or no it were fitt to condemne so many Martyrs so many other Saints and the whole primitive Church which practised this domestick Communion M. Jurieux cuts of the discourse with too much confidence Is there the least sincerity sayes he to draw a proofe from a practise opposed to that of the Apostles which is condemned at present and which would passe in the Church of Rome for the worst of crimes Was it not his businesse here again to make the world beleeve that wee condemne togeather with him and his the practise of so many Saints as contrary to that of the Apostles But wee are far from such horrible temerity M. Jurieux knows it very well and a man who boasts thus much of sincerity ought to have so much of it as to take notice that the Church as I have showne elsewhere dos not condemne all the practises she changes and that the Holy-Ghost who guides her makes her not only condemne ill practises but also to quitt good ones and forbid them severely when they are abused I beleeve the falsity of this History which M. Jurieux gives us of the first ages of the Church for a eleaven hundred or a thousand yeares appeares sufficiently what he sayes of following times is no lesse contrary to truth I have no neede to speake of the manner how he relates the establishment of the reall presence and Transubstantiation during the X. age that is not to our present subject Sect. V. p. 469. and otherwise nothing obliges us to refute what he advances without proofe But that which is to be remarked is that he regards Communion under one kind as a thing which was not introduced but by presupposing Transubstantiation All in good time when therefore it shall henceforth appeare as wee have invincibly shown that Communion under one species was practised even in the first ages of the Church and in the times of the Martyrs it can be no more doubted but that Transubstantiation was also at that time establised and M. Jurieux himselfe will be obliged to grant this consequence But let us retourne to what follows in his History He shows us there Communion under one species as a thing first thought of in the eleaventh age after the reall presence and Transubstantiation had been well established For then they perceived sayes he that under a crumme of bread Ibid. 470. as well as under every drop of wine the whole Flesh and all the Blood of our Lord were included What happened upon it Let us heare This false reason prevailed in such a manner over the institution of our Lord and over the practise of the whole antient Church that the custome of communicating under the sole species of Bread was insensibly established in the XII and XIII ages It was insensibly established so much the better for us What I have said then is true that the people reduced themselves without contradiction and without difficulty to the sole species of Bread so well were they prepared by the Communion of the sick by that of infants by that which was received at home by that which was practised in the Church it selfe and finally by all those practises wee have seen to acknowlege a true and perfect Communion under one species This is an untoward and troublesome businesse for our Reformers They have great reason indeed to boast of these insensible changes where in they putt the whole stresse of their cause they never yet produced neither will they ever produce one example of such a change in essentiall matters That indifferent matters should be insensibly changed and without contradiction is no such great wonder but as wee have said the faith of the people and those practises which are beleeved essentiall to Religion are not so easily changed For then Tradition the antient beliefe custome it selfe and the Holy Ghost who animates the Body of the Church oppose themselves to his novelly When therefore a change is made without difficulty and without being perceived it is a signe the matter was never beleeved to be so necessary M. Jurieux saw this consequence Ibid. and after having said that the custome of communicating under the sole species of bread was establised insensibly in the XII and XIII age he adds immediately after It was not however without resistance the people could not suffer without great impatience that they should take from them halfe of JESUS-CHRIST they murmured in all parts He had said a little before that this change verry different from those which are made after an insensible manner without opposition and without noise was on the contrary made with great noise and splendour These Gentlemen answer things as best pleases them the present difficulty transports them and beeing pressed by the objection they say at that moment what seemes most to disentangle them from it without much reflecting whether it agree I do not say with truth but with their own thoughts The cause it selfe demands this and wee must not expect that an errour can be defended after a consequent manner This is the state in which M. Jurieux found himselfe This custome says he that is to say this of communicating under one kind was insensibly established nothing can be more quiet and tranquile It was not neverthelesse without resistance without noise without the greatest impatience without murmuring on all sides behold a grand commotion Truth made him candidly speake the first and the adhesion to his cause made him say the other In effect nothing can be found of these universall murmurs of these extreame impatiences of these resistances of the people and this induceth to the establising an insensible change On the other side it must not be said that a practise which is represented so strange so unheard of so evidently sacrilegious was established without repugnance and without taking any notice of it To avoid this inconvenience a resistance must be imagined and if none can be found invented But furthermore what could be the subject of these universall murmurings M. Jurieux has told us his thoughts of them but in this point he coheares as little with himselfe as in all the rest That which caused these murmurings is sayes he that the people suffered with the greatest impatience that they should be deprived of one halfe of JESUS-CHRIST Has he forgot what he even now said that the reall presence had made them see that under each crumme of bread the whole Flesh and all the Blood of JESUS-CHRIST were contained Ibid. p. 469. Dos he reflect upon what he is presently about to say that if the doctrine of Transsubstantiation and of the reall presence be true Sect. VI. p. 480. it is true also that the bread containes the Flesh and the Blood of JESUS-CHRIST Where then was this half of JESUS-CHRIST taken away which the people suffered according to him with the highest impatience If a man will have them make complaints let him at least afford them matter conformable to their sentiments
strangers did no lesse seduce them then the Chananites they beleeved they ought equally to exclude them all not so much by the letter and propper tearmes as by the spirit of the law which they also interpreted contrary to the precedent practise in respect of the Moabites the Synagogue alwayes beleeving herselfe to have received from God himselfe a right to give decisions according to occurring necessityes I do not beleeve that any one will persuade himselfe that they observed according to the letter and in all sorts of cases Exod. 21.24.28 Lev. 24.19.20 Dont 19.21 that severe law of Talionis so often repeated in the Bookes of Moyses For even to regard these tearmes only eye for eye tooth for tooth hand for hand bruse for bruse wound for wound nothing dos appeare to establish a more perfect and a more just compensation yet nothing is in reality further from it if wee weigh the circumstances and nothing in fine would have been more unequall then such an equality nor indeed is it alwayes possible to give to a malefactor a wound altogeather proportionable to that he had given his brother Practise taught the Jewes that the true dessigne of the law was to make them sensible there ought to be a reasonable compensation profitable both to particulars and to the publick which as it consists not in a precise point nor in a certain measure the same practise determined it by a just estimation It would not be hard to alledge many other Traditions of the antient people as much approved of as these The ablest writers of the new reforme do grand it When therefore they would destroy all unwritten Traditions in generall under pretense of the words of our Lord where he condemnes those Traditions which were contrary to the tearmes or to the sense and intent of the law Math. 15.3 Mark 7.7 c. and in short those which had not a sufficiently sollid foundation there is no sincerity in their discourses and all men of sence will agree that there was lawfull traditions though not written without which the practise it selfe of the law was impossible in so much that it cannot be denyed but that they obliged in conscience Will the Gentlemen of the Pretended Reformed Religion permit me to mention in this place the Tradition of prayer for the dead This prayer is manifest by the Book of Machabees 2. Mach. 11.43.46 neither neede wee here enter into dispute with these Gentlemen whether this Booke be canonicall or no seeing it suffices as to this point that it was certainly writ before the Gospell This custome remaines to this day amongst the Jewes and the tradition of it my be asserted by these words of Saint Paul 1. Cor. 15.29 What shall they do else who are baptised that is to say purifyed and mortifyed for the dead if the dead rise not at all JESUS-CHRIST and his Apostles had found amongst the Jewes this Tradition of praying for the dead without reprehending them for it on the contrary it passed immediately from the Judaicall to the Christian Church and Protestants who have writ bookes where they shew this Tradition was establised in the primitive times of Christianity could yet never shew the beginning of it Notwithstanding it is certain there was nothing of it in the law It came to the Jewes by the same way which handed to them so many other unviolable Traditions But if a law which descendes to so minute particulars and which is as I may say wholy literall stood in need that it might be rightly understood according to its true sence of being interpreted by the practise and declarations of the Synagogue how much more need have wee in the law of the Gospell where there is a greater liberty in the observances and where the practises are lesse circumstanced A hundred examples will manifest the truth of what I say I will draw them from the very practises of the Pretended Reformers themselves and I will not stick at the same time to relate togeather with them as a thing which will decide the matter what passed for current in the antient Church because I cannot imagine that these Gentlemen can with sincerity reject it § VI. A proofe from the observances of the New Testament THE institution of the Sabaoth day preceded the law of Moyses and had its ground from the creation and neverthelesse these Gentlemen dispense as well as wee with that observance without any other foundation then that of Tradition and the practise of the Church which cannot be dirived from other then divine authority The allegation that the first day of the weeke consecrated by the Resurrection of JESUS-CHRIST Act. 20.7 1. Cor. 16.2 is mentioned in the writings of the Apostles as a day of assembly for Christians and that it is also called in the Revelations Apoc. 1.10 the day of the Lord or Sunday Is vaine for besides that there is no mention made in the New Testament of that rest annexed to the Sunday it is moreover manifest that the addition of a new day dit not suffise to take away the solemnity of the old nor to make us change the Preceps of the Decalogue togeather with humain Tradition The prohibition of eating Blood and that of eating the flesh of strangled creatures was given to all the children of Noe before the establishment of legal observances from which wee are freed by the Gospel and the Apostles have confirmed it in the Council of Jerusalem in joyning it to two unchangeable observances of which the one is the prohibition to participate of sacrifices to Idols and the other the condemnation of the sin of fornication But because the Church alwayes beleeved that this law though observed during many ages was not essentiall to Christianity the Pretended Reformers as well as we dispence with themselves about it though the Scriptures have no where derogated from so precise and so solemne a decision of the Apostles expressely registred in their Acts by Saint Luke But to shew how necessary it is to know the Tradition and practise of the Church in what regards the Sacraments let us consider what is practised in the Sacrament of Baptisme and that of the Eucharist which are the two Sacraments our adversaryes acknowledge with one accord It is to the Apostles that is to the heads of the flock Math. 28.19 that JESUS-CHRIST gave the charge of administring Baptisme Tertull. de Bapt. Concil Illid c. 38. c. notwithstanding the whole Church has understood not only that Priests but Deacons also yea even all the faithfull in cases of necessity were the Ministers of this Sacrament Tradition alone has interpreted that Baptisme which JESUS-CHRIST committed only into the hands of his Church and of his Apostles could be validly administred by Hereticks and out of the communion of the truly faithfull In the XI chapter of the Discipline of the Pretended Reformers and first article it is said that Baptisme administred by him who
the nature of a Sacrifise but that none ever gave the two species is what wee dispute and good ordre not to say sincerity dit not permitt that these two things should be equally joyned togeather as indisputable But that which seemes most intolerable is that it should be asserted that during the space of above a thousand yeares the Communion was never given but under both species and that this also should be a thing notorious and publick a thing which needs no proofe a thing which is not contested Wee ought to regard publick faith and not to abuse these weighty expressions M. Jurieux knows in his own conscience that wee deny all he here sayes the sole titles of the articles of the first part of this discourse show clearly enough how many occasions there are where wee uphold that Communion was given under one kinde I am not the first that have said it God forbid and I do nothing but explicate what all other Catholicks have said before me But can any thing be lesse sincere then to bring here no exception from ordinary communions but only that of the sick and with all to finde there no difference but in this that they then mixed the two species togeather seeing M. Jurieux would relate nothing but what is not contested by Catholicks he ought to speake after another manner He knows very well wee maintaine that the Communion of the sick consisted not in giving them the two species mixed but in giving them ordinaryly the sole species of bread He knows very well what our Authors say upon the Communion of Serapion upon that of Saint Ambrose upon others which I have remarked and that in a word wee say the ordinary manner of communicating the sick was to communicate them under one sole species It is already to much to dare to deny a matter of fact so well established but to advance this boldnesse to such a height as to say the contrary is not contested is what I know not how M. Jurieux could resolve upon But what is it he would be at when he affirmes as a thing not contested by us that during the space of above a thousand yeares the Communion was never given otherwise then under both species except in the Communion of the sick where both the species were given mixed togeather What a strange kind of exception is this Both species were alwayes given except when they gave them both mixed togeather M. Jurieux would willingly have said much better then he did But in affirming as he does that during the space of above a thousand yeares they never gave the Communion but under both species he saw verry well that he ought at least to except the communion of the sick He would have done it had he proceded candidly but at the same time he foresaw by this exception alone he lost the fruict of so universall a proposition and otherwise there was not any likelihood the antient Church sent dying persons to the Tribunall of JESUS-CHRIST after a Communion received contrary to his command So that he durst not say what naturally occurred and fell into a manifest labarynth In fine wherefore speakes he only of the Communion of the sick Whence comes it that in this relation he has said nothing of the Communion of infants and domestick Communion both which he knows verry well wee alledge as given under one species only Why do's he dissemble what our Authors have maintained what I have proved after them by the Decrees of Saint Leo and Saint Gelasius that it was free to communicate under one or both species I say in the Church it selfe and at the publick Sacrifise Was M. Jurieux ignorant of these things to say nothing of the rest Was he ignorant of the Office of Good Friday and of the Communion then and there under one sole species A man so learned as he did he not know what was writ concerning this by Amalarius and Authors of the VIII and IX ages whom wee have quoted To know these things and to affirme as an indispautable practise that during the space of above a thousand yeares the Communion was never given but under both species is it not manifestly to be tray the truth and defile his own conscience The other Authors of his Communion who have writ against us act with more sincerity Calixtus M. du Bourdieu and the others endeavour to answer those objections wee make M. Jurieux followes another method and contents himselfe to say boldly That during the space of above a thousand yeares none ever undertooke to communicate the faithfull otherwise then under both species and that this matter is not contested This is the shortest way and the surest to deceive the simple But wee must beleeve that those who love their salvation will open their eyes and not suffer themselves to be any longer imposed on M. Jurieux has but one only remaning refuge to witt that these Communions so frequent in the antient Church under one species were not the Sacrament of JESUS-CHRIST any more then the Communion which is given in their Churches in bread alone to those who drinke no wine In answering after this manner he would have answered according to his principles I confesse but after all I maintaine he had not the boldnesse to make use of this answer nor to impute to the antient Church this monstrous practise where a Sacrament is given which is in reality no Sacrament but an humain invention in Communion Neverthelesse in a history such as he had promised it was his businesse to have alwayes related these considerable matters of fact He says not one word of them in his narrative I wonder not at it for he could not have spoken of so many important practises without showing that there was at the least a great contestation betwixt them and us and it pleased him to say that it is a thing which has no need of proofe and is not contested It is true that in another place in answering objections he speakes a word or two of domestick Communion But he comes of in answering that it is not certain whether those who carried away with them the Eucharist after this manner Ibid. Sect. VII 483. 484. carried not also the wine and that this later is much more likely It is not certain this last is much more apparent Certainly a man thus positive as he is diffides verry much of his cause when he speakes at this rate but at least seing he doubts he ought not to say that it is a matter without contestation that no body ever undertooke during above a thousand yeares to communicate the Faithfull otherwise then under both species Behold even in the first ages of the Church an infinite number of Communions that he himselfe durst not affirme to have been under both species It was an abuse sayes he What then the practise was to be related the question concerning the abuse would come after and wee should then see whether
wilfully loose this seede of life or rather the eternall truth it brings us There needs no more to confound M. Jurieux Exam. T. VI. sect 5. p. 469. At that time sayes he that is to say in the eleaventh age when according to him Transsubstantiation was established they begun to thinke of the consequences of Transsubstantiation When men were persuaded that the Body of our Lord was contained whole and entire under each little dropp of wine they were seized with a feare least it should be spilt If then this feare of effusion seized also our Forefathers from the primitive ages of the Church then did they already believe Transsubstantiation and all its consequences M. Jurieux goes on They trembled to thinke the adorable Body of our Lord should lye upon the ground amongst dust and dirt without a possibility of taking it up If the Fathers have trembled to thinke of it as well as they then had they according to him the same beliefe He is never weary of shewin us this feare of effusion as a necessary consequence of the beliefe of the reall presence Ibid. Sect. 7. This reason sayes he that is to say that which is drawn from the feare of effusion may be proper for them that is to say for the Catholicks but it is of no account to us who do not acknowledge that the Flesh and Blood of our Saviour are really contained under Bread and Wine You see Gentlemen your Ministers would feare as well as wee this spilling or effusion if they believed the same reall presence the Fathers then once more believed it seing they had as it is manifest the same feare and apprehension It is in vaine that M. Jurieux scoffs at this feare Ibid. 469. In an age sayes he when men were not as they are at present ashamed to carry upon their faces the character or marke of their sexe they dipped a great beard into the sacred Cupp and carryed back with them a multitute of Bodyes of JESUS-CHRIST which hang at each haire This gave them horrour and I finde they had reason This fine phancy pleased him P. 485. I am in paine sayes he in another place to conceive how the Faithfull of the antient Church dit not tremble to see so many Bodyes of JESUS-CHRIST hang at all the hares of a great beard after receiving the sacred Cupp How came it they had not an horrour to see this beard wiped with a handkerchief and the Body of our Lord put into the pocket of some seaman or soldier As if a sea-man or soldier were lesse considerable in the eyes of God then other men If this unseasonable buffoon had remarked in the antient Fathers with what decency and respect they approched to the Eucharist if he would have regarded in Saint Cyrill after what manner the faithfull at this time tasted the sacred Cupp Cyr. Hier. Gat. 5. myst and how they were so far from suffering one drop of it to be lost that with respect they touched that moistnesse which remained upon their lipps to applye it to their eyes and the other organs of the sences which they believed to be sanctified thereby hee would have found it a thing more worthy himselfe to have candidly set forth this act of piety than to make his party laugh by the ridiculous description wee have now heard But these seoffers may do their worst their railleries can do no more injury to the Eucharist then those of others did to the Trinity and to the Incarnation of the Son of God and the majesty of these mysteryes cannot be debased by such discourses M. Jurieux reprefents us as men who feare least there should arrive some offensive accident to the Body and Blood of our Lord. I do not perceive sayes he that he is better placed upon a white cloth then in the dust and seeing wee can behold him without horrour in the mouth and stomack wee ought not to be astonished to see him upon the pavement In effect to speake humanly and according to the flesh the pavement is perhaps a place as much or more proper then our stomacks and to speake according to faith the glorious state of JESUS CHRIST at present dos equally elevate him above all but respect and decency will have it that as far as lyes in us wee should place him where himselfe would be It is man that he seekes and he is so far from having on abhorrance from our flesh seing he created it seing he redeemed it seing he vallues it that he willingly approches to sanctify it What ever has a relation to this use honours him because it has a dependance upon that glorious quality of Saviour of man kinde Wee do as much as lyes in us endeavour to hinder whatever may derogate from the veneration due to the Body and Blood of our Master and without fearing any accident should happen prejudiciall to JESUS-CHRIST wee avoid whatever might shew in us the least want of respect But if our precautions cannot prevent all wee know that JESUS-CHRIST who is sufficiently guarded by his own Majesty is contented with our zeale and cannot be debased by any place A man may railly if he will at this doctrine but wee are so far from blushing at it that wee blush for those who do not remember that those railleries they make use of against our precautions reflect upon the Holy Fathers no lesse cautious then wee If it was fitting to augment them these later ages it is not that the Eucharist hath been more honoured then in the first but raither that piety being relaxed it was necessary it should be excited by more efficacious meanes in such sort that these new and needfull precautions in denoting our respects make it appeare there has been some negligence in our conduct For my selfe I easily believe that amidst the order the silence the gravity of antient Ecclesiasticall assemblyes it seldome or never arrived that the Blood of our Lord was spilt it was only in the tumult and confusion of these last ages that these scandals frequently arriving caused the people to desire to receive that species only which they saw lesse exposed to the like inconveniencies so much the rather because in receiving it alone they knew they lost nothing seing they possessed him whole and entire who was the sole object of their love Neverthelesse I will not deny but that after Berengarius had rejected in despite of the Church of his time and the Tradition of all the Fathers the reall presence of JESUS-CHRIST in this Sacrament the beliefe of this mystery was as I may say enlivened or animated and that the piety of the faithfull offended by this heresy sought how to signalize it selfe by new testimonyes I acknowledge in this the spirit of the Church which did not adore JESUS-CHRIST nor the Holy Ghost with such illustrious testimonyes til after hereticks had denyed their divinity The mistery of the Eucharist ought to be in equall proportion with the rest and Berengarius his heresy must not serve the Church lesse then that of Arius and Macedonius As to what concernes adoration Cyr. Hier. Cat. myst 5. Amb. lib. III. de Spir. S. c. 12. Aug. Tr. in Ps 98. Theodor. Dial. II. Chrys lib. VI. de Sacerd. Aug lib. II. p. 432. 803. 822. Hist Euch. 3. p. ch 4. p. 341. seq what necessity is there that I should speake of it after so many passages of the Fathers cited even by Aubertin and since him by M. de la Roque in his history of the Eucharist Do not wee see in these passages the Eucharist adored or rather JESUS-CHRIST adored in the Eucharist and adored by the Angells themselves whom Saint Chrysostome represents to us as bowing before JESUS-CHRIST in this mystery and rendring him the same respects which the Emperours Gards rendred to their Master It is true Hist Euch. III. p. ch 4 p. 541. seqq these Ministers answer that this adoration of the Eucharist is not a souveraine adoration rendred to the Divinity but an inferiour adoration rendred to the sacred Symboles But can they show us the like adoration rendred to the water of Baptisme Chrys lib. VI. de Sacerd c. Theod. loc cit c. sup What can be answered to those Passages where it appeares the adoration rendred here is like to that which is rendred to the King when present that this adoration is rendred to the mysteryes as being in effect what they were believed to be as beeing the Flesh of JESUS-CHRIST God and man These Passages of the Antients are formall and till such times as our Reformers have comprehended them so far as to be convinced of it they will at least see this inferiour worship upon which they make so many cavills they will see a worship distinguished from the supreme worship yet neverthelesse a religious one seing it makes a part of the divine service and of the reception thus of the Holy Sacraments By justifying themselves so so concerning the Eucharist they take from themselves all wayes or meanes of accusing us in relation to Reliques Images and the veneration of Saints So true it is that their Church and Religion ressembles a ruinous structure which cannot as I may say be covered on one side without beeing exposed on the other and can never exhibit that perfect integrity and proportion of parts which compose the beauty and solidity of a building