Learned Discourse of the Sacrament quotes out of S t Ambrose who says he speaking of that Body which is received in the Eucharist calls it the spiritual Body of Christ the Body of a Divine Spirit and he does confidently affirm of all the Antients who have either purposely interpreted or occasionally quoted the Words of Christ in the sixth of S t Iohn touching the eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood that they all understand him to speak of a Spiritual Flesh and Blood distinct not only from the Substance of the Holy Elements but also from that natural Body of Christ which he took of the Substance of the Holy Virgin pag. 233. So little Novelty is there in this distinction of the Body and Blood of Christ into natural and Spiritual or Divine CHAP. VII 1. An Apology for being thus operose and copious in inculcating the present point from the usefulness thereof 2. The first usefulness in that it defeats Monsieur de Meaux his Stratagem to reduce us to Transubstantiation as if no Real Presence without it 3. The second usefulness for the rectifying the Notion of Consubstantiation 4. The third for more fully understanding the Mystery of the Eucharist with Applications of it to several Passages in our Communion-Service 5. The fourth for a very easie and natural Interpretation of certain Passages in our Church-Catechism 6. The priviledge of the faithful Receiver and of what great noment the Celebration of the Eucharist is 7. The last usefulness in solidly reconciling the Rubrick at the end of the Communion-Service with that noted Passage in our Church-Catechism 1. THE Reader may haply think I have been over operose and copious in inculcating this Distinction of Gratian's touching the Body and Blood of Christ in the Holy Eucharist But the great usefulness thereof I hope may apologize for this my extraordinary diligence and industry For the Notion being both true and unexceptionable and not at all clashing so far as I can discern with either the Holy Scripture or right Reason and solid Philosophy to say nothing of the Suffrage of the Primitive Fathers but rather very agreeable and consentaneous to them all and also having as I said its weighty usefulness it was a point I thought that was worth my so seriously insisting upon and as I have hitherto endeavoured faithfully to set out the Truth thereof I shall now though more briefly intimate its Usefulness 2. And the first Usefulness is this Whereas that Reverend Prelate the Bishop of Meaux tugs so hard to pull back again the Reformed Churches to the Communion of the Church of Rome by this Concession or rather Profession of theirs that there is a Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ at the Celebration of the Eucharist to be received by the faithful and that therefore they must return to the Doctrine of Transubstantiation as if there were no other Mode of a Real Presence to be conceived but it the force of this Inference is plainly taken away by this Distinction that Gratian one of their own Church hath luckily hit upon or rather taken out of some antient Father and is more fully made out in this Discourse that there is a Spiritual and Divine Body of Christ distinct from that particular Body of his that hung on the Cross which the faithful partake of in the Lord's Supper Whence it is plain there is no need of Transubstantiation which is incumbred with such abundance of Impossibilities and Contradictions 3. Secondly This Notion of ours is hugely serviceable for the rectifying of the Doctrine of Consubstantiation in the Lutheran Church who are for an Ubiquity of the particular Body of Christ that hung on the Cross which assuredly is a grand Mistake But I believe in the Authors thereof there was a kind of Parturiency and more confused Divination of that Truth which we have so much insisted upon and their Mistake consists only in this that they attributed to the particular Body of Christ which belongs to his restrained and circumscribed humane Nature that which truly and only belongs to his Divine Body as he is the Eternal Logos in whom is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Life or Spirit of the Logos to which Spirit of his this Body belongs and therefore is rightly called his Body as appertaining to his Spirit For this Body this Divine and Spiritual Flesh as Gratian calls it is every where present though not to be received as the Food of the Inward man but only by the Faithful and Regenerate so that according to this Notion there may be a Consubstantiation rightly interpreted that is a Compresentiation or rather Compresentiality of both the Real Bread and Wine and the Real Body and Blood of Christ at once so that they both may be really and indeed received by all true Believers And Lutheranism in this point thus candidly interpreted will prove a sound and unexceptionable Doctrine And I charitably believe the first Authors of it if they had fully understood their own meaning meant no more than so And I wish I had as much reason to believe that the Pontificians meant no more by their Transubstantiation but a firm and fast hold of the Real Presence I hope the most ingenuous of them at this time of the day mean no more than so viz. That they are as well assured of the Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ to be received in the Celebration of the Eucharist as if the very Bread was turned into his Body and the Wine into his Blood by a miraculous Transubstantiation 4. Thirdly It is from this Notion or Distinction of the antient Fathers as I hinted above of the Body and Blood of Christ into Natural and Spiritual or Divine that we have ever been well appointed to give a more full and distinct account of the nature of the Solemnity of the Eucharist as it is celebrated in our Church it plainly comprizing these two things The first the Commemoration of the Death of Christ of the breaking his Body or Flesh viz. the wounding thereof with Nails and Spears The other The partaking of the Divine Body and Blood of Christ by which our Inward Man is nourished to Eternal Life which our eating the Bread and drinking the Wine are Symbols of Both which in our Communion-Service are plainly pointed at The first fully in the Exhortation to Communicants where it is said And above all things you must give most humble and hearty thanks to God the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost for the Redemption of the World by the Death and Passion of our Saviour Christ both God and Man who did humble himself even to the Death upon the Cross for us miseable sinners And to the end we should always remember the exceeding great love of our Master and only Saviour Jesus Christ thus dying for us and the innumerable benefits which by his precious Blood-shedding he hath obtained to us he has instituted and ordained Holy
is Repugnant to the very Being of a Body or of any finite substance in the Universe It is as if the Mill-stone were not only supernaturally supported in the Air but were as transparent as soft and fluid and of as undetermined a shape as the Air it self or as if a right-angled Triangle were declared to be so still though the Hypotenusa were not of equal power with the Basis and Cathetus which is a thing impossible but if instead of a supernatural manner of existence it had been said an Asystatal manner of existence that is an existence repugnant to the very Being of a Body or any finite substance else it would have been discovered to be a contradiction at the very first sight and therefore such as ought to be rejected as well as the affirming that what Christ gave was really Bread and really his Body at once 6. And now notwithstanding this soft and smooth term of supernatural that it is an Asystatal manner of existence that is here given to the Body of Christ may appear from our Author's description thereof For in vertue he saith of this supernatural manner of existence there may be a Transubstantiation without danger of multiplying Christ's Body and making as many Christs as Altars But it is impossible this Absurdity should be avoided supposing Transubstantiation For there is not a more certain and infallible sign of two bodily Persons being two bodily Persons and not the same Person that distance of place wherein they are separate one from another and consequently two not one body and this is the very case in Transubstantiation which manifestly implies that the body of Christ is in many thousand distant places at once Which imagined condition in it is not supernatural but Asystatal and contradictious to the very Being of any finite substance whatever as has been intimated and firmly proved before Chap. 2. And as distance of place necessarily infers difference of Bodies or Persons so does also difference of time of their Production That which was produced suppose sixteen hundred Years ago and remains so produced cannot be produced suppose but yesterday or at this present moment and so be sixteen hundred Years older or younger than it self This is not only supernatural but Asystatal and implies a perfect contradiction but yet this is the very case in Transubstantiation The Body of Christ born suppose sixteen hundred Years ago is yet produced out of the Transubstantiated Bread but now or yesterday and so the same body is sixteen hundred Years older or younger than it self which is a perfect Contradiction 7. Secondly The Papist represented declares That the Body of Christ by vertue of this supernatural manner of Existence is left without Extension of parts which is a perfect contradiction to the very nature and essence of a Body whose universally acknowledged Definition is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 implying a Trinal inpenetrable dimension or extension Besides did Christ's Body at his last Supper so soon as he had Transubstantiated the Bread into it lose all extension of parts What then filled out his cloaths as he sat with his Disciples at Table or how could the Jews lay hold on Christ's Body to Crucifie it if he had no extension of parts to be laid hold on How could there be hands and feet and organization of parts either at the Table or on the Cross if there were no extension of parts to be organized And lastly being the Transubstantiated Bread is the very Individual Body of Christ if they would have this being left without extension of parts to be understood of it how can the very same Individual Body of Christ have Extension of Parts and have no Extension of Parts have Organization of Parts and have no Organization of Parts at once so that the condition of Christ's Body here supposed is plainly Asystatal not as is smoothly expressed only Supernatural 8. Thirdly Whereas the Papist Represented declares that this Supernatural Manner of Existence of Christ's Body renders it Independent of Place what can the meaning of that be but that by vertue of this priviledge it might exist without any Place or Ubi which Bodies in their natural condition cannot But this clashes with the very Story of our Saviour Christ who was certainly in the Room in which he ate the Passover with his Disciples after he had transubstantiated the Bread into his Individual Body and therefore it did not exist Independently of Place in virtue of any such Supernatural Manner of Existence as is imagined And as this does not agree with matter of Fact so it is a perfect contradiction to the Essence of any Body or finite Substance to be exempted from all connexion with Place or Ubi but a finite Substance must be in a definite Ubi and while it is in such a definite Ubi it is impossible to conceive that it is in another Place or Ubi whether intra or extra moenia Mundi He that closely and precisely considers the point he will not fail I think to discern the thing to be impossible And what contradiction it implies I have demonstrated above So that we see there can be no such Supernatural Manner of Existence conferred on a Body in making it independent of Place or Ubiety as to capacitate it to be one and the same Body in diverse places at once but that this supposed Supernatural Manner is truly an Asystatal Manner and such as is repugnant to the very Being of a Body or any finite Substance whatsoever 9. To make a body in this sense independent of Place or Ubiety is as unconceivable as to make it independent of Time which yet would so compleat this impossible Hypothesis that under this pretence when a thing has such a Supernatural Existence as exempts it from all connexion with or relation to Time but supposes it utterly independent thereof as was explained before touching Place we may suppose what we will of a Body that it may be Bread and not Bread at the same time that it may be at Thebes and at Athens at the same time as we ordinary mortals would phrase it sith it is lifted up above all Relation and Connexion with Time nor hath any thing to do with any Time But yet this assuredly is not a mere Supernatural Manner of Existence but plainly Asystatal and such as if God could cause there would be no Eternal and Immutable Truths but under a Pretext of exalting the Omnipotence of God they would imply him able to destroy his own Nature which would argue an Impotency in him and to extinguish and confound the Inviolable Ideas of the Divine Intellect as I intimated above 10. And fourthly and lastly That in vertue of this Supernatural manner of Existence the Body of Christ should be whole in every part of the Symbols and thereby become not obnoxious to any corporeal Contingencies which is said I suppose to avoid the Absurdity of grinding a pieces the Body of Christ with our Teeth when we
Heresy and Schism is 11. The fifth Prop further explained by Mounsieur Maimbourg in two Propositions 12. An Answer to the two Propositions 1. I HAVE I hope by this time sufficiently proposed and confirmed both the Truth and Usefulness of the distinction of the Body and Blood of Christ which occurs in the Primitive Fathers into Natural and Spiritual or Divine From whence it may plainly appear to any pious and uprejudiced Reader that the Inference of a Transubstantiation of the Bread and Wine into the Real Body and Blood of Christ from a Real Presence of them in the Lord's Supper is very weak and invalid Which Monsieur Maimbourg as well as the Bishop of Meaux formerly Bishop of Condom though he take special notice of in his Peaceable Method viz. that this Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ in the Lord's Supper is generally acknowledged by the Protestants Chap. 3. whom he will have to hold That the Sacrament is not a Figure or empty Sign without Efficacy but they do maintain saith he that it does communicate unto us in a most real and effectual Manner the Body of Jesus Christ to be the Food of our Souls And he will have Monsieur Claud himself acknowledge that before this Novelty of Transubstantiation was introduced every one believed that Iesus Christ is present in the Sacrament that his Body and Blood are there truly received by the faithful yet he is so wise and cautious as not to trust to the strength of this Engine for the pulling us back into a belief and profession of that incredible Hypothesis but according to the Fineness of his wit has spread a more large Net to catch us in and carry us captive not only into this gross Errour of Transubstantiation but into all other Errours which the Church of Rome has broached or may hereafter broach and propose as Articles of Faith And therefore it is a point worth our closest consideration 2. His general Maxim is this That that Church in which are found two Parties concerned has ever had the power to determine all differences and to declare that as matter of Faith which before there was no obligation to believe and that we are bound to acquiesce in her Decisions under Penalty of being Schismaticks By the Church her declaring as matter of Faith which seems to sound so harshly he does not mean That the Church has Authority to frame New Articles of Faith pag. 17. but that She is to act according to a Rule which is Holy Scripture and Tradition truly and purely Apostolical from which we have also received the Holy Scripture it self And page 18. The Church never did make and undoubtedly never will make any New Articles of Faith since it is not in her power to define any thing but according to the Word of God which she is always to consult with as with her Oracle and the Rule she is bound to follow His meaning therefore must be this That besides those plain and Universally known Articles of the Christian Faith and acknowledged from the very beginning of Christianity such as are comprised in the Apostles Creed there have been and may be other Articles of Faith more obscurely and uncertainly delivered in Scripture which until the Church in a lawful Synod or Council has determined the sense of those places of Scripture that appertain to the Controversie men have no obligation to believe but go for the present for but uncertain and indifferent Opinions But when once the true Church in which the Parties differing in Opinion are and her lawful Representative assisted by the Holy Ghost as is affirmed Chap. 2. pag. 28. a Canonical Assembly which alone has full Power and Sovereign Authority to say juridically Chap. 4. pag. 27. It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us has given definitive Sentence touching the Controversie that which before was but an indifferent Opinion becomes now Matter of Faith and is to be received as an Article of Faith by the Dissenting Party upon penalty of being Schismaticks and Hereticks This I conceive to be his precise meaning But the great Artifice of all is That he will have this meaning of his to be the general Opinion also of the Protestant Churches Who can says he page 27. question but the Protestant Churches of England France Germany and Switzerland and the Low Countries do hold as a Fundamental Maxim that in such Controversies as do arise concerning Doctrine in Matters of Religion the true Church of which the Dissenting Parties are Members has full and sovereign power to declare according to the Word of God what is of Faith and that there is an Obligation of standing to her Decrees under pain of being Schismaticks And page 35. I demand saith he nothing more for the present I will content my self with what themselves do grant That that Church of which the Parties contesting are Members be she fallible or infallible has full power to decide Differences and her Decrees do oblige under the Penalty of being Schismaticks 3. Now from this general Maxim granted as he conceives on both sides and which he does chiefly endeavour to prove from the carriage of the Synod of Dort toward the Arminians all which things to repeat here would be too moliminous and inconsistent with the Brevity I intend a full Answer to Monsieur Maimbourg's Method requiring some more able Pen he declining I say all dispute touching the Merit of the Cause the point of Transubstantiation he would hence draw us in to the imbracing that Doctrine merely because we were once of that Church that has Synodically determined for it and consequently reconcile us to all the rest of the Errours of the Church of Rome But that we may not so easily be taken in this Net or pulled in by this Engine we will first examine the Supposals that support the strength of it or of which it does consist The first and chiefest whereof is That such Synods to whose definitive sentence he would have us stand are assisted by the Holy Ghost The second That whether they be or be not we are to stand to their determination The third Whatever Matters of Opinion as they are for the present but such are decided by such a Synod pass into Articles of Faith The fourth That those that will not close with these Decisions be they what they will they are guilty of Schism as being bound to assent The fifth That these decisive Synods or Assemblies are to decide according to the Rule of the Word of God The sixth and last That both the Protestants and Papists are agreed in all these 4. Now before I examine these Particulars these Supposals Parts or Props of his general Maxim by which he would draw the Protestants again into the Church of Rome and make them embrace Transubstantiation and all other Superstitions and Errours which they have Synodically decided for matters of Faith I will following the very method of this shrewd Writer
propose not only one Maxime but several Maximes wherein both the Romanists and We and indeed all mankind are agreed in and which therefore I will instead of Maximes call Common Notions in allusion to those of Euclid And the first shall be this I. That which in it self is false no declaring or saying it is true can make it true II. Whatever is plainly repugnant to what is true is certainly false III. Whatever is false can be no due Article of a true Faith or Religion IV. The senses rightly circumstantiated are true Judges of their Object whether such an Object be Earth Air Fire or Water Body or Spirit and the like Besides that this is a Common Notion with all mankind the Incarnate Wisdom himself has given his suffrage for it in his arguing with S t Thomas Iohn 20. v. 27. Then saith he to Thomas Reach hither thy finger and behold my hands and reach hither thy hand and thrust it into my side and be not faithless but believing What is this but the appealing to the truth of sense by our Saviour himself And Luke 24. v. 29. Behold my hands and my feet that it is I my self handle me and see for a spirit has not flesh and bones as ye see I have Here is an appeal both to Sense and Reason at once and that about the very Body of Christ touching which the great Controversie is raised V. An Essence or Being that is one so long as it remains so as it is distinct from others so it is undividable or inseparable from it self VI. The whole is bigger than the part and the part less than the whole VII In every Division though the parts agree with the whole yet they disagree amongst themselves So that the part A. is not the very part B. nor the part B. the very part C. nor can each part be truly and adequately the whole by the foregoing common Notion VIII The same Body cannot be actually a Cube and a Globe at once and there is the same reason of any other different Figures of a Body IX No Revelation the Revealing whereof or the manner of the Revealing whereof is repugnant to the Divine Attributes can be from God X. No Tradition of any such Revelation can be true for as much as the Revelation it self is impossible XI No interpretation of any Divine Revelation that is repugnant to rightly circumstantiated Sense and pure and unprejudiced Reason whether it be from a private or publick hand can be any Inspiration from God XII No Body can be bigger and less than it self at once XIII That Individual Body that is already nor ceaseth to be cannot be made while it is already existing XIV One and the same Body cannot be both present with it self and many thousand miles absent from it self at once XV. One and the same Body cannot be shut up in a Box and free to walk and run in the Fields and to ascend into the very Heavens at the same time XVI And lastly to omit many other such self-evident Truths or Common Notions it is impossible that a man should swallow his whole Body Head Feet Back Belly Arms and Thighs and Stomach it self through his Mouth down his Throat into his Stomach that is every whit of himself into one knows not what of himself less than a Mathematical point or nothing For if all be swallowed what is there left of the man for it to be swallowed into but a mere point or rather nothing 5. Certainly all the World as well Papists as Protestants as soon as they do but conceive the meaning of the Terms will assent to the Truth of these Propositions at the very first sight which therefore has made me call them Common Notions Let us now apply our selves to the use of them in the examining the strength of Monsieur Maimbourg's general Maxime wherein he will have the Papists and Protestants agreed The first Prop thereof is That the true Church is infallible by the promise made to her of being assisted by the Holy Ghost But here I demand whether this promise be made to the Universal Church or any Particular Church or Churches throughout all Ages That it is not made to the Universal Church throughout all Ages is plain in that the parts thereof have been and are still divided in several matters of Faith That no such promise is made to any Particular Church or Churches is plain from hence that these Churches are not named in any part of the Scripture which omission is incredible if there had been any such entailment of Infallibility upon any Particular Church or Churches But of all Churches I humbly conceive it is impossible it should be the Church of Rome unless it be possible that all those Common Notions which I have set down and in which all the World even the Church of Rome her self if they will speak their Consciences are agreed in be false which they must be if Transubstantiation be true And therefore let any man judge whether is themore likely viz. That Transubstantiation should be false or those Common Notions not true 6. Again How does it appear that this promise of the assistance of the Holy Ghost is not conditional Indeed Christ says Iohn 16. 13. When the spirit of truth is come he will guide you into all truth viz. the same spirit that is promised chap. 14. v. 15 16 17. But the words of this pretended Charter of Infallibility are there set down more fully If you love me keep my commandments And I will pray the father and he shall give you another comforter that he may abide with you for ever even the spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive The promise of the assistance of the Holy Ghost for the infallibly concluding what is true even from the words of this pretended Charter of Infallibility is conditional that is to say if they so love Christ as to keep his commandments and become not worldly and carnal for the World cannot receive this spirit of truth then this spirit which leadeth into all truth shall assist them Wherefore as many as Christ sends this infallible spirit to he first fits them for it by mortifying the spirit of the World in them and making them members of his truly Holy Church for the calling themselves Holy Church makes them never a jot the more Holy if they really be not so by the first common Notion And besides If the Words of this Charter of Infallibility had not been so express yet in common sense and reason this condition would necessarily have been understood Forasmuch as nothing can be more absurd than to imagine the Assistance of the Holy Ghost to be so cheap and trivial a thing as to be procured for the concluding Controversies arising or set on foot in the Church which are needless and frivolous or more for satisfying Curiosity than Edification and which tend to Division and tearing the Church violently into parts which was one before and
those Decisions or any of like nature which may concern the Iustifiableness of our Christian Worship and indispensable way of Salvation the Church has Authority as she ever had in such Controversies to ratifie such Articles of Faith but she is not said to have Authority to make every Synodical Decision an Article of Faith whether the nature thereof will bear it or no. Nay her Authority is excluded from inforcing any thing besides what is clearly enough contained in the Scripture as assuredly those points are above mentioned though with weak or cavilling men they have been made questionable to be believed for Necessity of Salvation Which is the proper Character of an Article of Faith according as the Preface to the Athanasian Creed intimates And Monsieur Maimbourg himself is so sensible of this main Truth that in the Explication of his general Maxime he acknowledges that the Church has no Autority to coin any New Articles of Faith but only to declare she has discovered them existent before in the Scriptures but not so clearly espi'd or discerned as by an assembled Synod 5. But certainly no Article of Faith that is to say no Truth necessary to Salvation can be said to be pre existent in the Scriptures and having lain hid to be discovered afterwards that is not discovered but by such forced Interpretations of the Text that are repugnant to Common Sense and Reason Is not this a Reproach to the Wisdom of God that he should inspire the Holy Penmen to set down Truth necessary to Salvation so obscurely that the meaning cannot be reached without doing violence to Common Sense and Reason and running counter to those previous Principles without which it is impossible to make sense of any writing whatever Or without interpreting one place of Scripture repugnantly to the plain sense of another Which this Article expresly forbids as unlawful So plain is it that our Church limits the Authority of a Synod to certain Rules agreed of on all hands against which they have no Authority to define any thing And plain places of Scripture is one Rule contrary to which it is not lawful to interpret any either pretendedly or really obscure place Nor can any place at all be plain without the admittance of those Proleptick Principles of rightly circumstantiated sense and common undeniable Notions essentially ingrafted in the mind of man whether they relate to Reason or Morality These both Synod and Contesters are supposed to be agreed on and therefore no Synodical Decision repugnant to these according to our Church in interpreting of Scripture if I rightly understand her ought to have Autority with it 6. But as for doctrinal Decisions such as concern the Justifiableness of the Christian Worship and are of Necessity to Salvation and such as although either weak or willful cavilling men may make questionable yet are clearly enough delivered in Scripture these questionless a Synod has Autority to determine as Articles of Faith And such as have not the like Clearness nor Necessity as also innocent and indifferent Rites and Ceremonies when the one and the other seem advantagious to the Church such Synodical Decisions may pass into Articles of Communion in that sense I have above explained And lastly As in that case of the Synod of Dort when the points controverted have on both sides that invincible Obscurity and Intricacy and there seems to be forcible Arguments for either conclusion What I humbly conceive is to be done in that case I have fully enough expressed already and therefore think it needless again to repeat 7. In the mean time I hope I have made it manifoldly apparent that Monsieur Maimbourg's general Maxime viz. That the Church in which are found the two Parties concerned has ever had the Power to determine all differences and to declare that as Matter of Faith which before there was no Obligation to believe And that we are bound to acquiesce in her Decisions under the penalty of being Schismaticks is not especially as he would have his Maxime understood agreed on by all Churches as well Protestant as Pontifician And that therefore this Snare or Net wherewith he would catch and carry Captive the Protestants into a Profession of the Infallibility of the Church in Synodical Decisions so that the Church must be first allow'd Infallible that we may glibly swallow down whatsoever she decides even Transubstantiation it self with all other Errours of the Church of Rome this Net or Snare I hope I have sufficiently broken And I will only note by the bye how the subtilest Romanists declining the Merits of the Cause labour Tooth and Nail to establish the absolute Infallibility of their Church But our Saviour tells us By the fruit you shall know them Wherefore any man or Company of men that profess themselves infallible their Infallibility must be examined by their Doctrines which if they be plainly any one of them false their boast of Infallibility most certainly is not true 8. But forasmuch as an Appeal to a Maxime pretended to be agreed upon by both sides both Papists and Protestants is made use of with so much Wit and Artifice to ingage the Protestants to imbrace Transubstantiation and the rest of the Romish Errours I hope Monsieur Maimbourg will not take it amiss if I civilly meet him again in his own Way and show him by an Appeal not only to one Maxime but above a dozen at least of Common Notions which I did above recite and in which both Papists and Protestants and all mankind are agreed that it may demonstratively be made evident that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation is grosly false For that which in it self is false no declaring or saying it is true though by the vote of an entire Synod can make it true by the first of the Common Notions above-mentioned Chap. 8. Sect. 4. Secondly Whatever is plainly repugnant to what is true is certainly false and consequently can be no due Article of a true Faith or Religion by the second and third Common Notions And therefore Transubstantiation cannot pass into an Article of Faith by the Authority of any Synod whatever Thirdly Now that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation is false is manifest from the assurance of our Senses rightly circumstantiated To which our Saviour Christ appeals who is wiser than all the Synods that ever were or will be as was observed in Common Notion the fourth But our Senses assure us it is Bread still not the Body of Christ. Fourthly If Transubstantiation be true an Essence or Being that is one remaining still one may be divided or separated from it self which is repugnant to the fifth Common Notion Fifthly If Transubstantiation be true the whole is not bigger than the part nor the part less than the whole which contradicts the sixth Common Notion Sixthly If Transubstantiation be true the parts in a Division do not only agree with the whole but agree one with another and are indeed absolutely the same for divide a
consecrated Wafer into two viz. A. and B. this A. and B. are the same intire Individual Body of Christ according to this Doctrine which contradicts the seventh Common Notion Seventhly If the said Doctrine be true one and the same Body may be a Cube and a Globe at once have the figure of an Humane Body and of a Pyramid and Cylinder at the same time according as they shall mould the Consecrated Bread which is repugnant to the eighth Common Notion Eighthly Transubstantiation if it be any truth at all it is a Revealed Truth but no Revelation the Revealing whereof or the manner of Revealing is repugnant to the Divine Attributes can be from God by Common Notion the ninth but if this Doctrine of Transubstantiation were a Truth it seems not to sute with the Wisdom of God to reveal a Truth that seems so palpably to overthrow and thwart all the innate Principles of humane Understanding and the assurance of the rightly circumstantiated Senses to both which Christ himself appeals and without which we have no certainty of the Miracles of Christ and his Apostles And he hence exposes his Church to be befool'd by all the lucriferous fictions of a fallacious Priesthood And besides this the circumstances or manner of its first Revelation at the Lord's Supper as they would have it shows it cannot be for the Consecrated Bread retaining still the shape and all other sensible qualities of Bread without any change and that by a miraculous supporting them now not inherent in their proper subject Bread which is transubstantiated into that very Body that holds it in his hands or seems so to do I say as I have also intimated before to be thus at the expence of so vast a Miracle here at his last Supper and to repeat the same Miracle upon all the Consecrations of the Bread by the Priest which is the most effectual means to make all men Infidels as to the belief of Transubstantiation and to occasion thence such cruel and bloody Persecutions is apparently contrary to the Divine Wisdom and Goodness and therefore neither pretended Tradition nor fresh Interpretation of the inspired Text can make so gross a falshood true by the tenth and eleventh Common Notions Ninthly If Transubstantiation be true one and the same Body may be many thousand times bigger or less than it self at the same time forasmuch as the least Atom or particle of his Body or Transubstantiated Bread is his whole Body as well as the bigger lump according to this Doctrine which contradicts the twelfth Common Notion Tenthly If this Doctrine be true The same Individual Body still existing and having existed many Years may notwithstanding be made whiles it already exists which contradicts the thirteenth Common Notion Eleventhly If Transubstantiation be true one and the same Body may be present with it self and many thousands of miles absent from it self at once be shut up in a Box and free to walk in the Field and to ascend into Heaven at the same time contrary to the fourteenth and fifteenth Common Notions And lastly If this Doctrine be true a man may swallow his own Body whole Head Feet Back Belly Arms and Thighs and Stomach it self through his Mouth down his Throat into his Stomach that is to say every whit of himself into one knows not what of himself less than a Mathematical Point or nothing This Christ might have done and actually did if he did eat the Consecrated Bread with his Disciples which contradicts the sixteenth Common Notion Wherefore since in vertue of one single Maxim Monsieur Maimbourg supposing the Protestants as well as the Paepists agreeing therein though in that as I have show'd he is mistaken would draw in the Protestants to imbrace the Doctrine of Transubstantiation and other Ertors of the Roman Church I appeal to him how much more reasonable it is that he and as many as are of his perswasion should relinquish that Doctrine it contradicting so many Common Notions which not only all Papists and Protestants but indeed all the whole World are agreed in And hence clearly discerning the Infallibility of the Roman Church upon which this and other erroneous Doctrines are built such as Invocation of Saints Worshiping of Images and the like plainly to fail that they should bethink themselves what need there is to reform their Church from such gross errours and to pray to God to put it into the mind of their Governours so to do which would be a peaceable method indeed for the reuniting Protestants and Catholicks in matters of Faith and principally in the subject of the Holy Eucharist as the Title of his Method has it But to require an Union things standing as they are is to expect of us that we cease to be men to become Christians of a novel Mode unknown to the Primitive Church and under pretence of Faith to abjure the indeleble Principles of sound Reason those immutable Common Notions which the Eternal Logos has essentially ingrafted in our Souls and without which neither Certainty of Faith can consist nor any assured sense of either the Holy Scriptures or any Writing else be found out or understood Soli Deo Gloria
for Mark 16. 2. it is said of the two above said parties That very early in the morning the first day of the Week they came unto the Sepulcher at the rising of the Sun and they said among themselves Who shall roll us away the Stone from the door of the Sepulcher and when they looked they saw the Stone was rolled away c. And it is expresly said in Luke That they found the Stone rolled away from the Sepulcher And the like is recorded in St. John ch 20. so that it is a plain case the Stone was rolled away before their going to the Sepulcher What time therefore can we imagine more likely of this rolling away the Stone and terrible Earthquake than at the very Resurrection of Christ who rose in this awful terrour to the Keepers the Earth quaking and the too Glorious Angels officiously opening the stony door of the Sepulcher that the King of Glory might pass out without any further needless or useless Miracle such as he ever declined in his life time before his Death and Resurrection Wherefore this third Instance it is plain cannot with any shew be accommodated to the present case it being raised out of a mere mistake of the Story 5. The fourth and last Instance is Christ's entring amongst his Disciples the doors being shut recorded John 20. 19 and 26. there the Disciples are said to be gathered together privately or secretly for fear of the Jews for which cause they lockt or bolted the doors with-inside that no man might suddenly come upon them But while they were in this privacy or closeness Christ notwithstanding suddenly presented himself in the midst of them for all this closeness or secrecy and not without a Miracle supposing himself or some ministring Angel to unlock or unbolt the door suddenly and softly sine strepitu which upon this account would be more likely in that if he had come in the doors being still shut that might have seemed as great an Argument to Thomas that he was a Spirit as the feeling his Hands and Side that he was no Spirit Wherefore I conceive it is no sufficiently firm Hypothesis that Christ entred among his Disciples the doors in the mean time at his very entrance remaining shut But suppose they were so this will not prove his Body devoid of Extension to be independent of Place and whole in every part more than his passing the wicket of the Womb like light through Crystal did argue the same in the second Instance But the truth of the business will then be this That he being then in his Resurrection-body even that wherewith he was to ascend into Heaven which yet he kept in its Terrestrial Modification and Organization for those services it was to do amongst his Disciples while he conversed with them after his Resurrection upon Earth as he made use of it in a particular manner to S t Thomas he had a Power to modifie it into what Consistencies he pleased Aerial Aetherial or Coelestial it remaining still that Individual Body that was crucified This therefore might easily pass through the very Pores of the door and much more easily betwixt the door and the side-posts there without any inconvenience more than to other Spiritual Bodies For the Resurrection-body is an Heavenly and Spiritual Body as S t Paul himself expresly declares But yet as truly a Body as any body else that is it hath impenetrable Trinal Dimension is not without Place or Ubiety nor whole in every part This very Story demonstrates all this That his Body is not without Place For it stood in the midst of the Room amongst his Disciples Nor the whole in every part For here is distinct mention of Christ's Hand and his Side as elsewhere of his Flesh and Bones Luke 24. 26. which would be all confounded if every part were in every part And if there be these distinct parts then certainly his Body hath Extension and this ingeniously excogitated Distinction of the Natural and Supernatural Manner of Existence of a body can by no means cover the gross Repugnancies which are necessarily imply'd in the Doctrine of Transubstantiation 6. A Doctrine raised from the literal sense of those Words This is my Body which literal sense if we were tyed to it would also follow that that which Christ gave to his Disciples was as well Real Bread as his Real Body This plainly referring to what he took what he blessed and what he gave which was Bread and of this he says This is my Body Wherefore adhering to the literal sense it would be both Real Bread and the Real Body of Christ at once But this as being a Repugnancy as was noted above and Contradiction to the known inviolable and immutable Laws of Logick and humane Reason is justly rejected by the Church of Rome for this very Reason that it implies a Contradiction that one and the same Body should be Bread and the Real Body of Christ at once Wherefore Transubstantiation containing as has been proved so many of such Contradictions every jot as repugnant to the inviolable and immutable Laws of Logick or humane Reason that unextinguishable Lamp of the Lord in the Soul of man as this of the same body being Real Bread and the Real Body of Christ at once And there being no Salvo for these harsh Contradictions but the pretence of a Supernatural Manner of Existence of a Body which God is supposed to give to the Bread transubstantiated into the Body of Christ that is into the very Individual Body of Christ they being supposed by Transubstantiation to become one and the same Body I say this neat distinction of a Supernatural Manner of Existing being plainly demonstrated so as it is by the Papist Represented explained not to be a mere Supernatural Manner of Existence with which the being of a Body would yet consist but a Counter-essential Asystatal and Repugnant manner of Existence inconsistent with the being of a Body and none of the Instances that are produced as Pledges of the truth of the Notion or Assertion at all reaching the present case it is manifest that though there be a Real Presence of Christ's Body and Bloud in the Celebration of the Holy Eucharist acknowledged as well by the Reformed as the Pontifician Party that it is impossible that Transubstantiation which the Papist represented here declares should be the true mode thereof CHAP. V. 1. The Author's excuse for his civility to the Papist Represented that he shews him that the Road he is in is not the way of Truth touching the mode of the Real Presence 2. That the Bishop of Meaux makes the Real Presence the common Doctrine of all the Churches as well Reformed as Un-reformed and that it is acknowledged to be the Doctrine of the Church of England though she is so wise and so modest as not to define the mode thereof 3. The sincere Piety of our Predecessors in believing the Real Presence and their unfortunateness afterwards
in determining the mode by Transubstantiation or Consubstantiation 1. AND therefore the Papist Represented being in so palpable a mistake and by keeping to the literal sense having so apparently wandred from the path of Truth I hope my thus industriously and carefully advertizing him thereof for his own good will be no otherwise interpreted than an Act of Humanity or common Civility if not of indispensable Christianity thus of my own accord though not Roganti yet Erranti comiter monstrare viam or at least to assure him that this of Transubstantiation is not the right Road to the due understanding of the manner or mode of the Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ in the Celebration of the Holy Eucharist 2. Which opinion of the Real Presence the Bishop of Meaux declares to be the Doctrine of all the Churches as well Reformed as Un-reformed as I must confess I have been of that perswasion ever since I writ my Mystery of Godliness that it is the Doctrine of the Church of England and that the Doctrine is true And this I remember I heard from a near Relation of mine when I was a Youth a Reverend Dignitary of the Church of England and that often viz. That our Church was for the Real Presence but for the manner thereof if asked he would answer Rem scimus Modum nescimus We know the thing but the mode or manner thereof we know not And the assurance we have of the thing is from the common suffrage of the ancient Fathers such as the above-cited place of our Homilies glances at and from the Scripture it self which impressed that Notion on the minds of our Pious Predecessors in the Church of God 3. For I do verily believe that out of mere Devotion and sincere Piety and out of a Reverend esteem they had of the solemnity of the Eucharist they embraced this Doctrine as well as broached it at the first And if they had kept to the profession of it in general without running into Transubstantiation or Consubstantiation and had defined no further than the plain Scriptural Text in the sixth of St. Iohn and the suffrages of the Primitive Fathers had warranted them viz. That there was a twofold Body and Blood of Christ the one Natural the other Spiritual or Divine which we do really receive in the Holy Communion within which limits I shall confine my self here without venturing into any farther curiosities it had been more for the Peace and Honour of the Christian Church and it might have prevented much scandal to them without and much Cruelty and Persecution amongst our selves The History of which is very horrid even to think of But though there have been these Mistakes in declaring the Mode yet the thing it self is not therefore to be abandoned it being so great a Motive for a Reverend approaching the Lord's Table and duly celebrating the solemnity of the Holy Eucharist Nor can we as I humbly conceive relinquish this Doctrine of the Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ without the declining the most easie and natural sense of the Holy Scripture as it stands written in the sixth Chapter of St. Iohn CHAP. VI. 1. Gratian his distinction of the Flesh and Blood of Christ into Spiritual or Divine and into that Flesh that hung on the Cross and that Bloud let out by the Lance of the Souldier 2. The same confirmed out of S. Austin who makes the Body and Bloud of Christ to be partaken of in Baptism and also from S. Paul and Philo. 3. Other Citations out of Philo touching the Divine Logos agreeable with what Christ says of himself in his Discourse John 6. And out of which it further appears that the Antient Fathers ate the same Food that we the Divine Body of Christ but not that which hung on the Cross. 4. A strong Confirmation out of what has been produced that Gratian his distinction is true 5. The first Argument from our Saviour's Discourse That he meant not his Flesh that hung on the Cross because he says that he that eats it has Eternal Life in him 6. The second because his Flesh and Bloud is the Object of his Discourse not the Manner of eating and drinking them 7. The third because of his answer to his murmuring Disciples which removes his Natural Body far from them and plainly tells them The Flesh profiteth nothing 8. Gratian's distinction no novel Doctrine 1. OUT of which sixth Chapter of S. Iohn that is manifest which a Member of the Roman Church her self has declared an eminent Canonist of theirs Gratian In Canon dupliciter as it is cited by Philippus Mornaeus lib. 4. De Eucharistiâ Cap. 8. Dupliciter intelligitur Caro Christi Sanguis vel Spiritualis illa atque Divina de quâ ipse dicit Caro mea verè est Cibus Sanguis meus verè est Potus nisi manducaveritis Carnem meam biberitis Sanguinem meum non habebitis Vitam Aeternam vel caro quae Crucifixa est sanguis qui militis effusus est lanceâ I the rather take notice of this Passage because he makes use of the very Phrases which I used without consulting him in my Philosophical Hypothesis of the great Mystery of Regeneration calling that Body or Flesh which Christ so copiously discourses of Iohn 6. Spiritual or Divine which he plainly distinguishes as Christ himself there does from that Body that hung on the Cross and that Blood that was let out by the lance of the Souldier 2. For we cannot be Regenerate out of these in Baptism and yet in the same place S. Augustine says We are partakers of the Body and Blood of Christ in Baptism and therefore as Terrestrial Animals are not fed as they say the Chamaeleon is of the Air but by food of a Terrestrial Consistency so our Regeneration being out of spiritual Principles our inward man is also nourished by that Food that is Spiritual or Divine And that is a marvellous passage of St. Paul 1 Cor. 10. where he says The Fathers did all eat the same spiritual meat and did all drink the same spiritual drink for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them and that Rock was Christ where St. Austin Anselm Thomas Aquinas and others as you may see in Iacobus Capellus avouch That the ancient Patriarchs ate the same Spiritual Food that we which therefore must be the Flesh and Blood of Christ in that sense Christ understands it in Iohn 6. And that passage of Philo that Grotius notes on the same place is worth our taking notice of and that in two several Treatises of his he interprets the Manna of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Divine Logos which agrees hugely well with our supposing that the Flesh and Blood of which our Saviour saith it is meat indeed and drink indeed he speaks this as he is the Eternal Logos to whom appertains the universal Divine Body as being the Body of