonable and secure course to follow that Interpretation which is agreeable to the common Sense and Reason of Mankind and against which he tells us not only the Authority of a Synod but even a Divine Revelation is not sufficient to secure us 2. These Synods as I have shewed besides that they were particular were moreover Parties in the case And then 3. It is false to say that they always decided the same or that that which they decided is the same which the Church of Rome now holds in this matter All which our * Particularly Elondel to whom this Author refers us Eclairciss de l'Euch c. 20
and what is opposite to the one can no more be agreeable to the other than God can be contrary to himself And though if the Revelation be clear and evident we submit to it because we are then sure it cannot be contrary to Reason whatever it may appear to us yet when the contradiction is manifest as that a natural Body should be in more places than one at the same time we are sure that interpretation of Holy Scripture can never be the right which would infer this but especially when there is another and much more reasonable that do's not And in this we are after all justified by one whose Authority I hope our Author will not question even his own self If says he Treatise 1st §. 29. pag. 21. we are certain there is a contradiction then we are certain there neither is nor can be a contrary Revelation and when any Revelation tho' never so plain is brought we are bound to interpret it so as not to affirm a certainly known impossibility And let him that sticks to this rule interpret Christs words for Transubstantiation if he can But do not our own Authors sometimes say that notwithstanding all the difficulties brought against Transubstantiation yet if it can be shewn that God has revealed it they are ready to believe it Perhaps some may have said this because for that very Reason that there are so many contradictions in it they are sure it cannot be shewn that God has revealed it But if he means as he seems to insinuate that notwithstanding such plain contradictions as they charge it with they thought it possible nevertheless that God might have revealed it and upon that supposition they were ready to believe it I answer from his own words that their supposal then was Absurd and impossible since he himself assure us Treatise 1st §. xx n. 3. pag. 14. that None can believe a thing true upon what motive soever which he first knows to be certainly false or which is all one certainly to contradict For these we say are not verifyable by a divine Power and Ergo here I may say should a divine power declare a truth it would transcend its self Which last words if they signifie any thing and do not transcend Sense must suppose it impossible for such a thing as implies a certain Contradiction to be revealed II. Observation But our Author goes on I conceive that any one thing that seemeth to us to include a Perfect Contradiction can no more be effected by divine Power than another or than many others the like may Seeing then we admit that some seeming Contradictions to Reason may be verified by the Divine power in this Sacrament there is no reason to deny but that this may be also as well as any other Now not to contend with him about words whoever told our Author that we allow'd that there was any thing in this Sacrament as received by us that seemed to us to include a Perfect Contradiction Perfect Contradictions we confess are all of them equally verifyable by a divine Power that is are all of them impossible And for this we have his own word before Now if there be any such things as perfect contradictions to be known by us that which seems to us to be a perfect contradiction must really be a perfect contradiction unless contradictions are to be discover'd some other way than by seeming to our Reason to be so And such it not only seems but undoubtedly is for the same One natural finite Body to be in more places than one at the same time if to be and not to be be still the measure of Contradictions He that says of such a Body that it is in Heaven and on Earth at London and Rome at the same time says in Effect that 't is one and not one finite and not finite in one place and not in one place c. All which are such seemingly perfect contradictions that I fear 't will be a hard matter to find out any Power by which they can be verify'd III. Observation Treatise 1st §. xxii p. 15. He observes Thirdly That those who affirm a Real and Substantial presence of the very Body of Christ to the worthy communicant contradistinct to any such other Real presence of Christs Body as implies only a presence or it in Virtue and Spiritual Effects c. must hold this particular seeming Contradiction to be True or some other equivalent to it If by the Real Presence of the very Body of Christ he means as he before explains it That Christ's Natural Body that very Body which is now in Heaven should be also at the same time here upon Earth it is I think necessary for those who will affirm this to hold some such kind of Contradiction as he says And 't is for that very Reason I am perswaded he will find but few such Persons in the Church of England which so expresly declares that Christ's Natural Body is in Heaven and not here upon this very account That it is contrary to the truth of a Natural Body to be in more places than one at the same time However if any such there be as they herein depart from the Doctrine of their Church so it is not our concern to answer for their Contradictions IV. He observes lastly It seems to me that some of the more judicious amongst them the Divines he means of the Church of England have not laid so great a weight on this Philosophical Position Tract 1. §. xxviii p. 20. as wholly to support and regulate their Faith in this matter by it as it stands in opposition not only to Nature's but the Divine Power because they pretend not any such certainty thereof but that if any Divine Revelation of the contrary can be shewed they profess a readiness to believe it I shall not now trouble my self with what some of our Divines may seem to him to have done in this matter 't is evident our Church has laid stress enough upon this Contradiction Indeed where so many gross Repugnancies both to Sense and Reason are crowded together as we have seen before there are in this Point it ought not to be wondered if our Divines have not supported and regulated their Faith wholly upon this one alone We do not any of Us think it either safe or pious to be too nice in determining what God can or cannot do we leave that to the bold Inquisitiveness of their Schools But this we think we may say that if there are any unalterable Laws of Nature by which we are to judg of these things then God can no more make one Body to exist in ten thousand places at the same time than he can make one continuing one to be ten thousand than he can divide the same thing from its self and yet continue it still undivided And if any of our Divines have said that they cannot admit that one Body can be in several
which is altogether as unintelligible as the Mystery which 't is brought to explain I might to the particulars hitherto mentioned add the whole Sect of their new Philosophers who following the Hypothesis of their Master Des-cartes that Accidents are nothing else but the Modes of Matter must here either renounce his Doctrine or their Churches Belief But I shall close these remarks which have already run to a greater length than I designed with one instance more from a Prelate of our own Church but yet whos 's truly Christian sincerity will I am perswaded justifie him even to those of the Roman Communion The same is affirmed by Monsieur du Moulin of several Priests in France Disp Sedannens de Sacr. Euch. par 4. p. 846. Nec abs re de intentione presbyteri dubitatur cum plurimi Sacerdotes canant Missam relactante Conscientiâ quales multos vidimus qui ejurato Papismo fatebantur se diu cecinisse Missam animo à Missà alienissimo and it is the learned Archbishop Usher who having been so happy as to convert several Roman Priests from their errors and inquiring diligently of them what they who said Mass every day and were not obliged to confess Venial Sins could have to trouble their Confessors so continually withal ingenuously acknowledged to him that the chiefest part of their constant Confession was their Infidelity as to the point of Transubstantiation and for which as was most fit they mutually quitted and absolved one another And now that is thus clear from so many instances of the greatest Men in the Roman Church which this last Age has produced and from whose discovery we may reasonably enough infer the like of many others that have not come to our knowledge that several Persons who have lived and enjoyed some of the greatest Honours and Dignities in that Communion have nevertheless been Hereticks in this point may I beseech those who are still mis-led with this great Error to stop a while and seriously examine with me two or three plain considerations and in which I suppose they are not a little concerned And the first is Of their own danger but especially upon their Own Principles It is but a very little while since an ingenious Person now living in the French Church the Abbé Petit publish'd a Book which he calls (a) Les Veritez de la Religion prouveés defendues contre les auciennes Heresies par la verité de l'Eucharistie 1686. The truths of the Christian Religion proved and defended against the antient Heresies by the Truth of the Eucharist And what he means by this truth he thus declares in his Preface viz. the change of (b) Que du pain divienne le Corps du fils de Dieu du Vin son sang Preface p. 7. the Bread into the Body of the Son of God and of the Wine into his Blood. He there pretends that this Doctrine however combatted by us now was (c) Quoiqu'il n'y ait point presentement de verites plus incontestables que les trois grands articles de nostre foi qui sont contenus dans le symbole c'est à dire la dizinite de J. C. la divinite du S. Esprit la Resurrection Cependant j ' ose dire que la presence réelle de J. C. au Saint Sacrament etoit une verité encore plus indubitable dans les premiers siecles de l'Eglise Pref. p. 5. yet more undoubted in the Primitive Church than either the divinity of Christ and the Holy Ghost or the certainty of our future Resurrection And this he wrote as the Title tells us (d) Traitté pour confirmer les Noveaux Convertis dans la foi de l'Eglise Catholique To confirm the new Converts in the Faith of the Catholick Church meaning according to their usual figure the Roman How far this extravagant undertaking may serve to convince them I cannot tell this I know that if we may credit those who have been that Abbot ' s most intimate acquaintance he believes but very little of it himself unless he also be become in this point a new Convert But now if what has before been said of so many eminent Persons of their Church be true as after a due and diligent examination of every particular there set down I must beg leave to profess I am fully perswaded that it is 't will need no long deduction to shew how dangerous an influence their unbelief must have had in some of the chiefest instances of their constant Worship For 1. It is the Doctrine of the (e) Concil Trid. Sess vii Can. 11. siquis dixerit in ministris dum Sacramenta conficiunt non requiri intentionem saltem saciendi quod facit Ecclesia Anathema sit Council of Trent that to make a Sacrament the Priest must have if not an Actual yet at least a Virtual Intention of doing that which the Church does And in the (f) Vid. de defectibus circa Missam c. de defectu Intentionis In Missali R. Rubricks of their Missal the want of such an Intention in the Priest is one of the defects there set down as sufficient to hinder a Consecration Now if this be true as every Roman Catholick who acknowledges the Authority of that Synod must believe it to be 't is then evident that in all those Masses which any of the Persons I before named have said there could have been no Consecration It being absurd to suppose that they who believed not Transubstantiation could have an intention to make any such change of the Bread into the Body of Christ which they thought it impossible to do Now if there were no Consecration but that the Bread continued meer Bread as it was before then Secondly All those who attended at their Masses and Adored their Hosts pay'd the supream worship of God to a bare Wafer and no more How far the modern plea of their good Intention to Adore Christ in those sacred Offices may excuse them from having committed Idolatry it is not necessary I should here examine They who desire a satisfaction in this matter may please to recur to a late excellent Treatise written purposely on this Subject A Discourse concerning the Adoration of the Host Lond. 1685. and where they will find the weakness of this supposal sufficiently exposed But since (a) Vid. Catharin in Cajet pag. 133. Ed. Paris 1535. Where he quotes S. Thomas and Paludanus for the same Opinion This Book of his was seen and approved by the Pope's order by the Divines at Paris as himself tel's us in the review of it Lugdan 1542. many of their own greatest Men confess that if any one by mistake should worship an Unconsecrated Host taking it to have been Consecrated he would be guilty of Idolatry and that such an Error would not be sufficient to excuse him may they please to consider with what Faith they can pay this Divine Adoration to that which
all their Senses tell them is but a bit of Bread to the hinderance of whose Conversion so many things may interpose that were their Doctrine otherwise as infallible as we are certain it is false it would yet be a hundred to one that there is no Consecration in a word how they can worship that which they can never be secure is changed into Christ's Body nay when as the examples I have before given shew they have all the reason in the World to fear whether even the Priest himself who says the Mass does indeed believe that he has any Power or by consequence can have any intention to turn it into the Flesh of Christ And the same consideration will shew Thirdly How little security their other Plea of Concomitance which they so much insist upon to shew the sufficiency of their Communicating only in one kind viz. that they receive the Blood in the Body can give to the Laity to satisfie their Consciences that they ever partake of that Blessed Sacrament as they ought to do Since whatever is pretended of Christ's Body 't is certain there can be none of his Blood in a meer Wafer And if by reason of the Priest's infidelity the Host should be indeed nothing else of which we have shewn they can never be sure neither can they ever know whether what they receive be upon their own Principles an intire Communion And then Lastly for the main thing of all The Sacrifice of the Mass it is clear that if Christ's Body be not truly and properly there it cannot be truly and properly offer'd nor any of those great benefits be derived to them from a morsel of Bread which themselves declare can proceed only from the Flesh and Blood of their Blessed Lord. It is I know an easie matter for those who can believe Transubstantiation to believe also that there is no hazard in all these great and apparent dangers But yet in matters of such moment Men ought to desire to be well assured and not exposed even to any possible defects De defectibus cirea Missam De defectu panis Si panis non sit triticeus vel si triticeus sit admixtus granis alterius generis in tantâ quantitate ut non maneat panis triticeus vel sit alioqui corruptus non conficitur Sacramentum Si sit confectus de aqud rosaceâ vel alterius distillationis dubium est an conficiatur Et de defect vini Si Vinum sit factum penitus acetum vel penitus putridum vel de uvis acerbis seu non maturis expressiom vel admixtum tantum aque ut vinum sit corruptum non consicitur Sacramentum I do not now insist upon the common remarks which yet are Authorized by their own Missal and may give just grounds to their fears That if the Wafer be not made of Wheat but of some other Corn there is then no Consecration If it be mixed not with common but distill'd Water it is doubtful whether it be Consecrated If the Wine be sowre to such a certain degree that then it becomes incapable of being changed into the Blood of Christ with many more of the like kind and which render it always uncertain to them whether there be any change made in the blessed Elements or no * Du Moulin in the place above cited mentions one that in his time was burnt at Loudun for Consecrating a Host in the name of the Devil Thes Sedann Th. 97. n. 10. p. 846. Vol. 1. the Relations I have given are not of counterfeit Jews and Moors who to escape the danger of the Inquisition have sometimes become Priests and administred all the Sacraments for many years together without ever having an intention to Administer truly any one of them and of which I could give an eminent instance in a certain Jew now living who for many Years was not only a Priest but a Professor of Divinity in Spain and all the while in reality a meer Jew as he is now The Persons here mention'd were Men of undoubted reputation of great learning and singular esteem in their Church and if these found the impossibilities of Transubstantiation so much greater than either the pretended Authority or Infallibility of their Church certainly they may have just cause to fear whether many others of their Priests do not Live in the same infidelity in which these have Died and so expose them to all the hazards now mentioned and which are undeniably the consequences of such their Unbelief But these are not the only dangers I would desire those of that Communion to reflect on upon this occasion Another there is and of greater consequence than any I have hitherto mentioned and which may perhaps extend not only to this Holy Eucharist but it may be to the invalidating of most of their other Sacraments * Eugenii IV. decret in Act. Concil Florent Ann. 1439. Concil Labb Tom. 13. p. 535. Concil Trident. Sess VII Can. 2. It is the Doctrine of the Roman Church that to the Validity of every Sacrament and therefore of that of Orders as well as the rest three things must concur a due matter a right form and the Person of the Minister conferring the Sacrament with an intention of doing what the Church does Where either of these is wanting the Sacrament is not performed If therefore the Bishop in conferring the Holy Order of Priesthood has not an intention of doing what the Church does 't is plain that the Person to be ordained receives no Priestly Character of him nor by consequence has any power of consecrating the Holy Eucharist or of being hereafter advanced to a higher degree Now the form of conferring the Order of Priesthood they determine to be this †Ibid. pag. 5â—3 Catech. Concil Trid. de Sacr. Ord. n. xxii p. 222. Item n. L. p. 228. The Bishop delivers the Cup with some Wine and the Paten with Bread into the Hands of the person whom he Ordains saying Receive the Power of offering a Sacrifice in the Church for the living and the dead in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost By which Ceremony and words their Catechism tells us He is constituted an Interpreter and Mediator between God and Man which is to be esteemed the chiefest Function of a Priest So that then the intention necessary to the conferring the Order of Priesthood is this to give a Power to consecrate i. e. to Transubstantiate the Host into Christ's Body and so offer it as a Sacrifice for the Living and the Dead If therefore any of their Bishops for instance Cardinal du Perron or Monsieur de Marca did not believe that either the Church or themselves as Bishops of it had any Authority to confer any such Power they could not certainly have any Intention of doing in this case what the Church intends to do Having no such Intention the Persons whom they pretended to Ordain were no Priests