same Ministry of salvation and but one and the same Oeconomy of God Thus St. Peter affirms That by the precious blood of Christ we are redeemed from our vain conversation and it is every where affirmed that we are purified and cleansed by the blood of Christ and yet these are the express effects of his Spirit for by the spirit we mortifie the deeds of the body and we are justified and sanctified in the name of our Lord Jesus by the spirit of our God By which expressions we are taught to distinguish the natural blood of Christ from the spiritual the blood that he gave for us from the blood which he gives to us that was indeed by the spirit but was not the same thing but this is the spirit of grace and the spirit of wisdom And therefore as our Fathers were made to drink into one spirit when they drank of the water of the rock so we also partake of the spirit when we drink of Christs blood which came from the spiritual rock when it was smitten for thus according to the Doctrine of St. John the water aâ—d the blood and the spirit are one and the same glorious purposes As it was with our Fathers in the beginning so it is now with us and so it ever shall be world without end for they fed upon Christ that is they believed in Christ they expected his day they lived upon his promises they lived by faith in him and the same meat and drink is set upon our Tables and more than all this as Christ is the Lamb slain from the beginning of the world so he shall be the food of souls in heaven where they who are accounted worthy shall sit down and be feasted in the eternal Supper of the Lamb concerning which blessedness our B. Saviour saith Blessed is he that eateth bread in the Kingdom of God for he hath appointed to his chosen ones to eat and drink at his table in his Kingdom plainly teaching us that by eating and drinking Christ is meant in this world to live the life of the spirit and in the other world it is to live the life of glory here we feed upon duty and there we feed upon reward our wine is here mingled with water and with myrrhe there it is mere and unmixt but still it is called meat and drink and still is meant grace and glory the fruits of the spirit and the joy of the spirit that is by Christ we here live a spiritual life and hereafter shall live a life eternal Thus are sensible things the Sacrament and representation of the spiritual and eternal and spiritual things are the fulfillings of the sensible But the consequent of these things is this that since Christ always was is and shall be the food of the faithful and is that bread which came down from heaven since we eat him here and shall eat him there our eating both here and there is spiritual only the word of teaching shall be changed into the word of glorification and our faith into Charity and all the way our souls live a new life by Christ of which eating and drinking is the Symbol and the Sacrament And this is not done to make this mystery obscure but intelligible and easie For so the pains of hell are expressed by fire which to our flesh is most painful and the joyes of God by that which brings us greatest pleasure by meat and drink and the growth in grace by the natural instruments of nutrition and the work of the Soul by the ministeries of the body and the graces of God by the blessings of nature for these we know and we know nothing else and but by phantasmes and ideas of what we see and feel we understand nothing at all Now this is so far from being a diminution of the glorious mystery of our Communion that the changing all into spirituality is the greatest increase of blessing in the world And when he gives us his body and his blood he does not fill our stomachs with good things for of whatsoever goes in thither it is affirmed by the Apostle that God will destroy both it and them but our hearts are to be replenished and by receiving his spirit we receive the best thing that God gives not his liveless body but his flesh with life in it that is his doctrine and his spirit to imprint it so to beget a living faith and a lively hope that we may live and live for ever 4. St. John having thus explicated this mystery in general of our eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Christ added nothing in particular concerning any Sacraments these being in particular instances of the general mystery and communion with Christ. But what is the advantage we receive by the Sacraments besides that which we get by the other and distinct ministeries of faith I thus account in general The word and the spirit are the flesh and the blood of Christ that is the ground of all Now because there are two great Sermons of the Gospel which are the summe total and abbreviature of the whole word of God the great messages of the word incarnate Christ was pleased to invest these two words with two Sacraments and assist those two Sacraments as he did the whole word of God with the presence of his Spirit that in them we might do more signally and solemnly what was in the ordinary ministrations done plainly and without extraordinary regards Believe and repent is the word in Baptisme and and there solemnly consigned and here it is that by faith we feed on Christ for faith as it is opposed to works that is the new Covenant of faith as it is opposed to the old Covenant of works is the covenant of repentance repentance is expressly included in the new covenant but was not in the old but by faith in Christ we are admitted to pardon of our sins if we repent and forsake them utterly Now this is the word of faith and this is that which is called the flesh or body of Christ for this is that which the soul feeds on this is that by which the just do live and when by the operation of the holy spirit the waters are reformed to a Divine Nature or efficacy the baptized are made clean theâ— are sanctified and presented pure and spotless unto God This mystery St. Austin rightly understood when he affirmed that we are made partakers of the body and blood of Christ when we are in baptisme incorporated into his body we are baptized in the passion of our Lord so Tertullian to the same sense with that of St. Paul we are buried with him in baptisme into his death that is by baptisme are conveyed to us all the effects of Christ's death the flesh and blood of Christ crucified are in baptisme reached to us by the hand of God by his holy spirit and received by the hand of man the Ministery of
produce you ought not to esteem it strange and impossible for how earthly and mortal things are converted into the substance of Christ ask thy self who art regenerated in Christ Not long since thou wast a stranger from life a pilgrim and wanderer from mercy and being inwardly dead thou wert banished from the way of life On a sudden being initiated in the laws of Christ and renewed by the Mysteries of Salvation thou didst passe suddenly into the body of the Church not by seeing but by believing and from a son of perdition thou hast obtained to be adopted a son of God by a secret purity remaining in a visible measure thou art invisibly made greater than thy self without any increase of quantity thou art the same thou wert and yet very much another person in the progression of Faith to the outward nothing is added but the inward is wholly changed and so a man is made the son of Christ and Christ is formed in the mind of a man As therefore suddenly without any bodily perception the former vileness being laid down on the sudden thou hast put on a new dignity and this that God hath done that he hath cured thy wounds washed off thy staines wiped away thy spots is trusted to thy discerning not thy eyes so when thou ascendest the reverend altar to be satisfied with spiritual food by faith regard honour admire the holy body of God touch it with thy mind take it with the hand of thy heart even with the draught of the whole inward man SECT V. Practical conclusions from the preceding Discourses THe first I represent in the words of St. Augustin who reduces this whole doctrine to practice in these excellent words let this whole affair thus far prevail with us that we may eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ not only in the Sacrament which many evil persons doe but let us eat and drink unto the participation of the spirit that as members we may abide in the Lords body that we may be quickened by his spirit and let us not be scandalized because many do temporally eat and drink with us who yet in the end shall find eternal torments that is let us remember that the exteriour ministery is the least part of it and externally and alone it hath in it nothing excellent as being destitute of the sanctity that God requires and the grace that he does promise and it is common to wicked men and good but when the signs and the thing signified when the prayers of the Church and the spirit of God the word and the meaning the sacrament and the grace do concur then it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is a venerable cup and full of power and more honourable than all our possessions it is a holy thing saith Origen and appointed for our sanctification For Christ in the Sacrament is Christ under a vail as without the hand of faith we cannot take Christ so we must be sure to look here with an eye of faith and whatsoever glorious thing is said of the holy Sacrament it must be understood of the whole Sacrament body and spirit that is the Sacramental and the spiritual Communion 2. Let no man be lesse confident in his holy faith and persuasion concerning the great blessings and glorious effects which God designs to every faithful and obedient soul in the communication of these Divine mysteries by reason of any difference of judgement which is in the several Schools of Christians concerning the effects and consequent blessings of this Sacrament For all men speak honourable things of it except wicked persons and the scorners of Religion and though of several persons like the beholders of a dove walking in the sun as they stand in several aspects and distances some see red and others purple and yet some perceive nothing but green but all allow and love the beauties so do the several forms of Christians according as they are instructed by their first teachers or their own experience conducted by their fancy and proper principles look upon these glorious mysteries some as vertually containing the reward of obedience some as solemnities of thanksgiving and records of blessings some as the objective increasers of faith others as the Sacramental participations of Christ others as the acts instruments of natural union yet all affirm some great things or other of it and by their differences confesse the immensity and the glory For thus Manna represented to every man the taste that himself did like but it had in its own potentiality all those tasts and dispositions eminently and altogether those feasters could speak of great and many excellencies and all confessed it to be enough and to be the food of Angels so it is here it is that to every mans faith which his faith wisely apprehends and though there are some who are of little faith and such receive but a less proportion of nourishment yet by the very use of this Sacrament the appetite will increase and the apprehensions grow greater and the faith will be more confident and instructed and then we shall see more and feel more For this holy nutriment is not only food but physick too and although to him who believes great things of his Physitian and of his medicine it is apt to do the more advantage yet it will do its main work even when we understand it not and nothing can hinder it but direct infidelity or some of its foul and deformed ministers 3. They who receive the blessed Sacrament must not suppose that the blessings of it are effected as health is by physick or warmth by the contact and neighbourhood of fire but as musick one way affects the soul and witty discourses another and joyful tidings a way differing from both the former so the operations of the Sacrament are produced by an energy of a nature intirely differing from all things else But however it is done the thing that is done is this no grace is there improved but what we bring along with us no increases but what we exercise we must bring faith along with us and God will increase our faith we must come with charity and we shall go away with more we must come with truly penitential hearts and to him that hath shall be given and he shall have more abundantly he shall be a better penitent when he hath eaten the sacrifice that was slain for our sins and died in the body that we might live in the spirit and die no more For he is the bread from heaven he is the grain of wheat which falling into the earth unless it dies it remains alone but if it dies it brings forth fruit and brings it forth abundantly 4. Although the words the names and sayings concerning the Blessed Sacrament are mysterious and inexplicable yet they do nay therefore weare sure they signifie some great thing they are in the very expression beyond our understanding therefore much more are
is the first principle of the world not meaning that darknesse was before light but by Darkness they mean God as Damascius the Platonist rightly observes saying This darknesse or obscurity is the beginning of every intellectual being and every Sacramental action and therefore in their ceremonies they usually made three acclamations to the unknown Darkness that is to God whose secrets are pervious to no eye whose dwelling is in a light that is not to be discerned whose mysteries are not to be understood by us and whose Sacraments are objects of faith and wonder but not to be disordered by the mistaking undiscerning eye of people that are curious to ask after what they shall never understand Faith is oftentimes safer in her ignorance than in busie questions and to enquire after the manner of what God hath plainly and simply told may be an effect of infidelity but never an act of faith If concerning the things of God we once ask Why or How we argue our doubt and want of confidence and therefore it was an excellent Counsel of S. Cyril Believe firmly in the mysteries and consent to the words of Christ but never so much as speak or think How is this done In your faith be as particular and minute as Christ was in his expressions of it but no more He hath told us This is his body This is his blood believe it and so receive it but he hath not told us how it is so it is behind a cloud and tied up with a knot of secrecy therefore let us lay our finger on our mouth and worship humbly But he that looks into the eye of the Sun shall be blind and he that searches into the secrets of Majesty shall be confounded with the glory The next enquiry is What is the use of faith in this Sacrament It is tied but to little duty and a few plain articles what then is the use and advantages of it To what graces does it minister and what effect does it produce To this the answer is easie but yet such as introduces a further enquiry Faith indeed is not curious but material and therefore in the contemplation of this mysterious Sacrament and its Symbols we are more to regard their signification than their matter their holy imployment than their natural usuage what they are by grace than what they are by nature what they signifie rather than what they are defin'd Faith considers not how they nourish the body but how they support and exalt the soul that they are Sacramental not that they are also nutritive that they are made holy to purposes of Religion not that they are salutary to offices of nature that is what they are to the spirit not what they are to sense and disputation For to faith Christ is present by faith we eat his flesh and by faith we drink his blood that is we communicate not as men but as faithful and believers the meaning and the duty and the effect of which are now to be inquired 1. It signifies that Christ is not present in the Sacrament corporally or naturally but spiritually for thus the carnal and spiritual sense are opposed So St. Chrysostom upon those words of Christ the flesh profiteth nothing what is it to understand carnally To understand them simply and plainly as they are spoken For they are not to be judged as they seem but all mysteries are to be considered with internal eyes that is spiritually For the carnal sense does not penetrate to the understanding of so great a secret saith St. Cyprian For therefore we are not devourers of flesh because we understand these things spiritually So Theophilaect 2. Since the spiritual sense excludes the natural and proper it remains that the expression which is natural be in the sense figurative and improper and if the holy Sacrament were not a figure it could neither be a sign nor a Sacrament But therefore it is called the body and blood of Christ because it is the figure of them as St. Austin largely discourses â—or so when good Friday draws neer we say to morrow or the next day is the passion of our Lord although that passion was but once and that many ages since and upon the Lords day we say to day our blessed Lord arose from the dead although so many years be passed since and why is no man so foolish as to reprove us of falshood but because on these dayes is the similitude of those things which were done so long since Was not Christ once sacrificed and yet he is sacrificed still on the solemnities of Easter and every day in the Communions of the people neither does he say false who being asked shall say that he is sacrificed for if the Sacraments had not a similitude of those things whereof they are Sacraments they would be no Sacraments at all But most commonly by their similitudes things receive their names Thus Tertullian expresses this mystery This is my body that is the figure of my body and St. Gregory Nazianzen calls the Passeover because it antedated the Lords Supper a figure of a figure 3. But St. Austin added well The body of Christ is truth and figure too The holy Sacrament is not only called the Lords body and blood for the figure similitude and Sacramentality but for the real exhibition and ministration of it For it is truly called the body of Christ because there is joyned with it the vital power vertue and efficacy of the body and therefore it is called by St. Austin the intelligible the invisible the spiritual body by St. Hierom the Divine and spiritual flesh the celestial thing by St. Irenaeus the spiritual food and the body of the divine Spirit by St. Ambrose for by this means it can very properly be called the body and blood of Christ since it hath not only the figure of his death externally but internally it hath hidden and secret the proper and divine effect the life-giving power of his body so that though it be a figure yet it is not meerly so not only the sign and memorial of him that is absent but it bears along with it the very body of the Lord that is the efficacy and divine vertue of it Thus our blessed Saviour said of John the Baptist that Elias is already come because he came in the power and spirit of Elias As John was Elias so is the holy Sacrament the body and blood of Christ because it hath the power and spirit of the body of Christ. And therefore the ancient Doctors of the Church in their Sermons of these divine Mysteries use the word Nature and Substance not understanding these words in the natural or Philosophical but a Theological in a sense proper to the Schools of Christians by Substance meaning the power of the substance by Nature the gracious effect of his natural body the nature and use and mysteriousnesse of Sacraments so allowing them to speak
that when our affections to sin are gone when our hearts are clean then we may freely partake of the feast of the supper of the Lamb. For as in natural forms the more noble they are the more noble dispositions are required to their production so it is in the spiritual for when Christ is to be efformed in us when we are to become the Sons of God flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone we must be washed in water and purified by faith and sanctified by the spirit and cleansed by an excellent repentance we must be confirmed by a holy hope and softned by charity So God hath ordered in the excellent fabrick of humane bodies First our meat is prepared by fire then macerated by the teeth then digested in the stomach where the first separation is made of the good from the bad the wholesom juyces from the more earthy parts these being sent down to earth the other are conveyed to the Liver where the matter is separated again and the good is turned into blood and the better into spirits and thence the body is supplied with blood and the spirits repair unto the heart and head that thence they may be sent on Embassies for the ministeries of the body and for the work of understanding So it is in the dispensation of the affairs of the soul The ear which is the mouth of the soul receives all meat and the senses entertain the fuel for all passions and all interests of vertue and vice But the understanding makes the first separation dividing the clean from the unclean But when the spirit of God comes and purifies even the separate matter making that which is morally good to be spiritual and holy first cleansing us from the sensualities of flesh and blood and then from spiritual iniquities that usually debauch the soul then the holy nourishment which we receive passes into diviâ—e excellencies But if sensuality be in the palate and intemperance in the stomach if lust be in the liver and anger in the heart it corrupts the holy food and makes that to be a savour of death which was intended for health and holy blessiâ—gs But therefore when we have lived in the corrupted air of evil company and have sucked in the vile juices of coloquintida and the deadly henbane when that is within the heart which defiles the man the soul must be purged by repentance it must be washed by tears and purified by penitential sorrow For he that comes to this holy Feast with an unrepenting heart is like the flies in the Temple upon the day of Sacrifice the little insect is very busie about the flesh of the slain beasts she flies to every corner of the Temple and she tastes the flesh before the portion is laid before the God but when the nidour and the delicacy hath called such an unwelcome guest she corrupts the Sacrifice and therefore dies at the Altar or is driven away by the officious Priest So is an unworthy Communicant he comes it may be with pâ—ssion and an earnest zeal he hopes to be fed and he hopes to be made immortal he thinks he does a holy action and shall receive a holy blessing but what is his portion It is a glorious thing to be feasted at the Table of God glorious to him that is invited and prepared but not to him that is unprepared hateful and impenitent But it is an easie thing to say that a man must repent before he communicates so he must before he prayes before he dies before he goes a journey the whole life of a man is to be a continual repentance but if so then what particular is that which is required before we receive the holy Communion For if it be an universal duty of infinit extent of unlimited comprehension then every Christian must alwayes be doing some of the offices of repentance but then which are the peculiar parts and offices of this grace which have any special and immediate relation to this solemnity for if there be none the Sermons of repentâ—nce are nothing but the general doctrine of good life but of no special efficacy in our preparation The answer to this will explicate the intricacy and establish the measures of our duty in this proper relation in order to this ministery SECT II. The necessity of repentance in order to the holy Sacrament 1. THe holy Sacrament of the Lords Supper does not produce it's intended effect upon an unprepared subject He that gives his body to that which is against the spirit his spirit to the affections of the body cannot receive the body of Christ in a spiritual maner He that receives Christ must in great truth be a servant of Christ. It is not lawful saith Justin Martyr for any one to receive the holy Eucharistical bread and to drink of the sacred Calice but to him that believes and to him that lives according to Christs Commandment For as St. Paul argues of the infinite undecency of fornication because it is a making the members of Christ to become the members of an harlot upon the same account it is infinitely impossible that any such polluted persons should become the members of Christ to the intents of blessing and the spirit How can Christs body be communicated to them who are one flesh with an harlot and so it is in all other sins we cannot partake of the Lords table and the table of Devils A wicked person and a Communicant are of contrary interests of differing relations designed to divers ends fitted with other dispositions they work not by the same principles are not weighed in the same ballance nor meted by like measures and therefore they that come must be innocent or return to innocence that is they must repent or be such persons as need no repentance and St. Ambrose gives this account of the practise of the Church in this affair This is the order of this mystery which is every where observed that first by the pardon of our sins our souls be healed and the wounds cured with the medicine of repentance and then that our souls be plentifully nourished by this holy Sacrament and to this purpose he expounds the parable of the prodigal son saying that no man ought to come to this Sacrament unless he have the wedding ring and the wedding garment unless he have receiv'd the seal of the spirit and is cloathed with white garments the righteousness and justification of the Saints And to the same purpose it is that St. Cyprian complains of some in his Church who not having repented not being put under discipline by the Bishop and the Clergy yet had the Sacrament ministred to them against whom he presses the severe words of St. Paul He that eats and drinks unworthily eats and drinks damnation to himself that is he that repents not of his sins before he comes to the Holy Sacrament comes before he is prepared and therefore
him till the time of restitution of all things and so long as we are present in the body we are absent from the Lord. In the mean time we can taste and see that the Lord is gracious that he is sweet but Christ is so to be tasted as he is to be seen and no otherwise but here we walk by faith and not by sight and here also we live by faith and not by meer or only bread but by that Word which proceedeth out from God that as meat is to the body so is Christ to the soul the food of the soul by which the souls of the just do live He is the bread which came down from heaven the bread which was born at Bethlâ—hem the house of bread was given to us to be the food of our souls for ever The meaning of which mysterious and Sacramental expressions when they are reduced to easie intelligible significations is plainly this By Christ we live and move and have our spiritual being in the life of grace and in the hopes of glory He took our life that we might partake of his he gave his life for us that he might give life to us He is the Author and finisher of our faith the beginning and perfection of our spiritual life Every good thought we think we have it from him every good word we speak we speak it by his spirit for no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the holy Ghost and all our prayers are by the aids and communications of the spirit of Christ who helpeth our infirmities and by unutterable groans and unexpressible representment of most passionate desires maketh intercession for us In fine all the principles and parts all the actions and progressions of our spiritual life are derivations from the Son of God by whom we are born and nourished up to life Eternal 2. Christ being the food of our souls he is pleased to signifie this food to us by such symbols and similitudes as his present state could furnish us withal He had nothing about him but flesh and blood which are like to meat and drink and therefore what he calls himself saying I am the bread of life he afterwards calls his flesh and his blood saying My flesh is meat indeed my blood is drink indeed that is that you may perceive me to be indeed the food of your souls see here is meat and drink for you my flesh and my blood so to represent himself in a way that was neerest to our capacity and in a more intelligible manner not further from a Mystery but neerer to our manner of understanding and yet so involved in figure that it is never to be drawn neerer than a Mystery till it comes to experience and spiritual relish and perception But because we are not in darknesse but within the fringes and circles of a bright cloud let us search as far into it as we are guided by the light of God and where we are forbidden by the thicker part of the cloud step back and worship 3. For we have yet one further degree of charity and manifestation of this Mystery The flesh of Christ is his word the blood of Christ is his spirit and by believing in his word and being assisted and conducted by his spirit we are nourished up to life and so Christ is our food so he becomes life unto our souls Thus St. Clemens of Alexandria and Tertullian affirm the Church in their days to have understood this Mystery saying The word of God is called flesh and blood For so the eternal wisdom of the Father calls to every simple soul that wanteth understanding come eat of the bread and drink of the wine which I have mingled and that we may know what is this bread and wine he adds forsake the foolish and live and go in the way of understanding Our life is wisdom our food is understanding The Rabbins have an observation that when ever mention is made in the Book of the Proverbs of eating and drinking there is meant nothing but wisdom and the Law and when the Doctors using the words of Scripture say Come and eat flesh in which there is much fatness they would be understood to say Come and hear wisdom and learn the fear of God in which there is great nourishment and advantage to your souls Thus Wisdom is called Water and Vnderstanding Bread by the son of Sirach with the bread of understanding shall she feed him and give him the water of wisdom to drink It is by the Prophet Isaiah called water and wine and the desires of righteousness are called hunger and thirst by our blessed Saviour in his Sermon on the Mount And in pursuance of this mysterious truth we find that God in his anger threatens a famine of hearing the words of the Lord when we want Gods word we die with hunger we want that bread on which our souls do feed It was an excellent Commentary which the Jewish Doctors make upon those words of the Prophet with joy shall ye draw waters from the wells of salvation that is from the choicest or wisest of the just men saith Rabbi Jonathan from the chief Ministers of Religion the Heads of the people and the Rulers of the Congregation because they preach the Word of God they open the wells of salvation from the fountains of our Saviour giving drink and refreshment to all the people Thus the Prophet Jeremy expresses his spiritual joy and the sense of this Mystery Thy words were found and I did eat them and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart for I am called by thy Name O Lord God of Hosts the same with that of our Blessed Saviour My words are spirit and they are life they give life and comfort they refresh our souls and feed them up to immortality As the body or flesh of Christ is his Word so the blood of Christ is his Spirit in real effect and signification For as the body without blood is a dead and liveless trunck so is the Word of God without the Spirit a dead and ineffective Letter and this Mystery we are taught in that incomparable Epistle to the Hebrews For by the blood of Christ we are sanctified and yet that which sanctifies us is the spirit of grace and both these are one For so saith the Apostle the blood of Christ was offered up for us for the purification of our consciences from dead works but this offering was made through the eternal spirit and therefore he is equally guilty and does the same impiety he who does dâ—spâ—te to the spirit of Grace and he who accounts the blood of the Covenant an unholy thing for by this spirit and by this blood we are sanctified by this spirit and by the blood of the everlasting Covâ—nant Jesus Christ does perfect us in every good work so that these are the
a holy faith So that it can without difficulty be understood that as in receiving the word and the spirit illuminating us in our first conversion we do truely feed on the flesh and drink the blood of Christ who is the bread that came down from heaven so we do it also and do it much more in baptisme because in this besides all that was before there was superadded a rite of Gods appointment The difference is only this That out of the Sacrament the spirit operates with the word in the ministery of man in Baptisme the spirit operates with the word in the ministery of God For here God is the preacher the Sacrament is Gods sign and by it he ministers life to us by the flesh and blood of his Son that is by the death of Christ into which we are baptized And in the same Divine method the word and the spirit are ministred to us in the Sacrament of the Lords Supper For as in Baptisme so here also there is a word proper to the ministery So often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup ye declare the Lords death till he come This indeed is a word of comfort Christ died for our sins that is our repentance which was consigned in baptisme shall be to purpose we shall be washed white and clean in the blood of the sacrificed Lamb. This is verbum visibile the same word read to the eye and to the ear Hear the word of God is made our food in a manner so near to our understanding that our tongues and palats feel the Metaphor and the Sacramental signification here faith is in triumph and exaltation but as in all the other ministeries Evangelical we eat Christ by faith here we have faith also by eating Christ Thus eating and drinking is faith it is faith in mystery and faith in ceremony it is faith in act and faith in habit it is exercised and it is advanced and therefore it is certain that here we eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ with much eminency and advantage The sum is this Christs body his flesh and his blood are therefore called our meat and our drink because by his incarnation and manifestation in the flesh he became life unto us So that it is mysterious indeed in the expression but very proper and intelligible in the event to say that we eat his flesh and drink his blood since by these it is that we have and preserve life But because what Christ begun in his incarnation he finished in his body on the crosse and all the whole progression of mysteries in his body was still an operatory of life and spiritual being to us the Sacrament of the Lords Supper being a commemoration and exhibition of this death which was the consummation of our redemption by his body and blood does contain in it a visible word the word in symbol and visibility and special manifestation Consonant to which Docrtine the Fathers by an elegant expression call the blessed Sacrament the extension of the Incarnation So that here are two things highly to be remarked 1. That by whatsoever way Christ is taken out of the Sacrament by the same he is taken in the Sacrament and by some wayes here more than there 2. That the eating and drinking the consecrated symbols is but the body and lesser part of the Sacrament the life and the spirit is believing greatly and doing all the actions of that believing direct and consequent So that there are in this two manducations and Sacramental and the Spiritual That does but declare and exercise this and of the sacramental manducation as it is alone as it is a ceremony as it does only consigne or expresse the internal it is true to affirm that it is only an act of obedience but all the blessings and conjugations of joy which come to a worthy Communicant proceed from that spiritual eating of Christ which as it is done out of the Sacrament very well so in it and with it much better For here being as in baptisme a double significatory of the spirit a word and a sign of his own appointment it is certain he will joyn in this Ministration Here we have bread and drink flesh and blood the word and the spirit Christ in all his effects and most gracious communications This is the general account of the nature and purpose of this great mystery Christians are spiritual men faith is their mouth and wisdom is their food and believing is manducation and Christ is their life and truth is the Air they breath and their bread is the word of God and Gods spirit is their drink and righteousness is their robe and Gods laws are their light and the Apostles are their salt and Christ is to them all in all for we must put on Christ and we must eat Christ and we must drink Christ we must have him within us and we must be in him he is our vine and we are his branches he is a door and by him we must enter he is our shepherd and we his sheep Deus meus omnia he is our God and he is all things to us that is plainly he is our Redeemer and he is our Lord He is our Saviour and our Teacher by his Word and by his Spirit he brings us to God and to felicities eternal and that is the sum of all For greater things than these we can neither receive nor expect But these things are not consequent to the reception of the natural body of Christ which is now in heaven but of his Word and of his Spirit which are therefore indeed his body and his blood because by these we feed on him to life eternal Now these are indeed conveyed to us by the several ministries of the Gospel but especially in the Sacraments where the Word is preached and consigned and the Spirit is the teacher and the feeder and makes the Table full and the Cup to overflow with blessing SECT III. That in the Sacrament of the Lords Supper there are represented and exhibited many great blessings upon the special account of that sacred ministery proved in General IN explicating the Nature of this Divine mystery in general as I have manifested the nature and operations and the whole ministery to be spiritual and that not the natural body and blood of Christ is received by the mouth but the word and the spirit of Christ by faith and a spiritual hand and upon this account have discovered their mistake who think the secret lies in the outside and suppose that we tear the natural flesh of Christ with our mouthes So I have by consequent explicated the secret which others indefinitely and by conjecture and zeal do speak of and know not what to say but resolve to speak things great enough it remains now that I consider for the satisfaction of those that speak things too contemptible of these holy mysteries who say it is nothing but a commemoration of
Christs death an act of obedience a ceremony of memorial but of no spiritual effect and of no proper advantage to the soul of the receiver Against this besides the preceding discourse convincing their fancy of weakness and derogation the consideration of the proper excellencies of this mystery in its own seperate nature will be very useful For now we are to consider how his natural body enters into his oeconomy and dispensation For the understanding of which are to consider that Christ besides his Spiritual body and blood did also give us his natural and we receive that by the means of this For this he gave us but once then when upon the Crosse he was broken for our sins this body could die but once and it could be but at one place at once and Heaven was the place appointed for it and at once all was sufficiently effected by it which was design'd in the Counsel of God â—or by the vertue of that death Christ is become the Author of life unto us and of salvation he is our Lord and our Lawgiver but it he received all power in heaven and earth and by it he reconciled his Father to the world and in vertue of that he intercedes for us in heaven and sends his spirit upon earth and feeds our souls by his word he instructs us to wisdom and admits us to repentance and gives us pardon and by means of his own appointment nourishes us up by holinesse to life eternal This body being carried from us into heaven cannot be touch'd or tasted by us on earth but yet Christ left to us symbols and Sacraments of this natural body not to be or to convey that natural body to us but to do more and better for us to convey all the blessings and graces procured for us by the breaking of that body and the effusion of the blood which blessings being spiritual are therefore called his body spiritually because procured by that body which died for us and are therefore called our food because by them we live a new life in the spirit and Christ is our bread and our life because by him after this manner we are nourished up to life eternal That is plainly thus Therefore we eat Christs spiritual body because he hath given us his natural body to be broken and his natural blood to be shed for the remission of our sins and for the obtaining the grace and acceptability of repentance For by this gift and by this death he hath obtained this favour from God that by faith in him and repentance from dead works by repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ we may be saved To this sense of the Mystery are those excellent words of the Apostle He bare our sins upon his own body on the Tree that he might deliver us from the present evil world and sanctifie and purge us from all pollution of flesh and spirit that he might destroy the works of the devil that he might redeem us from all iniquity that he might purchase to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works and that we being dead unto sin might live unto righteousnesse Totum Christiani nominis pondus fructus mors Christi All that we are or do or have is produced and effected by the death of Christ. Now because our life depends upon his death the ministry of this life must relate â—o the ministry of this death and we have nothing to glory in but the Crosse of Christ the Word preached is nothing but Jesus Christ crucified and the Sacraments are the most eminent way of declaring this word for by Baptism we are buried into his death and by the Lords Supper we are partakers of his death we communicate with the Lord Jesus as he is crucified but now since all belong to this that Word and that Mystery that is highest and neerest in this relation is the principal and chief of all the rest and that the Sacrament of the Lords Supper is so is evident beyond all necessity of inquiry it being instituted in the vespers of the Passion it being the Sacrament of the passion a sensible representation of the breaking Christs body of the effusion of Christs blood it being by Christ himself intituled to the passion and the symbols invested with the names of his broken body and his blood poured forth and the whole ministry being a great declaration of this death of Christ and commanded to be continued until his second coming Certainly by all these it appears that this Sacrament is the great ministry of life and salvation here is the publication of the great word of salvation here is set forth most illustriously the body and blood of Christ the food of our souls much more clearly than in Baptism much more effectually than in simple enunciation or preaching and declaration by words for this preaching is to strangers and infants in Christ to produce faith but this Sacramental enunciation is the declaration and confession of it by men in Christ a glorying in it giving praise for it a declaring it to be done and own'd and accepted and prevailing The consequent of these things is this That if any Mystery Rite or Sacrament be effective of any spiritual blessings then this is much more as having the prerogative and illustrious principality above every thing else in its own kind or of any other-kind in exteriour or interiour Religion I name them both because as in Baptism the water alone does nothing but the inward cooperation with the outward oblation does save us yet to Baptism the Scriptures attribute the effect so it is in this sacred solemnity the external act is indeed nothing but obedience and of it self only declares Christs death in rite and ceremony yet the worthy communicating of it does indeed make us feed upon Christ and unites him to the soul and makes us to become one spirit according to the words of S. Ambrose Ideo in similitudinem quidem accipis sacramentum sed verae naturae gratiam virtutemque consequeris thou recâ—ivâ—st the Sacrament as the similitude of Christs body but thou shalt receive the grace and the virtue of the true nature I shall not enter into so useless a discourse as to inquire whether the Sacraments confer grace by their own excellency and power with which they are endued from above because they who affirm they do require so much duty on our parts as they also do who attribute the effect to our moral disposition but neither one nor the other say true for neither the external act nor the internal grace and morality does effect our pardon and salvation but the spirit of God who blesses the symbols and assists the duty makes them holy and this acceptable Only they that attribute the efficacy to the Ministration of the Sacrament chose to magnifie the immediate work of man rather than the immediate work of God and prefer the external at least in glorious
of the body of Christ for we being many are one body and one bread in baptisme we partake of the death of Christ and in the Lords Supper we do the same in that as Babes in this as men in Christ so that what effects are affirmed of one the same are in greater measure true of the other they are but several rounds of Jacobs ladder reaching up to heaven upon which the Angels ascend and descend and the Lord sits upon the top And because the Sacraments Evangelical be of the like kind of mystery with the Sacraments of old from them we can understand that even signs of secret graces do exhibit as well as signifie for besides that there is a natural analogy between the ablution of the body and the purification of the soul between eating the holy bread and drinking the sacred calice and a participation of the body and blood of Christ it is also in the method of the divine oeconomy to dispense the grace which himself signifies in a ceremony of his own institution thus at the Unction of Kings Priests and of Prophets the sacred power was bestowed and as a Canon is invested in his dignity by the tradition of a book and an Abbat by his staffe a Bishop by a ring they are the words of St. Bernard so are divisions of graces imparted to the diverse Sacraments And therefore although it ought not to be denyed that when in Scripture and the writings of the holy Doctors of the Church the collation of grace is attributed to the sâ—gn it is by a metonymy and a Sacramental manner of speaking yet it is also a synecdoche of the part for the whole because both the Sacrament and the grace are joyned in the lawful and holy use of them by Sacramental union or rather by a confederation of the parts of the holy Covenant Our hearts are purified by faith and so our consciences are also made clean in the cestern of water By faith we are saved and yet he hath savâ—d us by the laver of regeneration and they are both joyned together by St. Paul Christ gave himself for his Church that he might sanctifie and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word that is plainly by the Sacrament according to the famous Commentary of St. Austin accedat verbum ad elementum tum fit sacramentum when the word and the element are joyned then it is a perfect Sacrament and then it does effect all its purposes and intentions Thus we find that the grace of God is given by the imposition of hands and yet as Austin rightly affirmes God alone can give his holy spirit and the Apostles did not give the holy Ghost to them upon whom they laid their hands but prayed that God would give it and he did so at the imposition of their hands Thus God sanctified Aaron and yet he said to Moses thou shalt sanctifie Aaron that is not that Moses did it instead of God but Moses did it by his ministery and by visible Sacraments and rites of Gods appointment and though we are born of an immortal seed by the word of the living God yet St. Paul said to the Corinthians I have begotten you through the Gosâ—el and thus it is in the greatest as well as in the least he that drinks Christ's blood and eats his body hath life abiding in him it is true of the â—acrament and true of the spiritual manducation and may be indifferently affirmed of either when the other is not excluded for as the Sacrament operates only by the vertue of the spirit of God so the spirit ordinarily works by the instrumentality of the Sacraments And we may as well say that faith is not by hearing as that grace is not by the Sacraments for as without the spirit the word is but a dead letter so with the spirit the Sacrament is the means of life and grace And the meditation of St. Chrysostom is very pious and reasonable If we were wholly incorporeal God would have given us graces unclothed with signs and Sacraments but because our spirits are in earthen vessels God conveyes his graces to us by sensible ministrations The word of God operates as secretly as the Sacraments and the Sacraments as powerfully as the word nay the word is alwayes joyned in the worthy administration of the Sacrament which therefore operates both as word and sign by the ear and by the eyes and by both in the hand of God and the conduct of the spirit effect all that God intends and that a faithful receiver can require and pray for For justification and sanctification are continued acts they are like the issues of a Fountain into its receptacles God is alwayes giving and we are alwayes receiving and the signal effects of Gods holy spirit sometimes give great indications but most commonly come without observation and therefore in these things we must not discourse as in the conduct of oâ—her causes and operations natural for although in natural effects we can argue from the cause to the event yet in spiritual things we are to reckon only from the sign to the event And the signs of grace we are to place in stead of natural causes because a Sacrament in the hand of God is a proclamation of his graces he then gives us notice that the springs of heaven are opened and then is the time to draw living waters from the fountains of salvation When Jonathan shot his arrows beyond the boy he then by a Sacrament sent salvation unto David he bad him be gone and flie from his Fathers wrath and although Jonathan did do his business for him by a continual care and observation yet that symbol brought it unto David for so are we conducted to the joyes of God by the methods and possibilities of men In conclusion the sum is this The Sacraments and symbols if they be considered in their own nature are just such as they seem water and bread and wine they retain the names proper to their own natures but because they are made to be signs of a secret mystery and water is the symbol of purification of the soul from sin and bread and wine of Christs body and blood therefore the symbols and Sacraments receive the names of what themselves do sign they are the body and they are the blood of Christ they are Metonymically such But because yet further they are instruments of grace in the hand of God and by these his holy spirit changes our hearts and translates us into a Divine nature therefore the whole work is attributed to them by a Synecdoche that is they do in their manner the work for which God ordained them and they are placed there for our sakes and speak Gods language in our accent and they appear in the outside we receive the benefit of their ministery and God receives the glory SECT IV. The blessings and Graces of the Holy Sacrament enumerated and proved
the fruits of his passion and we shall if we abide in this union be all one body of a spiritual Church in heaven there to reign with Christ for ever Now unless we think nothing Good but what goes in at our eyes or mouth if we think there is any thing good beyond what our senses perceive we must confess this to be a real and eminent benefit and yet whatever it be it is therefore effected upon us by this Sacrament because we eat of one bread The very repeating the words of St. Paul is a satisfaction in this inquiry they are plain and easie and whatever interpretation can be put upon them it can only vary the manner of effecting the blessing and the way of the Sacramental efficacy but it cannot evacuate the blessing or confute the thing Only it is to be observed in this as in all other instances of the like nature that the grace of God in the Sacrament usually is a blessing upon our endeavours for spiritual graces and the blessings of sanctification do not grow like grasse but like corn not whether we do any husbandry or no but if we cultivate the ground then by Gods blessing the fruits will spring and make the Farmer rich if we be disposed to receive the Sacrament worthily we shall receive this fruit also Which fruit is thus expressed saying this Sacrament is therefore given unto us that the body of the Church of Christ in the earth may be joyned or united with our head which is in the heavens 3. The blessed Sacrament is of great efficacy for the remission of sins not that it hath any formal efficacy or any inherent vertue to procure pardon but that it is the ministery of the death of Christ and the application of his blood which blood was shed for the remission of sins and is the great means of impetration and as the Schools use to speak is the meritorious cause of it For there are but two wayes of applying the death of Christ an internal grace and an external ministery Faith is the inward applicatory and if there be any outward at all it must be the Sacraments and both of them are of remarkable vertue in this particular for by baptisme we are baptized into the death of Christ and the Lords supper is an appointed enunciation and declaration of Christs death and it is a Sacramental participation of it Now to partake of it Sacramentally is by Sacrament to receive it that is so to apply it to us as that can be applyed it brings it to our spirit it propounds it to our faith it represents it as the matter of Eucharist it gives it as meat and drink to our souls and rejoyces in it in that very formality in which it does receive it viz as broken for as shed for the remission of our sins Now then what can any man suppose a Sacrament to be and what can be meant by sacramental participation for unless the Sacraments do communicate what they relate to they are no communion or communication at all for it is true that our mouth eats the material signs but at the same time faith eats too and therefore must eat that is must partake of the thing signified faith is not maintained by ceremonies the body receives the body of the mystery we eat and drink the symbols with our mouths but faith is not corporeal but feeds upon the mystery it self it entertains the grace and enters into that secret which the spirit of God conveyes under the signature Now since the mystery is perfectly and openly expressed to be the remission of sins if the soul does the work of the soul as the body the work of the body the soul receives remission of sins as the body does the symbols of it and the Sacrament But we must be infinitely careful to remember that even the death of Christ brings no pardon to the impenitent persevering sinner but to him that repents truely so does the Sacrament of Christs death this can do no more than that and therefore let no man come with his guilt about him and in the heat and in the affections of his sin and hope to find his pardon by this ministery He that thinks so will but deceive wil but ruine himself They are excellent but very severe words which God spake to the Jews and which are a prophetical reproof of all unworthy Communicants in these divine mysteries What hath my beloved to do in my house seeing she hath wrought lâ—wdness with many The holy flesh hath passed from thee when thou doest evil that is this holy sacrifice the flesh and blood of thy Lord shall slip from thee without doing thee any good if thou hast not ceased from doing evil But the vulgar Latin reads these words much more emphatically to our purpose Shall the holy flesh take from thee thy wickedness in which thou rejoycest Deceive not thy self thou hast no part nor portion in this matter For the holy Sacrament operates indeed and consigns our pardon but not alone but in conjunction with all that Christ requires as conditions of pardon but when the conditions are present the Sacrament ministers pardon as pardon is ministred in this world that is by parts and in order to several purposes and with power of revocation by suspending the Divine wrath by procuring more graces by obtaining time of repentance and powers and possibilities of working out our salvation and by setting forward the method and Oeconomy of our salvation For in the usual methods of God pardon of sins is proportionable to our repentance which because it is all that state of Piety we have in this whole life after our first sin pardon of sins is all that effect of grace which is consequent to that repentance and the worthy receiving of the holy Communion is but one conjugation of holy actions and parts of repentance but indeed it is the best and the noblest and such in which man does best cooperate towards pardon and the grace of God does the most illustriously consign it But of these particulars I shall give full account when I shall discourse of the preparations of repentance 4. It is the greatest solemnity of prayer the most powerful Liturgy and means of impetration in this world For when Christ was consecrated on the crosse and became our High Priest having reconciled us to God by the death of the crosse he became infinitely gracious in the eyes of God and was admitted to the celestial and eternal Priesthood in heaven where in the vertue of the crosse he intercedes for us and represents an eternal sacrifice in the heavens on our behalf That he is a Priest in heaven appears in the large discourses and direct affirmatives of St. Paul that there is no other sacrifice to be offered but that on the crosse it is evident because he hath but once appeared in the end of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of
and unfruitful soul I have already a parched ground give me a land of Rivers of Waters my Soul is dry but not thirsty it hath no water nor it desires none I have been like a dead man to all the desires of heaven I am earnest and concerned in the things of the world but very indifferent or rather not well enduring the severities and excellencies of Religion I have not been greedy of thy Word or longed for thy Sacraments The worst of thy followers came runing after thee for loaves though they cared not for the miracle but thou offerest me loaves and miracles together and I have cared for neither Thou offerest me thy self and all thy infinite sweetnesses I have needed even the compulsion of laws to drive me to thee and then indeed I lost the sweetnesse of thy presence and reaped no fruit These things O God are not well they are infinitely amiss But thou that providest meat thou also givest appetite for the desire and the meat the necessity and the relief are all from thee II. Be pleased therefore O my dearest Lord to create in thy servant a great hunger and thirst after the things of thy kingdom and the righteousnesse of it all thy holy graces and all the holy ministeries of grace that I may long for the bread of heaven thirst after the fountains of salvation and as the Hart panteth after the brooks of water so my soul may desire thee O Lord. O kindle such a holy flame in my soul that it may consume all that is set before me that it may be meat and drink to me to do thy will III. Grant O blessed Jesus that I may omit no opportunity of serving thee of conversing with thee of receiving thee let me not rest in the least and lowest measures of necessity but passe on to the excellencies of love and the transportations of an excellent Religion that there may remain in me no appetite for any thing but what thou lovest that I may have no satisfaction but in a holy Conscience no pleasure but in Religion no joy but in God and with sincerity and zeal heartinesse and ingenuity I may follow after righteousnesse and the things that belong unto my peace until I shall arrive in the land of eternal peace and praises where thou livest and reignest for ever world without end Amen CHAP. III. Of Faith as it is a necessary disposition to the Blessed Sacrament EXamination of our selves is an inquiry whether we have those dispostions which are necessary to a worthy Communion Our next inquiry is after the dispositions themselves what they ought to be and what they ought to effect that we may really be that which we desire to be found when we are examined I have yet only described the ways of examining now I am to set down those things whereby we can approved and without which we can never approach to these divine Mysteries with worthinesse or depart with joy These are three 1. Faith 2. Charity 3. Repentance SECT I. Of Catechumens or unbaptised persons THE Blessed Sacrament before him that hath no faith is like messes of meat set upon the graves of the dead they smell not that nidour which quickens the hungry belly they feel not the warmth and taste not the juyce for these are provided for them that are alive and the dead have no portion in them This is the first great line of introduction and necessarily to be examined we have the rule from the Apostle Examine your selves whether ye be in the faith prove your own selves Know ye not your own selves how that Jesus Châ—ist is in you except ye be reprobates As if he had said ye are reprobates and Jesus Christ shall never dwell in you except by faith without this you can never receive him and therefore examine strictly your selves concerning your faith But the necessity of this preparation by faith hath a double sense and a proportionable necessity 1. It means that no unbaptised person can come to the holy Communion 2. It means that those that are baptized have an actual and an operative faith properly relative to these divine Mysteries and really effective of all the works of faith Of this we have the most ancient and indubitable records of the Primitive Church For in the Apology which Justin Martyr made for the Christians he gives this account of the manner of dispensing the holy Eucharist It is lawful for none to participate of this Eucharistical bread and wine but to him who believes those things to be true which are taught by us and to him that is washed in the laver of regeneration which is to the remission of sins and who live as Christ hath commanded Shut the proâ—hane and the unhallowed people out of doors So. Orpheus sang None comes to this holy feast but they whose sins are cleansed in Baptism who are saâ—ctified in â—hose holy waters of regeneration who have obedient Souls eaâ—s attentive to the Sermons of the Gospel and hearts open to the words of Christ. These are they who see by a brighter light and walk in the warmâ—h of a more refreshing Sun they live in a better air and are irradiated with a purer beam the glories of the Sun of righteousnesse and they only are to eat the precious food of the sacrificed lamb For by Baptism we are admitted to the spiritual life and by the holy Communion we nourish and preserve it But although Baptism be always necessary yet alone it is not a sufficient qualification to the holy Communion but there must be an actual faith also in every Communicant Neither faith alone nor baptism alone can suffice but it must be the actual faith of baptized persons which disposes us to this sacred Feast For the Church gives the Communion neither to Catechumens nor to Infants nor to mad men nor to natural fools Catechumens not admitted to the holy Communion Of this besides the testimony of Justin Martyr St. Cyril of Alexandria gives this full acoount We refuse to give the Sacraments to Catechumens although they already know the truth and with a loud voice confesse the faith of Christ because they are not yet enriched with the holy Ghost who dwells in them who are consummated and perfected by Baptism But when they have been baptized because it is believed that the holy Ghost does dwell within them they are not prohibited from the contact and communion of the body of Christ. And therefore to them who come to the mystical benediction the Ministers of the Mystery cry with a loud voice Sancta sanctis Let holy things be given to sanctified persons signifying that the contact and sanctification of Christs body does agree with them only who in their spirits are sanctified by the holy Ghost And this was the certain and perpetual Doctrine and Custom of the Church insomuch that in the primitive Churches they would not suffer unbaptized persons so much as to see the
they had zeal for the good of souls Let no man say I repent in private I repent before God in secret God who alone does pardon does know that I am contrite in heart For was it in vain was it said to no purpose whatsoever ye shall loose in earth shall be loosed in heaven we evacuate the Gospel of God we frustrate the words of Christ so S. Austin And therefore when a man hath spoken the sentence of the most severe medicine let him come to the Presidents of the Church who are to minister in the power of the Keyes to him and beginning now to be a good son keeping the order of his Mother let him receive the measure and manner of his repentances from the Presidents of the Sacraments Concerning this thing I shall never think it fit to dispute for there is nothing to inforce it but enough to perswade it but he that tries will find the benefit of it himself and will be best able to tell it to all the world SECT VII Penitential Soliloquies Ejaculations Exercises and preparatory Prayers to be us'd in all the days of preparation to the Holy Sacrament I. ALmighty and eternal God the fountain of all vertue the support of all holy hope the Author of pardon of life and of salvation thou art the comforter of all that call upon thee thou hast concluded all under sin that thou mightest have mercy upon all Look upon me O God and have pity on me lying in my blood and misery in my shame and in my sins in the fear and guilt of thy wrath in the shadow of death and in the gates of hell I confesse to thee O God what thou knowest already but I confesse it to manifest thy justice and to glorifie thy mercy who hast spared me so long â—hat I am guilty of the vilest and basest follies which usually dishonour the fools and the worst of the sons of men II. I have been proud and covetous envious and lustful angry and greedy indevout and irreligious restless in my passions sensual and secular but hating wise counsels and soon weary of the Offices of a holy Religion I cannot give an account of my time and I cannot reckon the sins of my tongue My crimes are intolerable and my imperfections shameful and my omissions innumerable and what shall I do O thou preserver of men I am so vile that I cannot express it so sinful that I am hateful to my self and much more abominable must I needs be in thy eyes I have sinn'd against thee without necessity sometimes without temptation only because I would sin and would not delight in the ways of peace I have been so ingrateful so foolish so unreasonable that I have put my own eyes out that I might with confidence and without fear sin against so good a God so gracious a Father so infinite a Power so glorious a Majesty so bountiful a Patron and so mighty a Redeemer that my sin is grown shameful and aggravated even to amazement I can say no more I am asham'd O God I am amaz'd I am confounded in thy presence III. But yet O God thou art the healer of our breaches and the lifter up of our head and I must not despair and I am sure thy goodness is infinite and thou dost not delight in the death of a sinner and my sins though very great are infinitely less than thy mercies which thou hast revealed to all penitent and returning sinners in Jesus Christ. I am not worthy to look up to heaven but be thou pleased to look down into the dust and lift up a sinner from the dunghil let me not perish in my folly or be consumed in thy heavy displeasure Give me time and space to repent and give me powers of Grace and aids of thy spirit that as by thy gift and mercy I intend to amend whatsoever is amiss so I may indeed have grace and power faithfully to fulfil the same Inspire me with the spirit of repentance and mortification that I may always fight against my sins till I be more than conquerour Support me with a holy hope confirm me with an excellent operative and unreprovable faith and enkindle a bright and a burning charity in my soul Give me patience in suffering severity in judging and condemning my sin and in punishing the sinner that judging my self I may not be condemned by thee that mourning for my sins may rejoyce in thy pardon that killing my sin I may live in righteousness that denying my own will I may always perform thine and by the methods of thy Spirit I may overcome all carnal and spiritual wickednesses and walk in thy light and delight in thy service and perfect my obedience and be wholly delivered from my sin and for ever preserved from thy wrath and at last passe on from a certain expectation to an actual fruition of the glories of thy Kingdom through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen Amen Amen 1. I am in thy sight O Lord a polluted person sin like a crust of leprosie hath overspread me I am a scandal to others a shame to my self a reproach to my relations a burden to the earth a spot in the Church and deserve to be rejected and scorn'd by thee 2. But this O God I cannot bear It is just in thee to destroy me but thou delightest not in that I am guilty of death but thou lovest rather that I should live 3. O let the cry of thy Sons blood who offers an eternal Sacrifice to thee speak on my behalf and speak better things than the blood of Abel 4. My conscience does accuse me the Devils rejoyce in my fall and aggravate my crimes already too great and thy holy Spirit is grieved by me But my Saviour Jesus died for me and thou pittiest me and thy holy Spirit still calls upon me and I am willing to come but I cannot come unlesse thou drawest me with the cords of love 5. O draw me unto thee by the Arguments of charity by the endearments of thy mercies by the order of thy providence by the hope of thy promises by the sense of thy comforts by the conviction of my understanding by the zeal and passion of holy affections by an unreprovable faith and an humble hope by a religious fear and an increasing love by the obedience of precepts and efficacy of holy example by thy power and thy wisdom by the love of thy Son and the grace of thy Spirit Draw me O God and I will run after thee and the sweetnesses of thy precious ointments 6. I am not worthy O Lord I am not worthy to come into thy presence much less to eat the flesh of the Sacrificed Lamb For my sins O Blessed Saviour Jesus went along in confederation with the High Priests in treachery with Judas in injustice with Pilate in malice with the people 7. My sins and the Jews crucified thee my hypocrisie was the kiss that betrai'd thee my covetous
or to speak nothing but what is pertinent for a day or for a day not to be angry and then sometimes for two daies and so diet your weak soul with little portions of food till it be able to take in and digest a full meal Or 6. Meditate often every day of death or the day of judgment By these and the like instruments it will happen to the remains of sin as it did to the Aegyptians what is left by the Hail the Catterpiller will destroy and what the Catterpiller leaves the Locusts will eat These instruments will eat up the remains of sin as the poor gather up the gleanings after the Carts in harvest 9. But if at any Communion and in the use of these advices you do not perceive any sensible progression in the spirit of mortification or devotion then be sure to be ashamed and to be humbled for thy indisposition and slow progression in the discipline of Christ and if thou beest humbled truly for thy want of improvement it is certain thou hast improved And if you come with fear and trembling it is very probable you will come in the spirit of repentance and devotion These exercises and measures will not seem many long and tedious as the rules of art if we consider that all are not to be used at all times nor by every person but are instruments fitted to several necessities and useful when they can do good and to be used no longer â—or he that uses these or any the like advices by way of solemnity and in periodical returns will still think fit to use them at every Communion as long as he lives but he that uses them as he should that is to effect the work of reformation upon his soul may lay them all aside according to his work is done But if we would every day do something of this if we would every day prepare for the day of death or which is of a like consideration for the day of our Communion if we would every night examine our passed day and set our things in order if we would have a perpetual entercourse and conversation with God or which is better than all examinations in the world if we would actually attend to what we do and consider every action and speak so little that we might consider it we should find that upon the day of our Communion we should have nothing to do but the third particular that is the offices of Prayer and Eucharist and to renew our graces by prayer and exercises of devotion SECT IV. Devotions to be used upon the morning of the Communion 1. O Blessed Lord our gracious Saviour and Redeemer Jesus King of Kings and Lord of Lords thou art fairer than the children of men upon thee the Angels look and behold and wonder what am I O Lord that thou who fillest heaven and earth shouldst descend and desire to dwell with me who am nothing but folly and infirmity misery and sin shame and death 2. I confess O God that when I consider thy greatness and my nothing thy purity and my uncleanness thy glory and my shame I see it to be infinitely unreasonable and presumptuous that I should approach to thy sacred presence and desire to partake of thy Sacraments and to enter into thy grace and to hope for a part of thy glory But when I consider thy mercy and thy wisdome thy bounty and thy goodness thy readiness to forgive and thy desires to impart thy self unto thy servants then I am lifted up with hope then I come with boldness to the throne of grace Even so O Lord because thou hast commanded it and because thou lovest it should be so 3. It was never heard O Lord from the beginning of the world that thou didst ever despise him that called upon thee or â—orsake any man that abides in thy fear or that any person who trusted in the Lord was ever confounded But if I come to thee I bring an unworthy person to be united unto thee if I come not I shall remain unworthy for ever If I stay away I fear to lose thee If I come I fear to offend thee and that will lose thee more and my self too at last I know O God I know my sins have separated between me and my God but thy love and thy passion thy holiness and thy obedience hath reconciled us and though my sins deter me yet they make it necessary for me to come and though thy greatness amazes me yet it is so full of goodness that it invites me 4. O therefore blessed Saviour who didst for our sakes take upon thee our passions and sensibilities our weaknesses and our sufferings who wert hungry after the temptation of the Devil weary and thirsty in thy discourse with the woman of Samaria who didst weep over Lazarus wert afflicted in the garden whipt in the Consistory nail'd on the Cross pierc'd with a spear wrapp'd in liâ—nen laid in the grave and so art become a 〈◊〉 High Priest and pitiful to our infiâ—â—â—â—ieâ— be pleased to receive a weary sinner 〈◊〉 overburdâ—neâ—â—â—nscience an afflicted polluted soul iâ—to thy câ—re and conduct into thy custody and â—â—re I know that a thousand years of tears and sorrow the purity of Angels the love of Saints and the humiliation of the greatest penitent is not sufficient to make we worthy to dwell with thee to be united to thy infinity to be fed with thy body and refreshed with thy purest bloud to become bone of thy bone and flesh of thy flesh and spirit of thy spirit 5. But what I cannot be of my self let me be made by thee I come to thee wounded and bruised and bleeding for thou art my Physician arise then with healing in thy wings I am thirsty and faint as the Hart longeth after the water brooks so longeth my soul after thee O God thou art the eternal fountain from whence spring the waters of comfort and salvation I am hungry and empty and weak and I come running after thee because thou hast the words of eternal life O send me not away empty for I shall faint and die I cannot live without thee O let vertue go forth from thee and heal all my sickness do thou appear to my soul in these mysteries heal my sores purifie my stains enlighten my darkness turn me from all vain imaginations and illusions of the enemy all perverseness of will all violence and inordination of passions sensual desires and devillish angers lust and malice gluttony and pride the spirit of envy and the spirit of detraction let not sin reign in my members nor the Devil lead my will captive nor the world abuse my understanding and debauch my conversation 6. O Jesus be a Jesus unto me and let this Sacrament be a savour of life and thy holy body the bread of life and thy precious bloud the purifier of my sinful life Grant I may receive these Divine mysteries for the amendment of my life and the defensative against my sins for the increase of vertue and the perfection of my spirit Grant
Spirit of mercy and justice prudence and diligence the favour of God and the love of their people and grace and blessing that they may live at peace with thee and with one another remembring the command of their Lord and King the serene and reconciling Jesus 4. Give an Apostolical Spirit to all Ecclesiastical Prelates and Priests grant to them zeal of souls wisdom to conduct their charges purity to become exemplar that their labours and their lives may greatly promote the honour of the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus O grant unto thy flock to be fed with wise and holy shepherds men fearing God and hating covetousness free from envy and full of charity that being burning and shining lights men beholding â—heir light may rejoyce in that light and glorifie thee our Father which art in heaven 5. Have mercy upon all states of men and women in the Christian Church the Governors and the governed the rich and the poor high and low grant to every of them in their several station to live with so much purity and faith simplicity and charity justice and perfection that thy will may be done in Earth as it is in Heaven 6. Relieve all oppressed Princes defend and restore their rights and suppress all violent and warring spirits that unjustly disturb the peace of Christendom Relieve and comfort all Gentlemen that are fallen into poverty and sad misfortunes Comfort and support all that are sick and deliver them from all their sorrows and all the powers of the enemy and let the spirit of comfort and patience of holiness and resignation descend upon all Christian people whom thou hast in any instance visited with thy rod And be graciously pleas'd to pity poor mankind shorten the days of our trouble and put an end to the days of our sin and let the Kingdom of our dearest Lord be set up in every one of our hearts and prevail mightily and for ever 7. I humbly present to thy Divine Majesty this glorious Sacrifice which thy servants this day have represented upon earth in behalf of my dearest Relations Wife Children Husband Parents Friends c. Grant unto them whatsoever they want or wisely and holily desire keep them for ever in thy fear and favour grant that they may never sin against thee never fall into thy displeasure never be separated from thy love and from thy presence but let their portion be in the blessing and in the service in the love and in the Kingdom of God for ever and ever 8. Have mercy upon all strangers and aliens from the Kingdom of thy Son let the sweet sound of thy Gospel be heard in all the corners of the earth let not any soul the work of thy own hands the price of thy Sons blood be any longer reckon'd in the portions of thy Enemy but let them all become Christians and grant that all Christians may live according to the Laws of the holy Jesus without scandal and reproach full of faith and full of charity 9. Give thy grace speedily to all wicked persons that they may repent and live well and be saved To all good people give an increase of gifts and holiness and the grace of perseverance and Christian perfection To all Hereticks and Schismaticks grant the Spirit of humility and truth charity and obedience and suffer none upon whom the Name of Christ is called to throw themselves away and fall into the portion of the intolerable burning 10. For all mankind whom I have and whom I have not remembred I humbly represent the Sacrifice of thy eternal Son his merits and obedience his life and death his resurrection and ascension his charity and intercession praying to thee in vertue of our glorious Saviour to grant unto us all the graces of an excellent and perfect repentance an irreconcilable hatred of all sin a great love of God an exact imitation of the holiness of the ever blessed Jesus the spirit of devotion conformable will and religious affections an Angelical purity and a Seraphical love thankful hearts and joy in God and let all things happen to us all in that order and disposition as may promote thy greatest glory and our duty our likeness to Christ and the honour of his Kingdom Even so Father let it be because it is best and because thou lovest it should be so bring it to a real and unalterable event by the miracles of grace and mercy and by the blood of the everlasting Covenant poured forth in the day of the Lords love whom I adore and whom I love and desire that I may still more and more love and love for ever Amen Amen SECT III. An Advice concerning him who only Communicates Spiritually THere are many persons well disposed by the measures of a holy life to communicate frequently but it may happen that they are unavoidably hindred Some have a timerous conscience a fear a pious fear which is indeed sometimes more pitiable than commendable Others are advis'd by their spiritual Guides to abstain for a time that they may proceed in the vertue of repentance further yet before they partake of the Sacrament of love and yet if they should want the blessings and graces of the Communion their remedy which is intended them would be a real impediment Some are scandalized and offended at irremediable miscarriages in publick Doctrines or Government and cannot readily overcome their prejudice nor reconcile their consciences to a present actual Communion Some dare not receive it at the hands of a wicked Priest of notorious evil life Some can have it at no Priest at all but are in a long journey or under a Persecution or in a Country of a differing perswasion Some are sick and some cannot have it every day but every day desire it Such persons as these if they prepare themselves with all the essential and ornamental measures of address and eanestly desire that they could actually Communicate they may place themselves upon their knees and building an Altar in their heart celebrate the death of Christ and in holy desire joyn with all the Congregations of the Christian world who that day celebrate the holy Communion and may serve their devotion by the former Prayers and actions Eucharistical changing only such circumstantial words which relate to the actual participation And then they may remember and make use of the comfortable Doctrine of S. Austin It is one thing saith that learned Saint to be born of the Spirit and another thing to be fed of the Spirit As it is one thing to be born of the flesh which is when we are born of our mother and another thing to be fed of the flesh which is done when she suckles her Infant by that nourishment which is chang'd into food that he might eat and drink with pleasure by which he was born to life when this is done without the actual and Sacramental participation it is called spiritual Manducation Concerning which I only add the pious advice of
seek for Christ we shall find him in the methods of Vertue and the paths of Gods Commandments in the houses of Prayer and the offices of Religion in the persons of the poor and the retirements of an afflicted soul we shall find him in holy reading and pious meditation in our penitential sorrows and in the time of trouble in Pulpits and upon Altars in the Word and in the Sacraments If we come hither as we ought we are sure to finde our Beloved him whom our soul longeth after Sure enough Christ is here but he is not here in every manner and therefore is not to be found by every inquirer nor touched by every hand nor received by all comers nor entertained by every guest He that means to take the air must not use his fingers but his mouth and he that receives Christ must have a proper that is a spiritual instrument a purified heart consecrated lips and a hallowed mouth a tongue that speaks no evil and a hand that ministers to no injustice and to no uncleanness For a disproportionate intrument is an undecency and makes the effect impossible both in nature and morality Can a man bind a thought with chains or carry imaginations in the palm of his hand Can the beauty of the Peacocks train or the Estrich plume be delicious to the palat and the throat Does the hand intermeddle with the joys of the heart or darkness that hides the naked make him warm Does the Body live as does the Spirit or can the Body of Christ be like to common food Indeed the Sun shines upon the good and bad and the Vines give Wine to the drunkard as well as to the sober man Pirates have fair winds and a calm Sea at the same time when the just and peaceful Merchant man hath them But although the things of this world are common to good and bad yet Sacraments and spiritual joys the food of the soul and the blessing of Christ are the peculiar right of Saints and the Rites of our Religion are to be handled by the measures of Religion and the things of God by the rules of the Spirit and the Sacraments are Mysteries and to be handled by Mystic persons and to be received by Saints and therefore whoever will partake of Gods secrets must first look into his own he must pare off whatsoever is amiss and not without holiness approach to the Holiest of all Holies nor eat of this Sacrifice with a defiled head nor come to this feast without a nuptial garment nor take this remedy without a just preparative For though in the first motions of our spiritual life Christ comes alone and offers his Grace and enlivens us by his Spirit and makes us begin to live because he is good not because we are yet this great mysterious Feast and magazine of Grace and glorious mercies is for those only that are worthy for such only who by their cooperation with the Grace of God are fellow-workers with God in the laboratories of salvation The Wrastler that Clemens of Alexandria tells us of addressing himself to his contention and espying the Statue of Jupiter Pisaeus prayed aloud If all things O Jupiter are rightly prepared on my part if I have done all that I could do then do me justice and give me the Victory And this is a breviate of our case He that runneth in races saith the Apostle he that contends for mastery is temperate in all things and this at least must he be that comes to find Christ in these Mysteries he must be prepared by the rules and method of the Sanctuary there is very much to be done on his part there is an heap of duties there is a state of excellency there are preparations solemn and less solemn ordinary and extraordinary which must be premised before we can receive the mysterious blessings which are here not only consign'd but collated and promoted confirmed and perfected The holy Communion or Supper of the Lord is the most sacred mysterious and useful conjugation of secret and holy things and duties in the Religion It is not easie to be understood it is not lightly to be received It is not much opened in the writings of the New Testament but still left in its mysterious Nature It is too much untwisted and nicely handled by the writings of the Doctors and by them made more mysterious and like a Doctrine of Phylosophy made intricate by explications and difficult by the aperture and dissolution of distinctions So we sometimes espie a bright cloud formed into an irregular figure when it is observed by unskilful and phantastick travellers looks like a Centaure to some and as a Castle to others some tell that they saw an Army with Banners and it signifies War but another wiser than his fellow says it looks for all the world like a flock of Sheep and foretels Plenty and all the while it is nothing but a shining cloud by its own mobility and the activity of a wind cast into a contingent and inartificial shape So it is in this great Mystery of our Religion in which some espie strange things which God intended not and others see not what God hath plainly told some call that part of it a Mystery which â—none and others think all of it nothing but a meer ceremony and a sign some say it signifies and some say it effects some say it is a Sacrifice and others call it a Sacrament some Schools of learning make it the Instrument of Grace in the hand of God others say that it is God himself in that Instrument of Grace some call it venerable and others say as the vain men in the Prophet that the Table of the Lord is contemptible some come to it with their sins on their head and others with their sins in their mouth some come to be cured some to be quickned some to be nourished and others to be made alive some out of fear and reverence take it but seldom others out of devotion take it frequently some receive it as a means to procure great graces and blessings others as an Eucharist and an office of thanksgiving for what they have received some call it an act of obedience meerly others account it an excellent devotion and the exercising of the virtue of Religion some take it to strengthen their Faith others to beget it and yet many affirm that it does neither but supposes Faith before-hand as a disposition Faith in all its degrees according to the degree of Grace whither the Communicant is arrived Some affirm the Elements are to be blessed by prayers of the Bishop or other Minister others say it is only by the mystical words the words of institution and when it is blessed some believe it to be the natural body of Christ others to be nothing of that but the blessings of Christ his Word and his Spirit his Passion in representment and his Grace in real exhibition And all these men have something of
it self indeed shall have what reward God please to apportion to it as it is obedience yet of it self it hath no other worthiness it is not so much as an argument of persuasion for the pouring forth of wine can no more prove or make faith that Christs blood was poured forth for us than the drinking the wine can effect this persuasion in us that we naturally though under a vail drink the natural blood of Christ which the Angels gathered as it ran into golden phials and Christ multiplied to a miracle like the loaves and fishes in the Gospel But because nothing that naturally remains the same in all things as it was before can do any thing that it could not do before the Bread and wine which have no natural change can effect none and therefore we are not to look for an egge where there is nothing but order and a blessing where there is nothing but an action and a real effect where there is nothing but an analogy a Sacrament a mystical representment and something fit to signify and many things past but nothing that is to come This is the sense and discourse of some persons that call for an express word or a manifest reason to the contrary or else resolve that their belief shall be as unactive as the Scriptures are silent in the effects of this mystery Only these men will allow the Sacraments to be marks of Christianity symbols of mutual Charity testimonies of a thankful mind to God allegorical admonitions of Christian mortification and spiritual alimony symbols of grace conferred before the Sacrament and rites instituted to stir up faith by way of object and representation that is occasionally and morally but neither by any Divine or physical by natural or supernatural power by the work done or by the Divine institution This indeed is something but very much too little But others go as far on the other hand and affirm that in the Blessed Sacrament we receive the body and blood of Christ we chew his flesh we drink his blood for his flesh is meat indeed and his blood is drink indeed and this is the Manna which came down from heaven our bodies are nourished our souls united to Christ and the Sacrament is the infallible instrument of pardon to all persons that do not maliciously hinder it and it produces all its effects by vertue of the Sacrament it self so appointed and that the dispositions of the Communicants are only for removing obstacles and impediments but effect nothing the sumption of the Mysteries does all in a capable subject as in infants who do nothing in penitents who take away what can hinder for it is nothing but Christ himself the body that dyed upon the crosse is broken in the hand of him that ministers and by the teeth of him that communicates and when God gives us his Son in this Divine and glorious manner with heaps of miracles to verify heaps of blessings how shall not he with him give us all things else They who teach this doctrine call the holy Sacrament The host the unbloody sacrifice the flesh of God the body of Christ God himself the Mass the Sacrament of the Altar I cannot say that this is too much but that these things are not true and although all that is here said that is of any material benefit and reall blessing is true yet the blessing is not so conferred it is not so produced A third sort of Christians speak indefinitely and gloriously of this Divine mystery they speak enough but they cannot tell what they publish great and glorious effects but such which they gather by similitude and analogy such which they desire but cannot prove which indeed they feel but know not whence they do derive them they are blessings which come in company of the Sacraments but are not alwayes to be imputed to them they confound spiritual senses with mystical expressions and expound mysteries to natural significations that is they mean well but do not alwayes understand that part of Christian Philosophy which explicates the secret nature of this Divine Sacrament and the effect of it is this that they sometimes put too great confidence in the mystery and look for impresses which they find not and are sometimes troubled that their experience does not answer to their Sermons and meet with scruples instead of comforts and doubts instead of rest and anxiety of mind in the place of a serene and peaceful conscience But these men both in their right and in their wrong enumerate many glories of the holy Sacrament which they usually signifie in these excellent appellatives calling it the Supper of the Lord the bread of elect souls and the wine of Angels the Lords body the New Testament and the calice of benediction spiritual food the great Supper the Divinest and Archisymbolical feast the banquet of the Church the celestial dinner the spiritual the sacred the mystical the formidable the rational Table the supersubstantial bread the bread of God the bread of life the Lords mystery the great mystery of salvation the Lords Sacrament the Sacrament of piety the sign of unity the contesseration of the Christian communion the Divine grace the Divine making grace the holy thing the desirable the comunication of Good the perfâ—ction and consummation of a Christian the holy particles the gracious symbols the holy gifts the Sacrifice of commemoration the intellectual and mystical good the hereditary donative of the New Testament the Sacrament of the Lords body the Sacrament of the Calice the Paschal Oblation the Christian pasport the mystery of perfection the great Oblation the Worship of God the life of Souls the Sacrament of our price and our Redemption and some few others much to the same purposes all which are of great and useful signification and if the explications and consequent propositions were as justifiable as the titleâ— themselves are sober and useful they would be apt only for edification and to minister to the spirit of devotion That therefore is to be the design of the present Meditations to represent the true and proper and mysterious nature of this divine nutriment of our souls to account what are the blessings God reacheth forth to us in the Mysteries and what returns of duty he expects from all to whom he gives his most holy Son I shall only here add the names and appellatives which the Scripture gives to these Mysteries and place it as a part of the foundation of the following doctrines It is by the Spirit of God called The bread that is broken and the cup of blessing the breaking of bread the body and blood of the Lord the communication of his body and the communication of his blood the feast of charity or love the Lords Table and the Supper of the Lord. Whatsoever is consequent to these titles we can safely own and our faith may dwell securely and our devotion like a pure flame with these may feed as with
the spices and gums upon the Altar of Incense SECT II. What it is which we receive in the holy SACRAMENT IT is strange that Christians should pertinaciously insist upon carnal significations and natural effects in Sacraments and Mysteries when our blessed Lord hath given us a sufficient light to conduct and secure us from such mis-apprehensions The flesh profiteth nothing the words which I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life that is the flesh is corruption and its senses are Ministers of death and this one word alone was perpetually sufficient for Christ's Disciples For when upon occasion of the grosse understanding of their Masters words by the men of Capernaum they had been once clearly taught that the meaning of all these words was wholly spiritual they rested there and inquired no further insomuch that when Christ at the institution of the Supper affirmed of the bread and wine that they were his body and his blood they were not at all offended as being sufficiently before instructed in the nature of that Mystery And besides this they saw enough to tell them that what they eat was not the natural body of their Lord This was the body which himself did or might eat with his body one body did eat and the other was eaten both of them were his body but after a diverse manner For the case is briefly this We have two lives a natural and a spiritual and both must have bread for their support and maintenance in proportion to their needs and to their capacities and as it would be an intollerable charity to give nothing but spiritual nutriment to a hungry body and pour diagrams and wise propositions into an empty stomach so it would be as useless and impertinent to feed the Soul with wheat or flesh unless that were the conveyance of a spiritual delicacy In the holy Sacrament of the Eucharist the body of Christ according to the proper signification of a humane body is not at all but in a sense differing from the proper and natural body that is in a sense more agreeing to Sacraments so St. Hierom expresly Of this sacrifice which is wonderfully done in the commemoration of Christ we may eat but of that sacrifice which Christ offered on the altar of the Crosse by it self or in its own nature no man may eat For it is his flesh which is under the form of bread and his blood which is in the form and tast of wine for the flesh is the Sacrament of flesh and blood is the Sacrament of blood for by flesh and blood that is invisible spiritual intelligible the visible and tangible body of our Lord Jesus Christ is consigned full of the grace of all vertues and of Divine Majesty So St Augustine For therefore ye are not to eat that body which ye see nor to drink that blood which my crucifiers shall pour out it is the same and not the same the same invisibly but not the same visibly For until the world be finished the Lord is above but the truth of the Lord is with us The body in which he rose again must be in one place but the truth of it is every where diffused For there is one truth of the body in the Mystery and another truth simply and without Mystery It is truly Christs body both in the Sacrament and out of it but in the Sacrament it is not the natural truth but the spiritual and the mystical And therefore it was that our Blessed Saviour to them who apprehended him to promise his natural body and blood for our meat and drink spake of his ascension into heaven that we might learn to look from heaven to receive the food of our souls heavenly and spiritual nourishment said St. Athanasius For this is the letter which in the New Testament kills him who understands not spiritually what is spoken to him under the signification of meat and flesh and blood and drink So Origen For this bread does not go into the body for to how many might his body suffice for meat but the bread of eternal life supports the substance of our spirit and therefore it is not touch'd by the body nor seen with the eyes but by faith it is seen and touched So St. Ambrose And all this whole mystery hath in it neither carnal sense nor carnal consequence saith St. Chrysostom But to believe in Christ is to eat the bread and therefore why do you prepare your teeth and stomach believe him and you have eaten him they are the words of S. Austin For faith is that intellectual mouth as S. Brasil calls it which is within the man by which he takes in nourishment But what need we to draw this water from the lesser cisterns we see this truth reflected from the spring it self the fountains of our blessed Saviour I am the bread of life he that cometh unto me shall not hunger and he that believeth on me shall not thirst and again He that eats my flesh hath life abiding in him and I will raise him up at the last day The plain consequent of which words is this that therefore this eating and drinking of Christs flesh and blood can only be done by the Ministeries of life and of the spirit which is opposed to nature and flesh and death And when we consider that he who is not a spiritual and a holy person does not feed upon Christ who brings life eternal to them that feed on him it is apparent that our manducation must be spiritual and therefore so must the food and consequently it cannot be natural flesh however altered in circumstance and visibilities and impossible or incredible changes For it is not in this spiritual food as it was in Manna of which our Fathers did eat and died but whosoever eats this divine nutriment shall never die The Sacraments indeed and symbols the exterior part and ministeries may be taken unto condemnation but the food it self never For an unworthy person cannot feed on this food because here to eat Christs flesh is to do our duty and to be established in our title to the possession of the eternal promises For so Christ disposed the way of salvation not by flesh but by the spirit saith Tertullian that is according to his own exposition Christ is to be desired for life and to be devoured by hearing to be chewed by the understanding and to be digested by faith and all this is the method and oeconomy of heaven which whosoever uses and abides in it hath life abiding in him He that in this world does any other way look for Christ shall never find him and therefore if men say Loe here is Christ or loe there he is in the desart or he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Cupboards or Pantries where bread or flesh is laid believe it not Christs body is in heaven and it is not upon earth the heavens must contain
himself and therefore since it is necessaâ—y that he hath something to offer so long as he is a Priest and there is no other sacrifice but that of himself offered upon the crosse it follows that Christ in heaven perpetually offers and represents that sacrifice to his heavenly Father and in vertue of that obtains all good things for his Church Now what Christ does in heaven he hath commanded us to do on earth that is to represent his death to commemorate this sacrifice by humble prayer and thankful record and by faithful manifestation and joyful Eucharist to lay it before the eyes of our heavenly Father so ministring in his Priesthood and doing according to his commandment and his example the Church being the image of heaven the Priest the Minister of Christ the holy Table being a Copy of the celestial altar and the eternal sacrifice of the Lamb slain from the beginning of the World being alwayes the same it bleeds no more after the finishing of it on the Crosse but it is wonderfully represented in heaven and graciously represented here by Christs action there by his commandment here and the event of it is plainly this that as Christ in vertue of his sacrifice on the crosse intercedes for us with his Father so does the Minister of Christs Priest-hood here that the vertue of the eternal sacrifice may be salutary and effectual to all the needs of the Church both for things temporal and eternal and therefore it was not without great mystery and clear signification that our blessed Lord was pleased to command the representation of his death and sacrifice on the crosse should be made by breaking bread and effusion of wine to signifie to us the nature and sacredness of the Liturgy we are about and that we minister in the Priest-hood of Christ who is a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedeck that is we are Ministers in that unchangable Priest-hood imitating in the external Ministery the prototype Melchisedeck Of whom it is said he brought forth bread and wine and was the Priest of the most high God and in the internal imitating the antitype or the substance Christ himself who offered up his body and blood for atonement for us and by the Sacraments of bread and wine and the prayers of oblation and intercession commands us to officiate in his Priest-hood in the external ministring like Melchisedeck in the internal after the manner of Christ himself This is a great and a mysterious truth which as it is plainly manifested in the Epistle to the Hebrews so it is understood by the ancient and holy Doctors of the Church So St. Ambrose Now Christ is offered but he is offered as a man as if he received his passion but he offers himself as a Priest that he may pardon our sins here in image or representation there in truth as an Advocate interceding with his Father for us So St. Chrysostom In Christ once the Sacrifice was offered which is powerful to our eternal salvation but what then do we do not we offer every day what we daily offer is at the memorial of his death and the Sacrifice is one not many because Christ was once offered but this Sacrifice is the example or representation of that And another Christ is not impiously slain by us but piously sacrificed and by this means we declare the Lords death till he come for here through him we humbly do in earth which he as a son who is heard according to his reverence does powerfully for us in heaven where as an advocate he intercedes with his Father whose office or work it is for us to exhibit and interpose his flesh which he took of us and for us and as it were to presse it upon his Father To the same sense is the meditation of St. Austin By this he is the Priest and the Oblation the Sacrament of which he would have the daily Sacrifice of the Church to be which because it is the body of that head she learns from him to offer her self to God by him who offered himself to God for her And therefore this whole Office is called by St. Basil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the prayer of oblation the great Christian Sacrifice and Oblation in which we present our prayers and the needs of our selves and of our brethren unto God in virtue of the great Sacrifice Christ upon the Crosse whose memorial we then celebrate in a divine manner by divine appointment The effect of this I represent in the words of Lyra That which does purge and cleanse our sins must be celestial and spiritual and that which is such hath a perpetual efficacy and needs not to be done again but that which is daily offered in the Church is a daily commemoration of that one Sacrifice which was offered on the Crosse according to the command of Christ Do this in commemoration of me Now this holy Ministry and Sacrament of this death being according to Christs commandment and in our manner a representation of the eternal Sacrifice an imitation of Christs intercession in heaven in vertue of that Sacrifice must be after the pattern in the Mount it must be as that is pur â prece as Tertullians phrase is by pure prayer it is an intercession for the whole Church present and absent in the virtue of that Sacrifice I need add no more but leave it to the meditation to the joy and admiration of all Christian people to think and to enumerate the blessings of this Sacrament which is so excellent a representation of Christs death by Christs commandment and so glorious an imitation of that intercession which Christ makes in heaven for us all it is all but the representment of his death in the way of prayer and interpellation Christ as head and we as members he as High Priest and we servants as his Ministers and therefore I shall stop here and leave the rest for wonder and Eucharist we may pray here with all the solemnity and advantages imaginable we may with hope and comfort use the words of David I will take the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord we are here very likely to prevail for all blessings for this is by way of eminency glory and singularity Calix benedictionis the cup of blessing which we bless and by which God will bless us and for which he is to be blessed for evermore 5. By the means of this Sacrament our bodies are made capable of the resurrection to life and eternal glory For when we are externally and symbolically in the Sacrament and by faith and the spirit of God internally united to Christ and made partakers of his body and his blood we are joyned and made one with him who did rise again and when the head is risen the members shall not see corruption for ever but rise again after the pattern of our Lord. If by the Sacrament we are really united and
made one with Christ then it shall be to us in our proportion as it was to him we shall rise again and we shall enter into glory But it is certain we are united to Christ by it we eat his body and drink his blood Sacramentally by our mouths and therefore really and spiritually by our spirits and by spiritual actions cooperating For what good will it do us to partake of his body if we do not also partake of his spirit but certain it is if we do one we do both cum naturalis per sacramentum proprietas perfectae sacramentum sit unitatis as St. Hilaries expression is the natural propriety viz the outward elements by the Sacrament that is by the institution and blessing of God become the Sacrament of a perfect unity which beside all the premisses is distinctly affirmed in the words of the Apostle we which are sanctified and he which sanctifies are all of one and again the bread which we break is it not the communication of the body of Christ and the cup which we drink is it not the communication of the blood of Christ plainly saying that by this holy ministery we are joyned and partake of Christs body and blood and then we become spiritually one body and therefore shall receive in our bodies all the effects of that spiritual union the chief of which in relation to our bodies is resurrection from the grave And this is expresly taught by the Ancient Church So St. Irenaeus teaches us As the bread which grows from the earth receiving the calling of God that is blessed by prayer and the word of God is not now common bread but the Eucharist consisting of two things an earthly and an heavenly so also our bodies receiving the Eucharist are not now corruptible but have the hope of resurrection And again when the mingled calice and the made bread receives the word of God viz. is consecrated and blessed it is made the Eucharist of the body and blood of Christ out of those things by which our body is nourished and our substance does consist and how shall any one deny that the flesh is capable of the gift of God which is eternal life which is nourished by the body and blood of Christ And St. Ignatius calls the blessed Eucharist 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the medicine of immortallity for the drink is his blood who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 incorruptible love and eternal life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so the Fathers of the Nicene Councel the symbols of our resurrection the meat nourishing to immortallity and eternal life so Cyril of Alexandria for this is to drink the blood of Jesus to be partakers of the Lords incorruptibility said St. Clement For bread is food and blood is life but we drink the blood of Christ himself commanding us that together with him we may by him be partakers of eternal life So St. Cyprian aut quicunque sit author Sermon de coenâ Domini 6. Because this is a ministry of grace by bodily ceremonies and conveys spiritual blessings by temporal ministrations there is something also of temporal regard directly provided for our bodies by the holy Sacrament It sometimes is a means in the hand of God for the restoring and preserving respectively of our bodily health and secular advantages I will not insist upon that of St. Gorgonia who being oppressed with a violent head-ach threw her self down before the holy Table where the Sacrament was placed and prayed with passion and pertinacy till she obtained relief and ease in that very place Nor that of St. Ambrose who having trod upon a Gentlemans foot afflicted with the gout in the time of ministration gave him the holy smbols and told him it was good for his sicknesse also and that he presently found his cure I my self knew a person of great sanctity who was afflicted to deaths door with a vomiting and preparing her self to death by her viaticum the holy Sacrament to which she always bore a great reverence she was infinitely desirous and yet equally fearful to receive it lest she should reject that by her infirmity which in her spirit she passionately longed for but her desire was the greater passion and prevailed she received it and swallowed it and after great and earnest reluctancy being forced to cast it up in zeal and with a new passion took it in again and then retained it and from that instant speedily recovered against the hope of her Physician and the expectation of all her friends God does miracles every day and he who with spittle and clay cured the blind mans eyes may well be supposed to glorifie himself by the extraordinary contingences and Sacramental contacts of his own body But that which is most famous and remarked is that the Austrian Family do attribute the rise of their House to the present Grandeur to Wâ—lliam Earl of Hasburgh and do acknowledg it to be a reward of his piety in the venerable treatment and usage of these Divine mysteries It were easier to heap together many rare contingences and miraculous effects of the holy Sacrament than to find faith to believe them now-adayes and therefore for this whole affair I relie upon the words of Saint Paul affirming that God sent sicknesses and sundry kinds of death to punish the Corinthian irreverent treatment of the Blessed Sacrament and therefore it is not to be deemed but that life and health will be the consequent of our holy usages of it for if by our fault it is a savour of death it is certain by the blessing and intention of God it is a favour of life But of these things in particular we have no promise and therefore such events as these cannot upon this account of faith and certain expectations be designed by us in our communions If God please to send any of them as sometimes he hath done it is to promote his own glory and our value of the Blessed Sacrament the great ministry of salvation 7. The sum of all I represent in these few words of St. Hilary These holy mysteries being taken cause that Christ shall be in us and we in Christ and if this be more than words we need no further inquiry into the particulars of blessing consequent to a worthy communion for if God hath given his Son unto us how shall not he with him give us all things else nay all things that we need are effected by this said St. Clement of Alexandria one of the most antient Fathers of the Church of Christ Eucharistia qui per fidem sunt participes sanctifiâ—antur corpore animâ They who by faith are partakers of the Eucharist are sanctified both in body and in soul. Fonte renascentes membris sanguine Christi Vescimur atque ideo templum Deitatis habemur Sedul How great therefore and how illustrious benefits it is the meditation of St. Eusebius Emissenus does the power of the Divine blessing
Sacramental Symbols as a direct consignation of pardon not that it is them compleated for it is a work of time it is as long in doing as repentance is in perfecting it is the effect of that depending on its cause in a perpetual operation but it is then working and if we go on in duty God will proceed to finish the methods of his grace and snatch us from eternal death which we have deserved and bring us unto glory And this he is pleased by the Sacramental all the way to consigne God speaks not more articulately in any voice from Heaven than in such real indications of his love and favour 14. Lastly since the Sacrament is the great solemnity of prayer and imitation of Christs intercession in Heaven let us here be both charitable and religious in our prayers interceding for all states of men and women in the Christan Church and representing to God all the needs of our selves and of our Relatives For then we pray with all the advantages of the spirit when we pray in the faith of Christ crucified in the love of God and of our neighbour in the advantages of solemn piety in the communion of Saints in the imitation of Christs intercession and in the union with Christ himself Spiritual and Sacramental and to such prayers as these nothing can be added but that which will certainly come that is a blessed hearing and a gracious answer SECT III. Devotions preparatory to this Mystery Ejaculations I. 1. I Will praise thee with my whole heart before the Angels will I sing praise unto thee 2. I will worship towards thy holy Temple and praise thy Name for thy loving kindnesse and for thy truth for thou hast magnified above all thy name the word of thy praise 3. In the day when I call upon thee thou shalt answer and shalt multiply strength in my soul. 4. How precious are thy thoughts unto me O God how great is the sum of them The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me Thy mercy O Lord endureth for ever 5. I wait for the Lord my soul doth wait and in his word do I hope 6. My soul doth wait for the Lord more than they that keep the morning watches that they may observe the time of offering the morning sacrifices 7. O let my soul hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is mercy and with him is plenteous redemption he shall redeem his people from all iniquitie II. 1. Our Lord is gentle and just our God is merciful 2. The Lord keepeth the simple I was humbled but the Lord looked after my redemption 3. O my soul return thou unto thy rest because the Lord hath restored his good things unto thee 4. He hath snatched my soul from death mine eyes from tears and my feet from falling I will therefore walk before the Lord in the land of the living 5. I have believed therefore will I speak in the assemblies of just men I will greatly praise the Lord. 6. What shall I return unto the Lord all his retributions are repayed upon me 7. I will bear the chalice of redemptions in the Kingdom of God and in the name of the Lord I will call upon my God III. 1. I will pay my vows unto the Lord I will then shew forth his Sacraments unto all the people 2. Honourable before the Lord is the death of his holy one and thereby thou hast broken all my chains 3. I have sworn and I will perform it that I will keep thy righteous judgments 4. I will greatly praise the Lord with my mouth yea I will praise him among the multitude 5. For he shall stand at the right hand of the poor to save him from them that condemn his soul. 6. His work is honourable and glorious and his righteousnesse remaineth for ever He hath made his wonderful works to be remembred 7. The Lord is gracious and full of compassion he hath given meat unto them that fear him he will ever be mindful of his covenant he hath shewed his people the power of his works blessed be God The Prayers to be used in any day or time of preparation to the Holy Sacrament I. O Thou shepherd of Israel thou that feedest us like sheep thou makest us to lie down in pleasant pastures and leadest us by the still waters running from the clefts of the rock from the wounds of our Lord from the fountains of salvation thou preparest a table for us and anointest our heads with the unction from above and our cup runneth over let the blood of thy wounds and the water of thy side wash me clean that I may with a pure clean soul come to eat of the purest sacrifice the Lamb slain from the beginning of the world II. THou givest thy self to be the food of our souls in the wonders of the Sacrament in the faith of thy Word in the blessings and graces of thy Spirit Perform that in thy Servant which thou hast prepared and effected in thy Son strengthen my infirmities heal my sicknesses give me strength to subdue my passions to mortifie my inordinations to kill all my sin increase thy Graces in my soul enkindle a bright devotion extinguish all the fires of hell my lust and my pride my envy and all my spiritual wickednesses pardon all my sins and fill me with thy Spirit that by thy Spirit thou maist dwell in me and by obedience and love I may dwell in thee and live in the life of grace till it pasâ— on to glory and immensity by the power and the blessings by the passion and intercession of the Word incarnate whom I adore and whom I love and whom I will serve for ever and ever III. O Mysterious God ineffable and glorious Majesty what is this that thou hast done to the sons of men thou hast from thy bosom sent thy Son to take upon him our nature in him thou hast opened the fountains of thy mercy and hast invited all penitent sinners to come to be pardoned all the oppressed to be eased all the sorrowful to be comforted all the sick to be cured all the hungry to be filled and the thirsty to be refreshed with the waters of life and sustained with the wine of elect souls admit me O God to this great effusion of loving kindness that I may partake of the Lord Jesus that by him I may be comforted in all my griefs satisfied in all my doubts healed of all the wounds of my soul and the bruises of my spirit and being filled with the bread of heaven and armed with the strength of the Spirit I may begin continue and finish my journey thorow this valley of tears unto my portion of thy heavenly kingdom whither our Lord is gone before to prepare a place for every loving and obedient soul. Grant this O Eternal God for his sake who died for us and intercedes for us and gives himself daily to us our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Amen CHAP. II. Of
intrusted in a greater he that does not pray holily and prosperously can never communicate acceptably This therefore must be severely and prudently examined But let us remember this that there is nothing fit to be presented to God but what is great and â—xcellent for nothing comes from him but what is great and best and nothing should be returned to him that is little and contemptible in its kinde It is a mysterious elegancie that is in the Hebrew of the Old Testament when the Spirit of God would call any thing very great or very excellent he calls it of the Lord so the affrightment of the Lord that is a great affrightment fell upon them and the fearful fire that fell upon the shepherds and sheep of Job is called the fire of God and when David took the speare and water-pot from the head of Saul while he and his guards were sleeping it is said that the sleep of the Lord that is a very great sleep was fallen upon them Thus we read of the flames of God and a land of the darknesse of God that is vehement flames and a land of exceeding darknesse and the reason is because when God strikes he strikes vehemently so that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God And on the other side when he blesses he blesses excellently and therefore when Naomie blessed Boaz she said Let him be blessed of the Lord that is according to the Hebrew manner of speaking Let him be exceedingly blessed In proportion to all this whatsoever is offered to God should be of the best it should be a devout Prayer a fervent humble passionate supplication He that prays otherwise must expect the curses and contempt of his lukewarmness and will be infinitely unworthy to come to the holy Communion whether they that come intend to present their Prayers to God in the union of Christs intercession which is then solemnly imitated and represented An indevout Prayer can never be joined with Christs Prayers Fire will easily combine with fire and flame marries flame but a cold devotion and the fire of this Altar can never be friendly and unite in one pyramid to ascend together to the regions of God and the Element of love If it be a prayer of God that is fit to be intitled fit to be presented unto him it must be most vehement and holy The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man only can be confident to prevail nothing else can ever be sanctified by a conjunction with this sacrifice of prayer which must be consumed by a heavenly fire There is not indeed any greater indication of our worthiness or unworthiness to receive the holy Communion than to examine and understand the state of our daily prayer SECT V. Of preparatory examination of our selves in some other instances HE that comes to the holy Communion must examine himself concerning his passions whether that which usually transports him to undecency and shame to sin and folly be brought under the dominion of grace under the command of reason under the Empire of the spirit For the passions of the soul are the violences and storms of reason neither reason nor grace can be heard to speak when they are loud and in vain it is that you tell a passionate person of the interests of wisdom and Religion We see it in fools who have no allay of reason their anger is rage their jealousie is madness their desires are ravenous their loves are troublesome and unseasonable their hopes are groundless but ever confident their fears are by chance but alwayes without measure and a fool when his belly is full may as soon be perswaded into temperate discourses as he that is passionate to be obedient to God and to the rules of his own felicity A great fear and a constant vertue are seldom found in one man and a coward is vertuous by chance and so song as he is let alone but unless the fear of God be greater than the fear of man it is in the power of his enemy whether that man shall be happy or wise And so it is in a great or easie anger every man and every thing can put a peevish person out of his Religion It cannot in these and all the like cases be well unless by examining we find that our spirit is more meek our passion easier overcome and the paroxysms or fits return lesse frequently and the symptomes be lesse malignant In this instance we must be quick and severe and begin betimes to take a course with these vermin and vipers of the soul. Suetonius tells that when the witty flatterers of Cesar had observed that no frogs did breed in his Grandfathers Villa which was in the suburbs of Rome they set themselves to invent a reason which should flatter the Prince and boldly told abroad that when young Octavius was a childe he once in sport forbad them to make a noise and for ever after they were silent and left those pools ever since Octavius began to speak they left off to make their noises and their dwellings there If we suppresse our passions that make inarticulate noises in the soul if betimes and in their infancie we make them silent we shall find peace in all our dayes But an old passion an inveterate peevishness an habitual impotency of lust and vile desires are like an old Lion he will by no means be made tame and taught to eat the meat of peace and gentleness If thy passion be lasting and violent thou art in a state of evil if it be sudden and frequent transient and volatile thou wilt often fall into sin and though every passion be not a sin yet every excess of passion is a diminution of reason and Religion and when the acts are so frequent that none can number them what effects they leave behind and how much they disorder the state of grace none can tell Either therefore suffer no passion to transport and govern you or no examination can signifie any thing For no man can say that a very passionate man is a very good man or how much he is beloved of God who playes the fool so frequently nor how long God will love him who is at the mercy of his imperious passion which gives him laws and can every day change his state from good to bad It was well said of one If you give the reines to grief every thing that crosses thee can produce the biggest grief and the causes of passions are as they are made within He that checks at every word and is jealous of every look and disturb'd at every accident and takes all things by the wrong handle and reflects upon all disturbances switches and spurs his passion and strives to overtake sin and to be tied to infelicity but nothing can secure our Religion but binding our passions in chains and doubling our guards upon them least like mad-folkâ— they break their locks and bolts and
negative of the same thing 2. Whatsoever is against right reason that no faith can oblige us to believe For although reason is not the positive and affirmative measures of our faith and God can do more than we can understand and our faith ought to be larger than our reason and take something into her heart that reason can never take into her eye yet in all our Creed there can be nothing against reason If true reason justly contradicts an article it is not of the houshold of faith In this there is no difficulty but that in practice we take care that we do not call that reason which is not so for although a mans reason is a right Judge yet it ought not to passe sentence in an inquiry of faith until all the information be brought in all that is within and all that is without all that is above and all that is below all that concerns it in experience and all that concerns it in act whatsoever is of pertinent observation and whatsoever is revealed for else reason may argue very well and yet conclude falsly it may conclude well in Logick and yet infer a false Proposition in Theology but when our Judge is fully and truly informed in all that where she is to make her judgment we may safely follow it whithersoever she invites us If therefore any society of men calls upon us to believe in our Religion what is false in our experience to affirm that to be done which we know is impossible it ever can be done to wink hard that we may see the better to be unreasonable men that we may offâ—r to God a reasonable sacrifice they make Religion so to be seated in the will that our understanding will be uselesse and can never minister to it But as he that shuts the â—ye hard and with violence curles the eye lid forces a phantastick fire from the crystalline humor and espies a light that never shines and sees thousands of little fires that never burn So is he that blinds the eye of his reason and pretends to see by an eye of faith he makes little images of notion and some atoms dance before him but he is not guided by the light nor instructed by the proposition but sees like a man in his sleep and grows as much the wiser as the man that dreamt of a Lycanthropy and was for ever after wisely wary not to come neer a River He that speaks against his own reason speaks against his own conscience and therefore it is certain no man serves God with a good conscience that serves him against his reason For though in many cases reason must submit to faith that is natural reason must submit to supernatural and the imperfect informations of art to the perfect revelations of God yet in no case can a true reason and a right faith oppose each other and therefore in the article of the Sacrament the impossible affirmatives concerning Transubstantiation because they are against all the reason of the world can never be any part of the faith of God 3. Whatsoever is mâ—tter of curiosity that our faith is not obliged to believe or confess For the faith of a Christian is pure as light plain as a Commandment easie as childrens Lessons it is not given to puzzle the understanding but to instruct it it brings clarity to it not darknesse and obscurity Our faith in this Sacrament is not obliged to inquire or to tell how the hoâ—y bread can feed the soul or the calice purifie our spirits how Christ is united to us and yet we remain imperfect even then when we are all one with him that is perfect there is no want of faith though we do not understand the secret manner how Christ is really present and yet this reality be no other but a reality of event and positive effect though we know not that Sacramental is more than figurative and yet not so much as natural but greater in another kind It is not a duty of our faith to discern how Christs body is broken into ten thousand pieces and yet remains whole at the same time or how a body is present by faith only when it is naturally absent and yet faith ought to believe things to be as they are and not to make them what of themselves they are not We need not to be amazed concerning our faith when our overbusie reason is amazed in the article and our faith is not defective though we confesse we do not understand how Christs body is there incorporeally that is a body after the manner of a Spirit or though we cannot apprehend how the Symbols should make the grace presential and yet that the grace of God in the receiver can make the Symbols operative and energetical The faith that is required of those who come to the holy Communion is of what is revealed plainly and taught usually what sets devotion forward not what ministers to curiosity that which the Good and the plain the easie and the simple man can understand For if thou canst not understand the reciprocations and pulses of thy own arteries the motion of thy blood the feat of thy memory the rule of thy dreams the manner of digestion the disease of thy bowels and the distempers of thy spleen things that thou bearest about thee that cause to thee pain sorrow it is not to be expected that thou shouldest understand the secrets of God the causes of his will the impulses of his grace the manner of his Sacraments and the Oeconomy of his spirit Gods works are secret and his words are deep and his dispensations mysterious and therefore too high for thy understanding St. Gregory Nazianzen sayes of God the more you think you comprehend of him in your understanding the lesse he is comprehended like the sand of the glass which the harder you grasp the less you can retain or like the sand of the sea which you can never number but by going about it you are confounded and by doing something of it you make it impossible to do the rest Curious inquiries are like the contentions of Protogenes and Apelles who should draw the smallest line and after two or three essayes they left this monument of their art that they drew three lines so curiously that they were scarcely to be discerned And therefore since faith is not concerned in intrigues and hard questions it were very well if the Sacrament it self were not disguised and charity disordered by that which is not a help but a temptation to Faith it self In the holy Communion we must retain an undoubted faith but not enquire after what manner the secrets of God are appointed Whether it be or no that is the object of faith to enquire and to accept accordingly What it is he that is to teach others and speak mysteries may modestly dispute but how it is nothing but curiosity will look after The Egyptians used to say that unknown darknesse
and so requiring us to understand 4. And now to this spiritual food must be sitted a spiritual manner of reception and this is the work of faith that spiritual blessings may invest the spirit and be conveyed by proportioned instruments lest the Sacrament be like a treasure in a dead hand or musick in the grave But this I chuse rather to represent in the words of the Fathers of the Church than mine own We see saith St. Epiphanius what our Saviour took into his hands as the Gospel says he arose at supper and took this anâ— when he had given thanks he said This is my body and we see it is not equal nor like to it neither to the invisible Deity nor to the flesh for this is of a round form without sense but by grace he would say This is mine and every one hath faith in this saying For he that doth not believe this to be true as he hath said he is fallen from grace and salvation But that which we have heard that we believe that it is his And again The bread indeed is our food but the virtue which is in it is that which gives us life by faith and efficacy by hope and the perfection of the Mysteries and by the title of sanctification it should be made to us the perfection of salvation For these words are spirit and life and the flesh pierces not into the understanding of this depth unlesse faith come But then The bread is food the blood is life the flesh is substance the body is the Church For the body is indeed shewn it is slain and given for the nourishment of the world that it may be spiritually distributed to every one and be made to every one the conservatory of them to the resurrection of eternal life saith St. Athanasius Therefore because Christ said This is my body let us not at all doubt but believe and receive it with the eye of the soul for nothing sensible is delivered us but by sensible things he gives us insensible or spiritual so St. Chrysostom For Christ would not that they who partake of the divine Mysteries should attend to the nature of the things which are seen but let them by faith believe the change that is made by grace For according to the substance of the creatures it remains after consecration the same it did before But it is changed inwardly by the powerful vertue of the holy Spirit and faith sees it it feeds the soul and ministers the substance of eternal life for now faith sees it all whatsoever it is From these excellent words we are confirmed in these two things 1. That the divine Mysteries are of very great efficacy and benefit to our souls 2. That Faith is the great instrument in conveying these blessings to us For as St. Cyprian affirms the Sacraments of themselves cannot be without their own vertue and the divine Majesty does at no hand absent it self from the Mysteries But then unless by faith we believe all this that Christ said there is nothing remaining but the outward Symbols and the sense of flesh and blood which profits nothing But to believe in Christ is to eat the flesh of Christ. I am the bread of life he that cometh to me shall not hunger that is he shall be filled with Christ and he that believeth in me shall not thirst coming to Christ and believing in him is the same thing that is he that believes Christs Words and obeys his Commandments he that owns Christ for his Law-giver and his Master for his Lord and his Redeemer he who lays down his sins in the grave of Jesus and lays down himself at the foot of the Crosse and his cares at the door of the Temple and his sorrows at the Throne of Grace he who comes to Christ to be instructed to be commanded to be relieved and to be comforted to this person Christ gives his body and blood that is food from heaven And then the bread of life and the body of Christ and eating his flesh and drinking his blood are nothing else but mysterious and Sacramental expressions of this great excellency that whoever does this shall partake of all the benefits of the Crosse of Christ where his body was broken and his blood was poured forth for the remission of our sins and the salvation of the world But still that I may use the expression of St. Ambrose Christ is handled by faith he is seen by faith he is not touched by the body he is not comprehended by the eyes 5. But all the inquiry is not yet past For thus we rightly understand the mysterious Propositions but thus we do not fully understand the mysterious Sacrament For since coming to Christ in all the addresses of Christian Religion that is in all the ministeries of faith is eating of the body and drinking the blood of Christ what does faith in the reception of the blessed Sacrament that it does not do without it Of this I have already given an account But here I am to add That in the holy Communion all the graces of a Christian all the mysteries of the Religion are summ'd up as in a divine compendium and whatsoever moral or mysterious is done without is by a worthy Communicant done more excellently in this divine Sacrament for here we continue the confession of our faith which we made in Baptism here we perform in our own persons what then was undertaken for us by another here that is made explicit which was but implicit before what then was in the root is now come to a full year what was at first done in mystery alone is now done in mystery and moral actions and vertuous excellencies together here we do not only here the words of Christ but we obey them we believe with the heart and here we confesse with the mouth and we act with the hand and incline the head and bow the knee and give our heart in sacrifice here we come to Christ and Christ comes to us here we represent the death of Christ as he would have us represent it and remember him as he commanded us to remember him here we give him thanks and here we give him our selves here we defie all the works of darknesse and hither we come to be invested with a robe of light by being joined to the Son of Righteousnesse to live in his eyes and to walk by his brightnesse and to be refreshed with his warmth and directed by his spirit and united to his glories So that if we can receive Christs body and drink his blood out of the Sacrament much more can we do it in the Sacrament For this is the chief of all the Christian Mysteries and the union of all Christian Blessings and the investiture of all Christian Rights and the exhibition of the Charter of all Christian Promises and the exercise of all Christian Duties Here is the exercise
the beloved Son the first born of every creature according to the Prophecies which went before him of the seed of of Abraham and David and of the Tribe of Judah He who is the maker of all that are born was conceived in the womb of a Virgin and he that is void of all flesh was incarnate and made flesh He was born in time who was begotten from eternity He conversed piously with men and instructed them with his holy Laws and doctrine He cured every disease and every infirmity He did signs and wonders among the people He slept and eat and drank who feeds all the living with food and fills them with his blessing He declared thy Name to them who knew it not He enlightned our ignorances He enkindled Godliness and fulfilled thy will and finished all that which thou gavest him to do All this when he had done he was taken by the hands of wicked men by the treachery of false Priests and an ungodly people he suffered many things of them and by thy permission suffered all shame and reproach He was delivered to Pilate the President who judged him that is the Judge of the quick and dead and condemned him who is the Saviour of all others He who is impassible was crucified and He died who is of an immortal nature and they buried him by whom others are made alive that by his death and passion he might free them for whom he came and might dissolve the bands of the Devil and deliver men from all his crafty malices But then he rose again from the dead he conversed with his Disciples forty days together and then was received up into heaven and there sits at the right hand of God his Father We therefore being mindful of these things which he did and suffered for us give thanks to thee Almighty God not as much as we should but as much as we can and here fulfil his Ordinance and believe all that he said and know and confess that he hath given us his body to be the food and his blood to be the drink of our souls that in him we live and move and have our being that by him we are taught by his strength enabled by his graces prevented by his spirit conducted by his death pardoned by his resurrection justified and by his intercession defended from all our enemies and set forward in the way of holinesse and life eternal O grant that we and all thy servants who by faith and Sacramental participation communicate with the Lord Jesus may obtain remission of our sins and be confirmed in piety and may be delivered from the power and illusions of the Devil and being filled with thy Spirit may become worthy members of Christ and at last may inherit eternal Life through the same our Lord Jesus Christ Amen CHAP. IV. Of Charity preparatory to the Blessed Sacrament SECT I. THE second great Instrument of preparation to the blessed Sacrament is Charity for though this be involved in faith as in its cause and moral principle yet we are to consider it in the proper effects also of it in its exercise and operations relative to the Mysteries For they that speak distinctly and give proprieties of employment to the two Sacraments by that which is most signal and eminent in them both respectively call Baptism the Sacrament of Faith and the Eucharist the Sacrament of Charity that is Faith in Baptism enters upon the work of a good life and in the holy Eucharist it is actually productive of that Charity which at first was designed and undertaken For Charity is that fire from heaven which unlesse it does enkindle the Sacrifice God will never accept it for an atonement This God declared to us by his Laws given to the sons of Israel and Aaron The Sacrifice that was Gods portion was to be eaten and consumed by himself and therefore to be devoured by the holy fire that came down from heaven And this was imitated by the Persians who worshipped the fire and thought what the fire devoured their god had plainly eaten So Maximus Tyrius tells of them that bringing their Sacrifices they were wont to say O Fire our Lord eat this meat And Pindar in his Olympiaes tells of the Rhodians that when they brought a Sacrifice to Jupiter and had by chance forgotten to bring their fire he accepting of their good intentions and pitying their forgetfulnesse rained down upon them a golden shower from a yellow cloud that is a shower of fire came and consumed their sacrifice Now this is the great emblem of Charity the flame consumes the feasters Sacrifice and makes it a divine nutriment our Charity it purifies the Oblation and makes their Prayers accepted The Tables of the Lord like the Delian Altars must not be defiled with blood and death with anger and revenge with wrath and indignation and this is to be in all senses of duty and ministration an unbloody Sacrifiâ—e The blood of the Crosse was â—he last that was to have been shed The Laws can shed more but nothing else For by remembring and representing the effusion of blood not by shedding it our expiation is now perfected and compleat but nothing hinders it more than the spirit of war and death not only by the emissions of the hand or the apertures of a wound but by the murder of the tongue and the cruelties of the heart or by an unpeaceable disposition It was love that first made Societies and love that must continue our Communions and God who made all things by his power does preserve them by his love and by union and society of parts every creature is preserved When a little wâ—ter is spilt from a full Vessel and falls into its enemy dust it curles it self into a drop and so stands equally armed in every point of the circle dividing the Forces of the enemy that by that little union it may stand as long as it can but if it be dissolved into flatnesse it is changed into the nature and possession of the dust War is one of Gods greatest plagues and therefore when God in this holy Sacrament pours forth the greatest effusion of his love peace in all capacities and in all dimensions and to all purposes he will not endure that they should come to these love-feasts who are unkind to their brethren quarrelsom with their neighbours implacable to their enemies apt to contentions hard to be reconciled soon angry scarcely appeased These are dogs and must not come within the holy place where God who is the Congregating Father and Christ the great minister of peace and the holy spirit of love are present in mysterious Symbols and most gracious Communications For although it be true that God loves us first yet he will not continue to love us or proceed in the methods of his kindnesse unlesse we become like unto him and love For by our love and charity he will pardon us and he will
kindnesses which Christ requires of thee for thy enemy that is to pray for him and to love him But you may secure your selves by all means which his violence and your case hath mâ—de necessary But this I say is in case the evil be intolerable or that â—o avoid it be a matter of duty or charity to those to whom you are obliged Though my old friend and new enemy Caâ—bo do me little spites and kill my Deer or shoot my Pigeons or trespasse upon my grasse I must not be avenged on him at the Law or right my self by afflicting him but strive for the rewards of patience and labour for the fruits of my charity and for the rest use all the guards of prudence that I can yet if he takes away my childrens portions or fires my houses or exposes me and mine to beggary or destitution I must do that duty which my charity to my children and my justice does oblige me I may defend my childrens right though that defence exposes him to evil that does the evil I may not let Carbo alone and suffer my children to be undone I must provide for my own according to their condition and states of life if this provision be but necessary or competent according to prudent modest and wise accounts and be not a contention for excesses and extravagancies of wealth He that goes to Law for another hath greater warrant than he that does it for himself for it is more likely to be charity in their case and revenge in my own and certainly in the disputes of charity our children are to be preferred before our enemies In short If the vexation that is brought by the suit of Law upon an injurious person be not revenge and if the defence be necessary or greatly charitable and if the injury be intolerable or greatly afflictive in all these cases Christ hath left us to the liberties of Nature and Reason and the Laws 5. No man must in his own case prosecute his enemy to death or capital punishment The reasons are because no mans temporal evil his injury his disgrace his money and his wound are not a competent value for the life of a man and when beyond this there is no evil that we can do it can in no sense consist with charity that goes so far He that prosecutes his enemy to death forgives nothing forbears nothing of that injury he means no good to his enemy desires not his amendment is not careful of his repentance is not ambitious to gain a brother to secure the interest of a soul for God to get himself the rewards of charity and it is a sad thing to make thy adversary pay the utmost farthing even whilst he is in the way and to send him to make his accounts to God reeking in his sins and his crimes broad blown about his ears There are not many cases in which it can consist with the spirit of Christianity for the Laws themselves to put a criminal hastily to death Whatsoever is necessary that is lawful and of the necessities of the publick publick persons are to judge only they are to judge according to the analogy and gentlenesse of the Christian Law by a Christian spirit and to take care of souls as well as of bodies and estates If the criminal can be amended as oftentimes he can it is much better for a Common-wealth that a good Citizen be made than that he be taken away while he is evil Strabo tells of some Nations dwelling about Caucasus that never put their greatest malefactors to death and Diodorus says that Sabacon a pious and good King of Egypt changed capital punishments into slavery and profitable works and that with excellent successe because it brought more profit to the publick and brought the criminal to repentance and a good mind Balsamo says the Greek Emperours did so and St. Augustin advises it as most fitting to be done But if this in some case be better in the publick it self it is necessary in the private and it is necessary in our present inquiry in order to charity preparatory to the holy Communion and in the Council of Eliberis there is a Canon If any Christian accuse another at the Law and prosecute him to banishment or death let him not be admitted to the Communion no not so much as in the article of death For he whose malice passed unto the death of his brother must not in his death receive the Communion of the faithful and the seal of the Charities of God But this was severe and it is to be understood only to be so unlesse when we are commanded to prosecute a criminal by the interest of necessary justice and publick charity and the command of the Laws But in other cases he that hath done so let him repent greatly and long and at last Communicate That 's the best expedient Question VII Whether the Laws of Forgivâ—â—esse and the Charities of the Communioâ— oblige the injured person to forgive the adulterous Husband or Wife if they do repent There are two cases in which it is so far from being necessary that it is not lawful to do some things of kindnesse which in all other cases are indeed true charity and highly significative of a soul truly merciful and worthy to Communicate 1. When to retain the adulterous person is scandalous as in the Primitive Church it was esteemed so in Clergy men then sâ—ch persons though they be penitent must noâ— be suffered to cohabit they must be paâ—doned to aâ—l purposes which are not made unlawful by accident and to all purposes which may minister unto their repentance and salvation but charity must not be done to a single person with offence to â—he Chuâ—ch and a Criminal must not receive advâ—ntage by the prejudice of the holy and the innocenâ— Against this I have nothing to oppose but tâ—at those â—hurches which diâ— foâ—bid this forgivenâ—sse upon pretence of scandal should also have considered whether or no that the forgiveness of the Criminal and the charitable toleration of the injury and the patient labours of love and the endeavours of repâ—â—tance be not only more profitable to them both but also more exemplar to others 2. The other is the case of direct dâ—nger if the sin of the offending party be promoted by the charity of the injured man or woman it is made unlawful so far to forgive as to cohabit if this charity will let her loose to repent of her repentance it turns to uncharitablenesse and can nâ—ver be a duty But except it be in these cases it is not only lawful but infinitely agreeable to the duty of charity to restore the repenting person to his first condition of love and society But this is such a charity as although it be a counsel of perfection and a nobleness of forgivenesse yet that the forgivenesse shall extend to society and mutual endearments of cohabitation is under no Commandment
hast thou to do to declare my Statutes or that thou shouldst take my Covenant in thy mouth seeing thou hatest instruction and castest my words behind thee Thou sittest and speakest against thy Brother thou slanderest thine own mothers Son These things thou hast done and I kept silence but I will reprove thee and set them in order before thine eyes Now consider this ye that forget God lest I tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver Deliver me from bloud-guiltiness O God thou God of my salvation and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness Blessed is he that considereth the poor the Lord will deliver him in the time of trouble The Lord will deliver him and keep him alive and he shall be blessed upon the earth and thou wilt not deliver him into the will of his enemies The Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness But I said Lord be merciful to me heal my soul for I have sinned against thee Yet the Lord will command his loving kindness in the day time and in the night his song shall be with me and my prayer unto the God of my life O send out thy light and thy truth let them lead me let them bring me to thy holy Hill and to thy Tabernacles Then will I go unto the Altar of God my exceeding joy yea upon the harp will I praise thee O God my God The righteous shall be glad in the Lord and shall trust in him and all the upright in heart shall glory Do good O Lord to them that are true of heart and evermore mightily defend them Do good in thy good pleasure unto Sion build thou the walls of Jerusalem In God will I praise his word in the Lord will I praise his word Thy vows are upon me O God I will render praises unto thee For thou hast delivered our souls from death wilt not thou deliver our feet from falling that we may walk before God in the light of the living I will love thee O God and praise thee for ever because thou hast done it and I will wait on thy name for it is good before thy Saints Glory be to the Father c. A Prayer for the grace of Charity c. O Most gentle most merciful and gracious Saviour Jesu thou didst take upon thee our nature to redeem us from sin and misery thou wert for us led as a Lamb to the slaughter and as a Sheep before the shearer is dumb so thou openedst not thy mouth thou turnedst thy back to the smiters and thy cheeks to the nippers thou wert mock'd and whip'd crucified and torn but thou didst nothing but good to thy enemies and prayedst with loud cries for thy persecutors and didst heal the wound of one that come to lay violent hands upon thee O plant in my heart gentleness and patience a meek and a long suffering spirit that I may never be transported with violent angers never be disordered by peevishness never think thoughts of revenge but may with meekness receive all injuries that shall be done to me and patiently bear every cross accident and with charity may return blessing for cursing good for evil kind words for foul reproaches loving admonitions for scornful upbraidings gentle treatments for all derisions and affronts that living all my daies with meekness and charity keeping peace with all men and loving my neighbour as my self and thee more than my self and more than all the world I may at last come into the regions of peace and eternal charity where thou livest who lovest all men and wouldst have none to perish but all men to be saved through thee O most merciful Saviour and Redeemer Jesu Amen An act of Forgiveness to be said with all earnestness and sincerity before every Communion O God my God I have sinned grievously against thee I am thy debtor in a vast and an Eternal debt and if thou shouldest take the forfeiture I shall be for ever bound in eternal prisons even till I pay the utmost farthing But I hope in thy mercies that thou wilt forgive me my ten thousand Talents and I also do in thy presence forgive every one that hath offended me whoever hath taken my goods privately and injuriously or hurt my person or contrived any evil against me whether known or unknown who ever hath lessened my reputation detracted from my best endeavours or hath slandered me or reproached reviled or in any word or way done me injury I do from the bottom of my soul forgive him praying thee also that thou wilt never impute to him any word or thought or action done against me but forgive him as I desire thou wouldst also forgive me all that I have sinned against thee or any man in the world Give him thy grace and a holy repentance for whatever he hath done amiss grant he may do so no more keep me from the evil tongues and injurious actions of all men and keep all my enemies from all the expresses of thy wrath and let thy grace prevail finally upon thy servant that I may never remember any injury to the prejudice of any man buâ— that I may walk towards my enemies as Christ did who received much evil but went about seeking to do goâ—d to every man and if ever it shall be in my power and my opportunity to return evill O then grant that the spirit of love and forgiveness may triumph over all anger and malice and revenge that I may be the Son of God and maâ— love God and prove my love to thee by my love to my Brother and by obedience to all thy Laws through the Son of thy love by whom thou art reconciled to mankind our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Amen Vers. Remember not Lord our offences nor the offences of our forefathers neither take thou vengeance of our sins Resp. Spare us good Lord spare thy people whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood and be not angry with us for ever Amen CHAP. V. Of Repentance preparatory to the Blessed Sacrament SECT I. WHen Isaac and Abimelech had made a covenant of peace and mutual agreement they would not confirm it by a Sacramental Oath till the next morning that they might swear fasting for the reverence and religious regard of the solemn Oath saith Lyra. But Philo says they did it Symbolically to represent that purity and cleanness of soul which he that swears to God or comes to pay his vows ought to preserve with great Religion He that in a religious and solemn addresse comes to God ought to consider whether his body be free from uncleannesse and his soul from vile affections He that is righteous let him be righteous still and he that is justified let him be justified yet more saith the Spirit of God and then it follows He that thirsts let him come and drink of the living waters freely and without money meaning
yet still this is done by parts and methods of natural progression after the manner of nature though by the aids of God and therefore it is fit that we expect the changes and make our judgment by material events and discerned mutations before we communicate in these mysteries in which whoever unworthily does communicate enters into death 4. He that hath resolved against all sin and yet falls into it regulaâ—ly at the next temptation is yet in a state of evil and unworthiness to communicate because he is under the dominion of sin he obeys it though unwillingly that is he grumbles at his fetters but still he is in slavery and bondage But if having resolved against all sin he delights in none deliberately chooses none is not so often surprized grows stronger in grace and is mistaken but seldom and repents when he is and arms himself better and watches more carefully against all and increases still in knowledge whatever imperfection is still adherent to the man unwillingly does indeed allay his condition and is fit to humble and cast him down but it does not make him unworthy to communicate because he is in the state of grace he is in the Christian warfare and is on Gods side and the holy Sacrament if it have any effect at all is certainly an instrument or a sign in the hands of God to help his servants to inlarge his grace to give more strengths and to promote them to perfection 5. But the sum of all is this He that is not freed from the dominion of sin he that is not really a subject of the Kingdom of grace he in whose mortal body sin does reign and the Spirit of God does not reign must at no hand present himself before the holy Table of the Lord because whatever dispositions and alterations he may begin to have in order to pardon and holiness he as yet hath neither but is Gods enemy and therefore cannot receive his holy Son 6. But because the change is made by parts and effected by the measures of other intellectual and spiritual changes that is after the manner of men from imperfection to perfection by all the intermedial steps of moral degrees and good and evil in some periods have but a little distance though they should have a great deal and it is at first very hard to know whether it be life or death and after that it is still very difficult to know whether it be health or sickness and dead men cannot eat and sick men scarce can eat with benefit at least are to have the weakest and the lowest diet and after all this it is of a consequence infinitely evil if men eat this Supper indisposed and unfit It is all the reason of the world that returning sinners should be busie in their repentances and do their work in the field as it is in the parable of the Gospel and in their due time come home and gird themselves and wait upon their Lord and when they are bidden and warranted then to sit down in the Supper of their Lord. But in this case it is good to be as sure as we can as sure as the analogy of these divine Mysteries require and as our needs permit 7. He that hath committed a single act of sin a little before the Communion ought for the reverence of the holy Sacrament to abstain till he hath made proportionable amends and not only so but if the sin was inconsistent with the state of grace and destroyed or interrupted the divine favour as in cases of fornication murder perjury any malicious or deliberate known great crime he must comport himself as a person returning from a habit or state of sin and the reason is because he that hath lost the divine favour cannot tell how long he shall be before he recovers it and therefore would do well not to snatch at the portion and food of Sons whilest he hath reason to fear that he hath the state and calamity of Dogs who are caressed well if they feed on fragments and crums that are thrown away Now this Doctrine and these cautions besides that they are consonant to Scripture and the analogy of this divine Sacrament are nothing else but what was directly the sentiment of all the best most severe religious and devoutest ages of the Primitive Church For true it is the Apostles did indefinitely admit the faithful to the holy Communion but they were persons wholly enflamed with those holy fires which Jesus Christ sent from heaven to make them burning and shining lights such which our dearest Lord with his blood still warm and fresh filled with his holy love such whose spirits were so separate from the affections of the world that they laid their estates at the Apostles feet and took with joy the spoiling of their goods such who by improving the graces they had received did come to receive more abundantly and therefore these were fit to receive the bread of the strong But this is no invitation for them to come who feel such a lukewarmnesse and indifference of spirit and devotion that they have more reason to suspect it to be an effect of evil life rather than of infirmity for them who feel no heats of love but of themselves for them who are wholly immerg'd in secular affections and interests for them who are full of passions and void of grace these from the example of the others may derive caution but no confidence So long as they persever'd in the Doctrine of the Apostles so long they also did continue in the breaking of bread and solemn conventions for prayer for to persevere in the Doctrine of the Apostles signified a life most exactly Christian for that was the Doctrine Apostolical according to the words of our Lord teaching to observe all things which I have commanded you And by this method the Apostolical Churches and their descendants did administer these holy Mysteries a full and an excellent testimony whereof we have in that excellent Book of Ecclesiastical Hierarchy commonly attributed to St. Dionys. The Church drives from the Sacrifice of the Temple meaning the divine Sacrament such persons for whom it is too sublime and elevated First those who are not yet instructed and taught concerning the participation of the Mysteries Next those who are fallen from the holy and Christian state meaning Apostates and such as have renounced their Baptism or fallen from the grace of it by a state of deadly sin or foulest crimes Thirdly they who are possessed with evil spirits And lastly those who indeed have begun to retire from sin to a good life but they are not yet purified from the phantasms and images of their past inordinations by a divine habitude and love with purity and without mixture And to conclude they who are not yet perfectly united to God alone and to speak according to the style of Scripture they who are not intirely inculpable and without reproach And when St.
Soter exhorted all persons to receive upon the day of the Institution or the vespers of the Passion he excepted those who were forbidden because they had committed any grievous sin But what was the Doctrine and what were the usages of the Primitive Church in the ministery of the Blessed Sacrament appears plainly in the two Epistles of St. Basil to Amphilochius in the Canons of Ancyra those of Peter of Alexandria Gregory Thaumaturgus and Nyssâ—en which make up the Penitential of the Greek Church and are explicated by Balsamo in which we find sometimes the penance of two years imposed for a single theft four years and seven years for an act of uncleannesse eleven years for perjury fifteen years for adultery and incest that is such persons were for so many years sepâ—rate from the Communion and by a holy life and strict observances of penitential impositions were to give testimony of their contrition and amends The like to which are to be seen in the Penitentials of the Western Church that of Theodorus Archbishop of Canterbury that of venerable Bede the old Roman and that of Rabanus Maurus Archbishop of Mentz The reason of which severity we find thus accounted in St. Basil All this is done that they may try the fruits of their repentance For we do not judge of these things by the time but by the manner of their repentance For the Bishop had power to shorten the days of their separation and abstention and he that was an excellent penitent was much sooner admitted but by the injunction of so long a trial they declar'd that much purification was necessary for such an address And if after or in these penitential years of abstention they did not mend their lives though they did perform their penances they were not admitted These were but the Churches signs by other accidents and manifestations if it hapned that a great contrition was signified or a secret incorrigibility became publick the Church would admit the first sooner and the latter not at all For it was purity and holinesse that the Church required of all her Communicants and what measure of it she required we find thus testified The faithful which hath been regenerated by baptism ought to be nourished by the participation of the divine Mysteries and being cloathed with Jesus Christ and having the quality of a child of God he ought to receive the nutriment of life eternal which the Son of God himself hath given us and this nutriment is obedience to the word of God and execution of his will of which Jesus Christ hath said Man lives not by bread alone but my meat is to do my Fathers will and a little after he affirms that whereas St. Paul saith that Jesus Christ hath appointed us to eat his body in memory of his death the true remembrance which we ought to have of his death is to place before our eyes that which the Apostle saith that we were wholly dead and Jesus Christ died for us to the end that we should no more live unto our selves but to him alone and that so we should do him honour and give him thanks for his death by the purity of our life without which we engage our selves in a terrible damnation if we receive the Eucharist And again He that not having this charity which presses us and causes us to live for him who died for us dares approach to the Eucharist grieves the holy Spirit For it is necessary that he who comes to the memorial of Jesus Christ who died and rose again for us should not only be clean from all impurity of flesh and spirit but that he should demonstrate the death of him who died and rose for us by being dead unto sin to the world and to himself and that he lives no more but only to God through Jesus Christ. And therefore St. Cyprian complains as of a new and worse persecution that lapsed persons are admitted to the Communion before they have brought forth fruits of a worthy repentance and affirms that such an admission of sinners is to them as hail to the young fruits as a blasting wind to the trees as the murren to the cattel as a tempest to the ships The ships are overturned and broken the fruits fall the trees are blasted the cattel die and the poor sinner by being admitted too soon to the ministeries of eternal life falls into eternall death And if we put together some words of Sâ— Ambrose they clearly declare this Doctrine and are an excellent Sermon Thou comest to the Altar the Lord Jesus calls thee he sees thee to be clean from all sin because thy sins are wash'd away therefore he judges thee worthy of the câ—lestial Sacraments and therefore he invites thee to the heavenly banquet Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth But some desire to be admitted to penance that presently they may receive the Communion These men do not so much desire themselves to be absolved as that the Priest be bound for they do not put off their own evil conscience But I would that the guilty man should hope for pardon let him require it with tears seek it with sighs beg to obtain it by the weepings of all the people and if he be denied the Communion again and again let him consider that his prayer was not sufficiently earnest let him weep more and pray more To which I shall add some like words of St. Austin Therefore my dearest Brethren let every one consider his conscience and when he finds himself wounded with any crime first let him take care with prayers and fastings and alms to cleanse his conscience and so let him receive the Eucharist .... for he that knowing his guilt shall humbly remove himself from the Altar for the amendment of his life shall not fear to be wholly ex-communicate from that eternal and celestial banquet For this Divine Sacrament is not to be eaten with confidence and boldnesse but with fear and all manner of purity saith St. Chrysostome for impudence in these approaches will certainly slay the souls For thâ—s is the body whither none but Eagles are to gather because they ought to be sublime and elevated souls such which have nothing of earthliness in them that do not sit and prey upon the ground that are not immerg'd in the love of Creatures but such whose flight is towards heaven whose spirit does behold the Sun of Righteousnesse with a penetrating contemplation and piercing eyes for this is the Table of Eagles and not of Owls And therefore this Saint complains of some who did approach to the Eucharist as it were by chance or rather by custom and constraint of Laws rather than by argument and choice In whatsoever estate their souls are they will partake of these Mysteries because it is Lent or because it iâ— the feast of the Epiphany but certain it is that it is not the time which puts us into
live with him and converse with him for ever It is good to be with Christ and S. Hierom said I would to God that we could alwayes receive with a pure conscience and without self-condemnation It is without dispute that it is better to be with Christ in all the wayes of being with him than to be away from him one hour this therefore ought to be no part of the question But because there is more required to the receiving Christ than eating the Symbols and a man may eat to his condemnation and increase his sins and swell his sad accounts and be guilty of Christs body and blood if he does not take heed therefore first men must be prepar'd and be in the state of holiness or else they may not receive at all and they that are so may receive it frequently the oftner the better So Hierom and St. Austin tell that even till their dayes the cuâ—tome of receiving every day remained in the Churches of Rome and Spain and all the Ancient Fathers exhort to a frequent communion but just as Physicians exhort men to eat the best and heartiest meats not the sickly and the infant but the strong man and the healthful And this we find thus determined by S. Chrysostom There are some living in desarts who receive but once in a year or it may be once in two years what then whom shall we account best of them that receive but once or that receive but seldome or that receive frequently Neither one nor the other But them that communicate with a sincere conscience with a pure heart and an unreprovable life They that are such let them alwayes communicate and they that are not so let them not approach so much as once because they do nothing but draw upon themselves the judgements of God and make themselves worthy of condemnation To which if we add the excellent discourse of S. Austin in this question the consequents of it may suffice to determine the whole inquiry Some will say that the Eucharist is not to be receiv'd every day If you ask why he tels you because some dayes are to be chosen in which a man may live more purely and continently that so he may come to so great a Sacrament more worthily because he that eats and drinks unworthily eats and drinks damnation to himself On the other side another sayes if thou hast received so great a wound and contracted so violent a disease that such remedies are to be deferr'd every such man ought by the authority of the Bishop to be remov'd fâ—om the Altar and put to penance and by the same authority be reconcil'd For this is to receive unworthily then to receive when a man should be doing penance and not according to his own pleasure offer himself to or withdraw himself from the Communion But if his sins be not so great as to deserve excommunication he ought not to separate himself from the dayly medicine of the Lords Body Between these possibly a man may determine the question better if he admonishes that men should abide in the peace of Christ. But let every one do what according to his faith he piously believes ought to be done For neither of them dishonours the body and blood of the Lord if they in their several wayes contend who shall most honour the most holy Sacrament For Zachaeus and the Centurion did not prefer themselves before one another when the one received Christ into his house and the other said he was not worthy to receive him under his roof both of them honouring our Blessed Saviour by a divers and almost a contrary way both of them were miserable by sins and both of them obtain'd mercy Now from the words of these two Saints put together we may collect these resolutions 1. The question does no way concern evil men desperately or greatly wicked for they so remaining or committing such sins quae non committit omnis bonae fidei speique Christianus which exclude men from the Kingdom of heaven and cannot stand with the hopes of a good man are separate from the Spirit of the Lord and ought not to touch the body of our Lord. 2. Neither does it concern such imperfect persons and half Christians who endeavour to accord the rules of the Gospel with their irregular and ruling passions who would enter into heaven and yet keep their affections for earth and earthly interests who part stakes between God and the world and resolve to serve two Masters who commit oftentimes deliberate and great sins and repent and yet sin again when the temptation comes for they are yet very far from the Kingdom of God and therefore ought not to be admitted to the portion of sons and the bread of children 3. It concerns only such whose life does not dishonour their profession who pretend to be servants of Christ and indeed are so in great truth whose faith is strengthned with hope and their hope animated with charity who cannot pretend to be more perfect than men yet really contend to avoid all sin like the children of God who have right to be nourished by the body of the Lord Corpus Christi quod ipsi sunt because they are indeed members of his body and joyned in the same Spirit The question is not between the Publican and the Pharisee but between the converted Publican and the proselyte Centurion between two persons who are both true honour ours of Christ. and penitent sinners and humbled persons and have no affection for sin remaining the question then is which is more to be commended he that out of love receives Christ or he who out of humility and reverence abstains because he thinks himself not worthy enough To this St. Chrysostome answers 4. They that are such have a right to receive every day and because they are rightly disposed it is certain that a frequent Communion is of great advantage to them and therefore they that frequent it not are like to be losers For this is the daily bread the heavenly supersubstantial bread by which our souls are nourished to life eternal This is the medicine against our daily imperfections and intrudings of lesser crimes and sudden emigration of passions it is the great consignation of pardon and St. Ambrose argues well If Christs bloud is powred forth for the remission of sins then I ought as often as I can receive it when it is poured forth to me that because I sin often I may perpetually have my remedy Which discourse of his is only to be understood of those imperfections of our life which perpetually haunt those good men who are growing in grace untill they come to perfection and consummation in grace 5. They that in conscience of their past sins and apprehension of their repentance do abstain for fear of irreverence and the sentence of condemnation do very well as long as they find that their sin returns often or tempts strongly
it is but a suspicious state of life that can give no wise account to God and the Common-wealth 6. Examine thy self in the particulars of thy relation especially where thou governest and takest accounts of others and exactest their faults and art not so obnoxious to them as they to thee Princes and Generals and Parents and Husbands and Masters think more things are lawful to them towards their inferiours than indeed there are and as they may easily transgress in discipline and reproof so they very often fail in making provisions for the souls and bodies of their inferiours and proceed with more confidence and to greater progressions in evil because they pass without animadversion or the notice of laws These persons are not often responsible to their subordinates but alwaies for them and therefore it were good that we took great notice of it our selves because few else do 7. Let us examine our selves concerning the great and little accidents of our private entercourse and conversation in our family especially between man and wife in the little quarrellings and accidental unkindnesses wherein both think themselves innocent and it may be both are to blame If the matter be disputable then do thou dispute it with thy self or rather condemn thy self for if it be fit to be questioned it is certainly in some measure fit to be repented of For either in the thing it self or in the misapprehension of the thing or in the not expounding it well or in the not suffering it or in the not concealing it or in the not turning it into vertue or in the not forgiving it or not conducting it prudently it is great odds but thou art to blame These little rencontres between man and wife are great hindrances to prayer as St. Peter intimates and by consequence do infinitely indispose us to the greatest solennity of prayer the holy Sacrament and therefore ought to be strictly surveyed and the principles rescinded and the beginnings stopt or else we shall communicate without fruit 8. Be sure against a day of Communion to examine thy self in those things which no law condemns but yet are of ill report such as are sumptuous and expensive cloathing great feasts gaudy dressings going often to Taverns phantastick following of fashions inordinate merriments living beyond our means in these and the like we must take our measures by a proportion to the prudence and severity of Christian Religion and by observation of the customs and usages of the best and wisest persons in every condition of men and women For that we do things which are of good report is a precept of the Apostle and as by little illnesses in the body so by the smallest indispositions in the soul if they be proceeded in we may finish â—he method of an eternal death And these things although when they are argued may in many particulars by witty men be represented in themselves as innocent yet they proceed from an evil and unsafe principle and not from a spirit fitted to dwell with Christ and live upon Sacraments and secret participations 9. Let us with curiosity examine our souls in such actions which are condemned by the Laws of God and man respectively but are not defined and the guilty person cannot in many cases be argued and convinced such as are pride and covetousness For when external actions can proceed from many principles as a haughty gate from pride or an ill habit of body or imitation or carelesness or humour it will be hard for any man to say I am proud because I lift up my feet too high and who can say that a degree of care and thriftiness in my case and in my circumstances is covetousness Here as we must be gentle to others so we must be severe to our selves and not only condemn the very first entries of an infant sin but suspect his approaches and acknowledge a fault before it be certain and evident In these things we must the rather examine our selves because we can be the most certain accusers of our selves and the inquiries are of great concernment because they are that curiosity of piety and security of condition which becomes persons of growth in grace and such as are properly fitted to the Communion and indeed they are of things most commonly neglected men usually living at that rate that if they be not scandalous they suppose themselves to be Saints and fitted for the nearest entercourse with Christ. These instances of examination do suppose that we have already examined our selves concerning all habits of sin and laid aside every discernable weight and repented of every observed criminal action and broken every custome of lesser irregularities and are reformed by the measures of Laws and express Commandments and are changed from death to life and that we are persons so far advanced that we need not to regard what is behind but to press forward towards the state of a perfect man in Christ Jesus For he that is in that state of things that he is to examine how many actions of uncleanness or intemperance or slander he hath committed since the last Communion is not fit to come to another but must change his life and repent greatly before he comes hither SECT III. Of an actual supply to be made of such actions and degrees of good as are wanting against a Communion-day 1. IF on a Communion-day we need very much examination we can make but little supply of those many defects which it is likely a diligent inquiry will discover and therefore it is highly advisable that as we ought to repent every day and not put it all off till the day of our Communion or our death so we should every day examine our selves at the shutting in of the day or at our going to bed for so St. Basil St. Chrysostome St. Anthony and St. Austin St. Ephrem and St. Dorotheus do advise Others advise that it be done twice every day and indeed the oftner we recollect our selves 1. The more weaknesses we shall observe and 2. the more faults correct and 3. watch the better and 4. repent the more perfectly and 5. offend less and 6. be more prepared for death and 7. be more humble and 8. with ease prevent the contracting of evil habits and 9. interrupt the union of little sins into a chain of death and 10. more readily prevail upon our passions and 11. better understand our selves and 12. more frequently converse with God and 13. oftner pray and 14. have a more heavenly conversation and in fine 15. be more fitted for a frequent and holy Communion 2. The end of examination is 1. That we grieve for all our sins 2. That we resolve to amend all * 3. That we actually watch and pray against all Therefore it is necessary that when we have examined against a Communion day 1. We alwaies do actions of contrition for every thing we have observed to be amiss 2. That we renew our resolutions of better obediencâ—
3. And that we pray for particular strength against our failings 3. He that would communicate with fruit must so have ordered his examinations that he must not alwaies be in the same method He must not alwaies be walking with a candle in his hands and prying into corners but they must be swept and garnished and be kept clean and adorned His examinations must be made full and throughly and be productive of inferiour resolutions and must pass on to rules and exercises of caution That is 1. We must consider where we fail oftenest 2. From what principle this default comes 3. What are the best remedies 4. We must pass on to the real and vigorous use of them and when the case is thus stated and drawn into rules and resolutions of acting them we are only to take care we do so and every day examine whether we have or no. But we must not at all dwell in this relative and preparatory and ministring duty But if we find that we have reason to do so let us be sure that something is amiss we have played the hypocrites and done the work of the Lord negligently or falsly 4. If any passion be the daily exercise or tempâ—ation of our life let us be careful to put the greatest distress upon that and therefore against a Communion-day do something in defiance and diminution of that chastise it if it hath prevailed reenforce thy resolutions against it examine all thy aids see what hath been prosperous and pursue that point and if thou hast not at all prevailed then know all is not well for he communicates without fruit who makes no progressions in his mortifications and conquest over his passions It may be we shall be long exercised with the remains of the Canaanites for it is in the matter of Passions as Seneca said of Vices We fight against them not to conquer them intirely but that they may not â—onquer us not to kill them but to bring them under command and unless we do that we cannot be sure that we are in the state of grace and therefore cannot tell if we do or do not worthily communicate For by all the exteriour actions of our life we cannot so well tell how it is with us as by the observation of our affections and passions our wills and our desires For I can command my foot and it must obey and my hand and it cannot resist but when I bid my appetite obey or my anger be still or my will not to desire I find it very often to rebell against my word and against Gods word Therefore let us be sure to take some effective course with the appetite and place our guards upon the inward man and upon our preparation daies do some violence to our lusts and secret desires by holy resolutions and severe purposes and rules of caution and by designing a course of spiritual arts and exercises for the reducing them to reason and obedience something that may be remembred and something that will be done * But to this let this caution be added that of all things in the world we be careful of relapses into our old follies or infirmities for if things do not succeed well afterwards they were not well ordered at first 5. Upon our communion daies and daies of prepâ—ration let us endeavour to stir up every grace which we are to exercise in our conversation and thrust our selves forward in zeal of those graces that we begin to amend our lukewarmness and repair our sins of omission For this is a day of sacrifice and every sacrifice must be consumed by fire and therefore now is the day of improvement and the proper season for the zeal of duty and if upon the solemn day of the soul we do not take care of omissions and repair the great and little forgetfulnesses and omissions of duty and pass from the infirmities of a man to the affections of a Saint we may all our life time abide in a state of lukewarmness disimprovement and indifference To this purpose 6 Compare day with day week with week Communion with Communion time with time duty with duty and see if you can observe any advantage any ground gotten of a passion any further degree of the spirit of mortificaton any new permanent fires of devotion for by volatile sudden and transient flames we can never guess steadily But be sure never to think you are at all improved unless you observe your defects to be 1. fewer 2. or lighter or 3. at least not to be the same but of another kind and insâ—ance against which you had not made particular provisions formerly but now upon this new observation and experience you must 7. Upon or against a Communion day endeavour to put your soul into that order and state of good things as if that day you were to die and consider that unless you dare die upon that day if God should call you there is but little reason you should dare to receive the Sacrament of life or the ministry of death He that communicates worthily is justified from sins and to him death can have no sting to whom the Sacrament brings life and health and therefore let every one that is to communicate place himself by meditation in the gates of death and suppose himself seated before the Tribunal of Gods Judgment and see whether he can reasonably hope that his sins are pardoned and cured and extinguished And then if you judge righteous judgement you will soon find what pinches most what makes you most afraid what was most criminal or what is least mortified and so you will learn to make provisions accordingly 8. If you find any thing yet amiss or too suspicious or remaining to evill purposes the reliques of the scattered enemy after a war resolve to use some general instrument of piety or repentance that may by being useful in all the parts of your life and conversation meet with every stragling irregularity and by perpetuity and an assiduous force clear the coast 1. Resolve to have the presence of God frequently in your thought 2. Or endeavour and resolve to bring it to pass to have so great a dread and reverence of God that you may be more ashamed and really troubled and confounded to sin in the presence of God than in the sight and observation of the best and severest man 3. Or else resolve to punish thy self with some proportionable affliction of the body or spirit for every irregularity or return of undecency in that instance in which thou sets thy self to mortifie any one special passion or temptation Or 4. Firmly to purpose in every thing which is not well not to stay a minute but to repent instantly of it severely to condemn it and to do something at the first opportunity for amends Or 5. To resolve against an instance of infirmity for some short sure and conquerable periods of time as if you be given to prating resolve to be silent
that I may from thee thus Sacramentally communicated derive prevailing grace for the amendment of my life spiritual wisdom for the discerning the waies of peace the spirit of love and the spirit of purity that in all my life I may walk worthy of thy gracious favours which thou givest to me unworthy that I may do all my works in holiness and right intention that I may resist every temptation with a never fainting courage and a caution never surprized and a prudence never deceived 7. Sweetest Saviour I come to thee upon thy invitation and thy commandment I could not come to thee but by thee O let me never go from thee any more but enter into my heart feed me with thy word sustain me with thy spirit refresh me with thy comforts and let me in this divine mystery receive thee my dearest Saviour and be thou my wisdom and my righteousness my sanctification and redemption let me receive this holy nutriment as the earnest of an eternal inheritance as a defensative against all spiritual danger for the eviction of all the powers of the enemy as an incentive of holy love and a strengthning of my faith for the increasing of a holy hope and the consummation of a heavenly love that thou being one with me and I with thee I may by thee be gracious in the eyes of thy heavenly Father and may receive my portion amongst the inheritance of Sons O eternal and most gracious Saviour and Redeemer Jesu Amen Amen CHAP. VII Of our Comportment in and after our Receiving the Blessed Sacrament SECT I. Of the Circumstances and Manner of Reception of the Divine Mysteries IT is the custom of the Church of great antiquity and proportionable regard that every Christian that is in health should receive the Blessed Sacrament fasting The Apostles and primitive Bishops at first gave it after Supper or together with it but that soon passed into inconvenience and some were drunken and some were empty and despis'd and the Holy Sacrament was dishonour'd and the Lords body was not discerned and God was provoked to anger and the sinners were smitten and died in their sin as appears in the sad narrative which St. Paul makes of the misdemeanours and the misfortunes in the Corinthian Churches Something like to which is that which Socrates tells of some Christians in Aegypt they celebrated the Holy Communion at evening but never till they had fillâ—d themselves with varities of choice meat Of some also in Africa that communicated at evening St. Austin speaks and of others who communicated both morning and evening At evening because S. Paul called it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Lords Supper and in the morning from the universal custom of the Church which in most places from the very days of the Apostles prevail'd that the holy Eucharist should be given to none but to them that were fasting which thing was also decreed in the third Council of Carthage and hath been observed ever since And in this the Church hath not without good reason taken up the custom For besides that the intemperance of them that fâ—asted before they communicated did not only give scandal to the Religion but did infinitely indispose them that came and dishonour the Divine Mysteries and such feastings would for ever be a temptation and a snare and therefore could not be cured so well as by taking the occasion away besides these things the Church observed that in the time of the Synagogue the Servants of God did religiously abstain from meat and drink upon all their solemn feast days till their great Offices of Religion were finish'd and that upon this account the Jews were scandaliz'd at the Disciples for eating the ears of corn early on their Sabbath and Christ excus'd them only upon the reason of their hunger that is upon necessity or charity and after all even by natural reason and experience we find that they pray and worship best who are not loaden with meat and drink and that therefore this solemnity being the greatest worship of God in the whole Religion consequently ought to be done with all advantages it was therefore very reasonable that the Church took up this custom and therefore they who causelesly do prevaricate it shall bear their own burden and are best reproved by St. Pauls words We have no such custom nor the Churches of God But sick people and the weak are as readily to be excused in this thing as the Apostles were by Christ in the case before mentioned For necessity and charity are to be preferr'd before such ceremonies and circumstances of address 1. When you awake in the morning of your Communion day give God thanks particularly that he hath blessed thee with so blessed an opportunity of receiving the Symbols of pardon the ministery of the Spirit the Sacrament of Christ himself the seed of immortality and the Antepast of heaven and hasten earlier out of your bed The cock crowing that morning is like the noise that is made of the coming of the Bridegroom and therefore go out to meet him but rise that you may trim your lamp When you are up presently address your self to do such things as you would willingly be found doing when the Bridegroom calls and you are to appear before him to hear your final sentence 2. Make a general confession of your sins and be very much humbled in the sense and apprehension of them Compare the state and union of all your evils with the state and grandeur of that favour which God intends that day to consign to you and then think what you are and what God is what you have done and what God intends to do how ill you have deserved and yet how graciously you are dealth with And consider what an infinite distance there is between that state which you have deserved and that good which you are to have by considering how intolerable your case would have been if God had dealt with you as you deserve and as he hath dealt with very many who sinn'd no more than you have done and yet in what felicities you are placed by the mercies of your good God that you are in the hopes and in the methods and in the participations of pardon and eternal life 3. The effect of this consideration ought to be that you make acts of general contrition for all your sins known and unknown That you renew your purposes and vows of better obedience That you exercise acts of special graces and that you give God most hearty and superexalted thanks with all the transports and ravishments of spirit for so unspeakable so unmeritable so unrewardable a loving kindness 4. Worship Jesus Love him dedicate thy self to him recollect what he hath done for thy soul what glories he laid aside with what meanness he was invested what pains he suffered what shame he endur'd
what excellencies he preach'd what wisdom he taught what life he liv'd what death he died what Mysteries he hath appointed by what ministeries he conveys himself to thee what rare arts he uses to save thee and after all that he intercedes for thee perpetually in heaven presenting to his heavenly Father that great Sacrifice of himself which he finished on the Cross and commands thee to imitate in this Divine and Mysterious Sacrament and in the midst of these thoughts and proportionable exercises and devotions address thy self to the solemnities and blessings of the day 5. Throw away with great diligence and severity all unholy and all earthly thoughts and think the thoughts of heaven for when Christ descends he comes attended with innumerable companies of Angels who all behold and wonder who love and worship Jesus and in this glorious imployment and society let thy thoughts be pure and thy mind celestial and thy work Angelical and thy spirit full of love and thy heart of wonder thy mouth all praises investing and incircling thy prayers as a bright cloud is adorned with fringes and margents of light 6. When thou seest the holy man minister dispute no more inquire no more doubt no more be divided no more but believe and behold with the eyes of faith and of the spirit that thou seest Christs body broken upon the Cross that thou seest him bleeding for thy sins that thou feedest upon the food of elect souls that thou puttest thy mouth to the hole of the rock that was smitten to the wound of the side of thy Lord which being pierced streamed forth Sacraments and life and holiness and pardon and purity and immortality upon thee 7. When the words of Institution are pronounced all the Christians us'd to say Amen giving their consent confesâ—ing that faith believing that word rejoicing in that Mystery which is told us when the Minister of the Sacrament in the person of Christ says This is my body This is my blood This body was broken for you and this blood was poured forth for you and all this for the remission of your sins And remember that the guilt of eternal damnation which we have all incurr'd was a great and an intolerable evil and unavoidable if such miracles of mercy had not been wrought to take it quite away and that it was a very great love which would work such glorious mercy rather than leave us in so intolerable a condition A greater love than this could not be and a less love than this could not have rescued us 8. When the holy Man reaches forth his hands upon the Symbols and prays over them and intercedes for the sins of the people and breaks the holy bread and pours forth the sacred calice place thy self by faith and meditation in heaven and see Christ doing in his glorious manner this very thing which thou seest ministred and imitated upon the Table of the Lord and then remember that it is impossible thou shouldest miss of eternal blessings which are so powerfully procur'd for thee by the Lord himself unless thou wilt despise all this and neglect so great salvation and chusest to eat with swine the dirty pleasures of the earth rather than thus to feast with Saints and Angels and to eat the body of thy Lord with a clean heart and humble affections 9. When the consecrating and ministring hand reaches forth to thee the holy Symbols say within thy heart as did the Centurion Lord I am not worthy but entertain thy Lord as the women did the news of the resurrection with fear and great joy or as the Apostles with rejoycing and singleness of heart that is clear certain and plain believing and with exultation and delight in the loving kindness of the Lord. 10. But place thy self upon thy knees in the humblest and devoutest posture of worshippers and think not much in the lowest manner to worship the King of Men and Angels the Lord of heaven and earth the great lover of souls and the Saviour of the body him whom all the Angels of God worship him whom thou confessest worthy of all and whom all the world shall adore and before whom they shall tremble at the day of judgment For if Christ be not there after a peculiar manner whom or whose body do we receive But if he be present to us not in mystery only but in blessing also why do we not worship But all the Christians always did so from time immemorial No man eats this flesh unless he first adores said S. Austin For the wise men and the Barbarians did worship this body in the manger with very much fear and reverence let us therefore who are Citizens of heaven at least not fall short of the Barbarians But thou seest him not in the Manger but on the Altar and thou beholdest him not in the Virgins arms but represented by the Priest and brought to thee in Sacrifice by the holy Spirit of God So. St. Chrysostome argues and accordingly this reverence is practised by the Churches of the East and West and South by the Christians of India by all the Greeks as appears in their answer to the Cardinal of Guise by all the Lutheran Churches by all the world saâ—es Erasmus only now of late some have excepted themselves But the Church of England chooses to follow the reason and the piety of the thing it self the example of the Primitive Church and the consenting voice of Christendome And if it be irreverent to sit in the sight and before the face of him whom you ought to revere how much more in the presence of the living God where the Angel the president of prayer does stand must it needs be a most irreligious thing to sit unless we shall upbraid to God that our prayers to him have wearied us It is the argument of Tertullian To which many of the Fathers add many other fair inducements but I think they cannot be necessary to be produced here because all Christians generally kneel when they say their prayers and when they bless God anâ— I suppose no man communicates but he does both and therefore needs no oâ—her inducement to perswade him to kneel especially since Christ himself and St. Stephen and â—he Apostle St. Paul used that posture in their devotions that or lower for St. Paul kneeled upon the shore and our Lord himself fell prostrate on the earth But to them that refuse I shall only use the words of Scripture which the Fathers of the Council of Turon applied to this particular Why art thou proud O dust and ashes And when Christ opens his heart and gives us all that we need or can desire it looks like an ill return if we shall dispute with him concerning the humility of a gesture and a circumstance 11. When thou dost receive thy Lord do thou also receive thy Brother into thy heart and into thy bowels Thy Lord relieves thee
do thou relieve him and never communicate but be sure to give thy alms for one part of thy offering St. Cyprian does with some vehemency upbraid some wealthy persons in his time who came to the celebration of the Lords Supper and neglected the Corban or the ministring to the Saints Remember that by mercy to the poor the sentence of dooms-day shall be declared because what we do to them we do to Christ and who would not relieve Christ who hath made himself poor to make us rich And what time is so seasonable to feed the members of Christ as that when he gives his body to feed us and that when his members are met together to confess to celebrate to remember and to be joyned to their head and to one another In short The Church alwaies hath used at that time to be liberal to her poor and that being so seasonable and blessed an opportunity and of it self also a proper act of worship and sacrifice of religion and homage of thankfulness and charity it ought not to be omitted and it can have no measure but that of your love and of your power and the other accidents of your life and your religion 12. As soon as ever you have taken the holy Elements into your mouth and stomach remember that you have taken Christ into you after a manner indeed which you do not understand but to all purposes of blessing and holiness if you have taken him at all And now consider that he who hath given you his Son with him will give you all things else therefore represent to God through Jesus Christ all your needs and the needs of your relatives signifie to him the condition of your soul complain of your infirmities pray for help against your enemies tell him of your griefs represent your fears your hopes and your desires But it is also the great sacrifice of the world which you have then assisted in and represented and now you being joyned to Christ are admitted to intercede for others even for all mankind in all necessities and in all capacities pray therefore for all for whom Christ dâ—ed especially for all that communicate that day for all that desire it that their prayers and yours being united to the intercession of your Lord may be holy and prevail 13. After you have given thanks and finished your private and the publick devotions go home but do not presently forget the solemnity and sink from the sublimity of devotion and mystery into a secular conversation like a falling star from brightness into dirt The Ethiopians would not spit that day they had communicated thinking they might dâ—shonour the Sacrament if before the consumption of the Symbols they should spit but although they meant reverence yet they express'd it ill It was better which is reported of St. Margaret a daughter of the King of Hungary that the day before she was to communicate she fasted with bread and water and after the Communion she retired her self till the evening spending the day in meditations prayers and thanksgiving and at night she eat her meal Her imployment was very well sitted to the day but for her meal it is all one when she eat it so that by eating or abstaining she did advantage to her spiritual imployment But they that as soon as the office is finished part wiâ—h Christ and carry their mind away to other interests have a suspicious indifferency to the things of God They have brought their Lord into the house and themselves slip out at the back-door Otherwise does the Spouse entertain her beloved Lord I found him whom my soul loveth I held him and would not let him go He that considers the advantages of prayer which every faithful soul hath upon a Communion day will not easily let them slâ—p but tell all his said stories to his Lord and make all his wants known and as Jacob to the Aâ—gel will not let him go till he hath given a blessing Upon a Communion-day Christ who is the beloved of the soul is gone to rest and every secular imployment that is not necessary and part of duty and every earthly thought does waken our Beloved before he please let us take heed of that 14. But what we do by devotion and solemn religion that day we must do every day by the material practice of vertues we must verifie all our holy vows and promises we must keep our hearts curiously restrain our passions powerfully every day proceed in the mortification of our angers and desires in the love of God and of our neighâ—â—urs and in the patient toleration of all injuries which men offer and all the evil by which God will try us Let not drunkenness enter or evil words go forth of that mouth through which our Lord himself hath passed The Heathens used to be drunk at their Sacrifices but by this sacrifice Eucharistical it is intended we should be filled with the Spirit If we have communicated worthily we have given our selves to Christ we have given him all our liberty and our life our bodies and our souls our actions and our passions our affections and our faculties what we are and what we have and in exchange have received him and we may say with St. Paul I live but not I But Christ liveth in me So that we must live no more unto the world but unto God and having fed upon Manna let us not long to return to Aegypt to feed on Garlick For as when men have drank wine largely the mind is free and the heart at liberty from care so when we have drank â—he bloud of Christ the cup of our salvation the chains of the old man are untied and we must forget our secular conversation So St. Cyprian But the same precept is better given by Saint Paul But the love of Christ constraineth uâ— becuase we thus judge that he died for all that thâ—y which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him which died for them and rose again Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature old things are past away bâ—hold all things are become new He that hath communicated and does not afterwards live by the measures of that daies duty hath but acted a scene of Religion but himself shall dearly pay the pâ—ice of the pompous and solemn hypocrisie Remember that he is sick who is not the better for the bread he eats and if thou dost not by the aids of Christ whom thou hast received subdue thy passion and thy sin thou hast eaten the bread of idleness for so saith St Hierom does every one who when he hath taken of the Sacrificâ— of the Lords body does not persevere in good works imitating that in deed which he hath celebrated in mystery Let us take heed for the Angels are present in these mysteries to wait upon their Lord and ours and it is a matter of great caution
which was said by Vincentius Ferrerius The Angels that assist at this Sacrament would kill every unworthy Communicant unless the Divine mercy and long sufferance did cause them to forbear a speedy execution that the blessed Sacrament might acquire its intention and become a favour of life unto us SECT II. Acts of Vertues and Graces relative to the Mystery to be us'd before or at the Celebration of the Divine Sacrament I. The Address IT is well O sweetest Saviour Jesus it is very well that thou art pleas'd to be a daily Sacrifice for us and to become our daily supersubstantial bread to feed our souls Certain it is that we by our daily failings and the remaining pollution of our sins frequently sink down to the bottom of thy displeasure But do thou grant that being refreshed by the Sacrament and recreated by thy grace strengthened by thy spirit and comforted with thy miraculous sweetness my heart and my affections may be lifted up on high II. O grant that by thee my soul may be lifted up to thee and from her self may pass into thee with a pure mind with an unfeigned Religion with an unblameable faith and burning devotion with filial piety and a profound reverence For thou art the true God the word of life the bright Image and splendour of thy Fathers Glory the reward of the Saints and the Lord of Angels the brightness of eternal light the unspotted mirrour of eternal purity An Act of Love Thee alone O Lord my soul desires thou art eternal sweetness in my soul. If the perfume of thy oyntment be sufficient to all the the world what is the refection of thy Table If we live by every word proceeding out of thy mouth what felicity and joy is it to live upon thee the eternal Word chewing thee by faith and digesting thee by love and entertaining thee in our hearts for ever How shall not my bowels melt into thee the Sun of righteousness How is it that I do not forget all deliciousness besides thee A single pleasure poor and empty wearying and unsatisfying hath often made me to forget thee Now that thou art truly and effectively present with me how can any other pleasure in the world seem pleasant to me any more I will forget all the world I will quit all the world to live on thee if thou pleasest O dearest Saviour but do thou open thy ark and repositories of sweetness and fill my soul and all my desires that there may be no room for any thing else Thou hast called unto me to open my hand and thou wouldst fill it But I would not open it I held the world fast and kept my hand shut and would not let it go But do thou open it for me not my hand only but my mouth not my mouth but my heart also An Act of Desire after Jesus O blessed Jesus that hast said it is thy delight to be with the sons of men Thou hast made thy self the companion of our journeys the light of our ignorance the remedy of our infirmity Dwell with me sweetest Saviour and delight in me It is no small thing I ask O my God can it ever be that my God should delight in me That 's too much O God Grant that I may delight in thee and do thou delight to pardon me to sanctifie and to save me Grant that I may never offend thee that I may never grieve thy Holy Spirit that I may not provoke the Angel of the everlasting Covenant to anger But thou delightest in the works of thy hand in the graces of the Spirit in thy own excellencies and glories Endue me with thy graces fill me with thy excellencies let me communicate of thy spirit and then enjoy these thy delights with thy servant for thou canst not else delight in me Thou art thy own essential joy and everlasting blessedness and inseparable felicity But this thou hast said that thou delightest to be with the Sons of men because thou truly lovest us Blessed be thy Name for ever and ever An Act of Thanksgiving O Blessed Saviour Jesus I adore the secrets of thy eternal wisdom I admire the mysteriousness of our salvation and I love and praise and give all possible thanks to thee the Author of our spiritual life the Deliverer that came out of Sion the Redeemer of thy people the spoiler of all spiritual wickedness in heavenly places the conqueror over sin and death the triumpher over Devils thou hast taken from our strongest enemies all their armour and divided the spoil Grant that I may know nothing but thee account all things loss in comparison of thee and endeavour to be made conformable to thee in the imitation of thy actions and obedience of thy Laws in the fellowship of thy sufferings in the communion of thy graces and participation of thy glories that beginning here to praise thy Name according as I can I may hereafter for ever rehearse and adore thy excellencies according to the measures of glory for ever and ever Amen Ejaculations and Meditations to be us'd at any time but particularly after the Consecration of the Symbols when the holy Man that ministers is bringing the Sacrament 1. O holy Jesu I behold thee stretch'd upon the Cross with thy arms spread ready to embrace and receive all mankind into thy bosome 2. I come Lord Jesus I come O take me to thee in the comprehensions of an unalterable of an everlasting love for thou hast opened thy heart as well as thine arms and hast prepar'd a lodging place for me in the seat of love 3. I see the Symbols the holy bread and the blessed cup but I also contemplate thy authority establishing these rites I adore thy wisdom who hast made these Mysteries like thy own infancy I see thy self wrapt up in swadling clouts and cover'd with a vail I hear thy voice blessing these Symbols thy mercy reaching out my pardon thy holy Spirit sanctifying my spirit thy blessed self making intercession for me at the eternal Altar in the heavens 4. Thy infinite arm of mercy is reached unto us and our arm of faith reaches unto thee Blessed be Jesus who will be joyned unto his servants 5. This is thy body O blessed Saviour Jesus and this is thy blood but these are not thy wounds My Lord had the smart but we the ease his were the sufferings but ours the mercy he felt the load of stripes but from thence a holy balm did flow upon us He felt the thorns but we shall have the Crown and after he had paid the price we got the purchase Holy Jesus Blessed be God 6. I adore thy unspeakable goodness I delight in thy unmeasurable mercy I rejoyce in thy cross I desire to know nothing but the Lord Jesus and him crucified O let the power of thy Cross prevail against all the powers of darkness let the wisdom of thy Cross make me wise unto salvation let the peace
of thy Cross reconcile me to thy eternal Father and bring to me peace of Conscience let the victory of thy Cross mortifie all my evil and corrupt affections let the triumph of thy Cross lead me on to a state of holiness that I may sin no more but in all things please thee and in all things serve thee and in all things glorifie thee 7. Great and infinite are thy glories infinite and glorious are thy mercies who is like unto the Lord our God who dwelleth on high and yet humbleth himself to behold the things that are in Heaven and earth Heaven it self does wholly minister to our salvation God takes care of us God loves us first God will not suffer us to perish but imployes all his attributes for our good The Son of God dies for us the holy Spirit descends upon us and teaches us the Angels minister to us the Sacrament is our food Christ is married to our souls and heaven it self is offered to us for our portion 8. O God my God assist me now and ever graciously and greatly Grant that I may not receive bread alone for man cannot live by that but that I may eat Christ that I may not search into the secret of nature but inquire after the miracles of grace I do admire I worship and I love Thou hast overcome O Lord thou hast overcome Ride on triumphantly because of thy words of truth and peace load my soul in this triumph as thy own purchase thy love hath conquer'd and I am thy servant for ever 9. Thou wilt not dwell in a polluted house make my soul clean and do thou consecrate it into a Temple O thou great Bishop of our souls by the inhabitation of thy holy spirit of purity Let not these teeth that break the bread of Angels ever grind the face of the poor let not the hand of Judas be with thee in the dish let not the eyes which see the Lord any more behold vanity let not the members of Christ ever become the members of a harlot or the ministers of unrighteousness 10. I am nothing I have nothing I desire nothing but Jesus and to be in Jerusalem the holy City from above Make haste O Lord Behold my heart is ready my heart is ready Come Lord Jesus come quickly When the holy Man that Ministers reaches the consecrated Bread suppose thy Lord entring into his Courts and say Lord I am not worthy thou shouldest come under my roof but speak the word Lord and thy servant shall be whole After receiving of the Bread pray thus Blessed be the Name of our gracious God Hosannah to the Son of David Blessed is he that cometh in the name of our Lord. Hosannah in the highest Thou O blessed Saviour Jesus hast given me thy precious body to be the food of my soul and now O God I humbly present to thee my body and soul every member and every faculty every action and every passion Do thou make them fit for thy service Give me an understanding to know thee and wisdom like as thou didst to thy Apostles ingenuity and simplicity of heart like to that of Nathanael zeal and perfect repentance like the return of Zacheus Give me eyes to see thee as thy Martyr Stephen had an ear to hear thee as Mary a hand to touch thee as Thomas a mouth with Peter to confess thee an arm with Simeon to embrace thee feet to follow thee with thy Disciples an heart open like Lydia to entertain thee that as I have given my members to sin and to uncleanness so I may henceforth walk in righteousness and holiness before thee all the days of my life Amen Amen If there be any time more between the receiving the holy Body and the blessed Chalice then add O immense goodness unspeakable mercy delightful refection blessed peace-offering effectual medicine of our souls Holy Jesus the food of elect souls coelestial Manna the bread that came down from heaven sweetest Saviour grant that my soul may relish this divine Nutriment with spiritual ravishments and love great as the flames of Cherubims and grant that what thou hast given me for the remission of my sins may not â—y my fault become the increase of them Grant that in my heart I may so digest thee by a holy faith so convert thee into the unity of my spirit by a holy love that being conformed to the likeness of thy death and resurrection by the crucifying of the old man and the newness of a spiritual and a holy life I may be incorporated as a sound and living member into the body of thy holy Church a member of that body whereof thou art head that I mâ—y abide in thee and bring forth fruit in thee and in the resurrection of the Just my body of infirmity being reformed by thy power may be configured to the similitude of thy glorious body and my soul received into a participation of the eternal Supper of the Lamb that where thou art there I may be also beholding thy face in glory O blessed Saviour and Redeemer Jesus Amen When the holy Chalice is offered attend devoutly to the blessing and joyn in heart with the words of the Minister saying Amen I will receive the Cup of salvation and call upon the Name of our Lord. After receiving of the holy Cup pray thus It is finished Blessed be the name of our gracious God Blessing glory praise and honour love and obedience dominion and thanksgiving be to him that sitteth on the Throne and to the Lamb for ever and ever I bless and praise thy Name O eternal Father most merciful God that thou hast vouchsafed to admit me to a participation of these dreadful and desirable mysteries unworthy though I am yet thy love never fails and though I too often have repented of my repentances and fallen back into sin yet thou never repentest of thy loving kindness Be pleased therefore now in this day of mercy when thou openest the treasures of heaven and rainest Manna upon our souls to refresh them when they are weary of thy infinite goodness to grant that this holy Communion may not be to me unto judgment and condemnation but it may be sweetness to my soul health and safety in every temptation joy and peace in every trouble ligâ—t and strength in every word and work comfort and defence in the hour of my death against all the oppositions of the spirits of darkness and grant that no unclean thing may be in me who have received thee into my heart and soul. II. Thou dwellest in every sanctified soul she is the habitation of Sion and thou taâ—est it for thine own and thou hast consecrated it to thy self by the operation of glorious mysteries within her O be pleased to receive my soul presented to thee in this holy Communion for thy dwelling place make it a house of prayer and holy meditations the seat of thy Spirit the repository of graces reveal to me
thy mysteries and communicate to me thy gifts and love me with that love thou bearest to the Sons of thy house Thou hast given me thy Son with him give me all things else which are needful to my body and soul in order to thy glory and my salvation through Jesus Christ our Lord. III. An act of Love and Eucharist to be added if there be time and opportunity O Lord Jesu Christ Fountain of true and holy love nothing is greater than thy love nothing is sweeter nothing more holy Thy love troubles none but is entertained by all that feel it with joy and exultation and it is still more desired and is ever more desirable Thy love O dearest Jesu gives liberty drives away fear feels no labour but suffers all it eases the weary and strengthens the weak it comforts them that mourn and feeds the hungry Thou art the beginning and the end of thy own love that thou mayest take occasion to do us good and by the methods of grace to bring us to glory Thou givest occasion and createst good things and producest affections and stirrest up the appetite and dost satisfie all holy desires Thou hast made me and fed me and blessed me and preserved me and sanctified me that I might love thee and thou would'st have me to love thee that thou mayest love me for ever O give me a love to thee that I may love thee as well as ever any of thy servants loved thee according to that love which thou by the Sacrament of love workest in thy secret ones Abraham excelled in faith Job in patience Isaac in fidelity Jacob in simplicity Joseph in chastity David in religion Josiah in zeal and Manasses in repentance but as yet thou hadst not communicated the Sacrament of love that grace was reserved till thou thy self shouldst converse with man and teach him love Thou hast put upon our hearts the sweetest and easiest yoke of love to enable us to bear the burden of man and the burden of the Lord give unto thy servant such a love that whatsoever in thy service may happen contrary to flesh and bloud I may not feel it that when I labour I may not be weary when I am despised I may not regard it that adversity may be tolerable and humility be my sanctuary and mortification of my passions the exercise of my daies and the service of my God the joy of my soul that loss to me may be gain so I win Christ and death it self the entrance of an eternal life when I may live with the Beloved the joy of my soul the light of my eyes My God and all things the blessed Saviour of the world my sweetest Redeemer Jesus Amen An Eucharistical Hymn taken from the Prophecies of the Old Testament relating to the blessed Sacrament Praise ye the Lord I will praise the Lord with my whole heart in the Assembly of the upright and in the Congregation He hath made his wonderful works to be remembred the Lord is gracious and full of compassion He hath given meat unto them that fear him he will ever be mindful of his Covenant His bread shall be fat and he shall yield royal dainties Binding his Foal unto the vine and his Asses colt unto the choice vine he washed his garment in wine and his cloaths in the bloud of grapes In this mountain shall the Lord of Hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things a feast of wine on the lees He will swallow up death in victory and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces and the rebuke of his people shall he take away from off all the earth for the Lord hath spoken it And the Lord their God shall save them as the flock of his people for how great is his goodness and how great is his beauty Corn shall make the young men chearful and new wine the virgins The Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his Temple even the messenger of the Covenant whom ye delight in He shall purifie the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness O Israel return unto the Lord thy God for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity Take with you words and turn to the Lord saying Take away all iniquity and receive us graciously so will we render the calves of our lips for in thee the Fatherless findeth mercy The Lord hath said I will heal their backslidings I will love them freely for mine anger is turned away They that dwell under his shadow shall return they shall revive as the corn and blossom as the Vine the memorial thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon The poor shall eat and be satisfied they shall praise the Lord that seek him your heart shall live for ever for he hath placed peace in our borders and fed us with the flower of wheat For from the rising of the Sun even unto the going down of the same the Name of the Lord shall be great among the Gentiles and in every place Incense shall be offered unto his Name and a pure offering for his Name shall be great among all Nations Who so is wise he shall understand these thiâ—gs and the prudent shall know them for the waies of the Lord are right and the just shall walk in them but the transgressors shall fall therein Glory be to the Father c. A Prayer to be said after the Communion in behalf of our souls and all Christian people 1. O most merciful and gracious God Father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Lord of glory thou art the great lover of souls and thou hast given thy holy Son to die for our salvation to redeem us from sin to destroy the work of the Devil and to present a Church to thee pure and spotless and undefiled relying upon thy goodness trusting in thy promises and having received my dearest Lord into my soul I humbly represent to thy divine Majesty the glorious sacrifice which our dearest Jesus made of himself upon the Cross and by a never ceasing intercession now exhibites to thee in heaven in the office of an eternal Priesthood in behalf of all that have communicated this day in the Divine Mysteries in all the Congregations of the Christian world and in behalf of all them that desire to communicate and are hindred by sickness or necessity by fear or scruple by censures Ecclesiastical or the sentence of their own consciences 2. Give unto me O God and unto them a portion of all the good prayers which are made in heaven and earth the intercession of our Lord and the supplications of all thy servants and unite us in the bands of the common faith and a holy charity that no interests or partialities no sects or opinions may keep us any longer in darkness and division 3. Give thy blessing to all Christian Kings and Princes all Republicks and Christian Governments grant to them the