of my Blood poured out for you that is of my Sacrifice for your sins For for what else could our Saviour be remembred or what else do the Elements represent or commemorate but that Sacrifice Thus then you see that as the old Jewish Sacrifices were Typical Sacrifices so the Christian Sacrament is a memorative Sacrifice And that one and the same thing might be both a Sacrament and a Sacrifice none will deny that considers the Paschal Lamb was both Yet that was but a Typical Sacrifice and a Typical Sacrament this both a true Sacrifice and Sacrament For although that Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross was performed once for all yet the Commemoration of it was to be often iterated in the Church till Christ's second coming Again why should we not as well call it a Sacrifice in memory of Christ's which it signifies as a Sacrament in token of his which it Seals or in token of a Covenant which it ratifies The Scripture I am sure no where calleth it by the name of Sacrament Sacrament the word not found in the Bible for there is no such word in the Bible And therefore they that will have a Proof out of the Scripture for every thing they say 'T is a Seal to the Covenant and therefore a Sacrifice and give no respect to the Custom and Language of the Church must desist by their own principles from the use of this word for they can have no Authority for it but the constant and unanimous tradition of the Church Moreover God never made Covenant with man but with Sacrifice For a Covenant since the fall was always made for the redintegration of our peace with God violated by sin Now there was no peace that is no Covenant renewed where there was no first remission of sin past and no remission of sin without satisfaction of Justice no satisfaction without the blood of a Sacrifice viz. Christ's Sacrifice For that is the ground of our Covenant with God and therefore wheresoever it is renewed that Sacrifice is withall commemorated in vertue whereof it was at first made and ever since renewed Besides as in Sacrifices God in token of Covenant and Attonement with man did as it were eat with him and Feast him at his own Table eating and drinking having been always esteemed tokens of Peace and Friendship For the Sacrifices were first presented and given up unto God consecrated unto him in Recognition of his Lordship over all Creatures then afterwards Slaughtered and Offered part whereof was consumed the other part was for the Sacrifice to Feast withal in token of Reconciliation with God so also is the Sacrament a Foederal Rite of our Address unto God to renew a Covenant The Bread and Wine are first Consecrated and made the Body and Blood of Christ that is a memorial of that Sacrifice which is the ground of our Covenant and then are given as meat from Gods Table to be a Sacrament sealing unto us his Reconciliation in vertue of his Sons Sacrifice there commemorated You see then that this Sacrament is how it is and why it is a Sacrifice Now if it be truly a Sacrifice Holy Table may fitly be called an Altar the Holy Table may fitly be called an Altar For as the Cross was the Altar of our Saviours Sacrifice corporally offered so is the Table the Altar of his Sacrifice mystically offered in the Supper And as a Cross did suit to his Body so a Table to the Bread As he did not institute any Carnal Body and Blood to be the memory of his Sacrifice but Bread and Wine so he did not institute a Cross for an Altar but that which was proportionable to the signs which he instituted As in the Old Law it was not necessary that the Type should in every thing be so Analogal as to have a man Crucified for a Sacrifice and a Cross for an Altar to represent the Sacrifice of Christ but a Beast for the one and a Table for the other so neither is it necessary in the New Testament the substantial Body of a Man should be the sign of Christ's Sacrifice or a Cross of an Altar for the memory thereof And this I have the more fully enlarged to answer those who will perchance confess our Saviours Cross to have been an Altar but not our Tables Furthermore Table and Altar promiscuously used what great material difference is there between an Altar and a Table that we are so scrupelous were not the Altars of the Old Law Tables else what means the promiscuous use of these words Mal. 1.7 Ye offer polluted Bread upon mine Altar mark it and ye say wherein have we polluted thee The answer of God by his Prophet is in that ye say the Table of the Lord is contemptible That which in the beginning of the Verse is called an Altar in the end is called a Table Obj. The word doth not infer Popery What 's this but by little and little to bâ—ing in Popery underhand when we begin to use their Language for so Popery came in and got head at first Resp No such matter Let the Papist take away their Doctrine of Transubstantiation or Corporal presence and we shall not differ from them in the use of this word for it is not theirs but the Speech of the Scripture and the Primitive Church The Papist may with as good reason say that the Table is transubstantiated into a Cross as the Bread into the Body For if our Saviour by those words This is my Body did mean to exhibit substantially that once offered Sacrifice even that very Body Crucified every time the Eucharist should be administred and so to make it a propitiatory Sacrifice for the Quick and Dead then it is necessary that he should mean also to turn the Table into the Cross For that was the real Altar of his real Sacrifice And therefore if they will have the true Body and Blood litterally understood to be then Crucified and Offered I see not how they can avoid the inferring of a true Cross whereinto the Table must be likewise turned For a Table was not the Altar of Christ's Bodily Sacrifice but a Cross I know no reason why I should imagine the same Indentical Numerical real bodily Sacrifice and not the same Indentical Numerical real Altar The same Numerical Sacrifice say they was offered on the Cross nay his Crusifying was his Sacrificing but no Crucifying but on a Cross therefore if his Numerical Sacrificing be there his Numerical Crusifying is also there if his Numerical Crusifying then his Numerical Cross These things do necessarily result one from another and all joyntly shew the absurdity of the Popish Error But now because they mix falshood with truth shall we relinquish the truth Because they make the Sacrament a real Corporal Sacrifice shall not we hold it to be a commemorative one as Christ teacheth us Because they say in the Sacrament Christ is Bodily shall we therefore
to the approved Practise of the Saints in all Ages First 1 It is lawful to determine our Worship towards some place It is lawful to specify or determine our Worship of God in his house to some place 1. Because it is necessary man should tender his Worship towards some place in special it being a bodily Act and he must look and bow one way either to the right or left to the upper or lower end unless he will turn round as he Worships or look nine ways at once that he might not be thought to adore the place he bows toward Secondly And to one place rather than another which is no Idolatry As our Worship must be done towards some place in special so it is lawful to do it towards one place rather than another 1. There is no Idolatry in it for unless we make the place the object of our Worship some ways it is no Worship of an Idol But we tender none of our Worship to the place You may as well say we cannot look up to Heaven when we say our Prayers but we must Worship the Heavens Besides if to Worship God towards one place rather than another be Idolatry then Daniel when he Worshipped God toword the Temple and the Jews when they worshipped toward the Altar and Ark committed Idolatry For if they could not Worship God toward one place more than nother but they must Worship the place Certainly ' God who is Jealous of his Glory in point of Idolatry would never have commanded or permitted it What was then no Idolatry cannot be now for Idolatry is the same thing now and then and the second commandment did alike concern them and us And as there is no Idolatry No superstition so there is no superstition in it For we no ways circumscribe God's Immensity or omni presence or confine it to a place hereby no more than Solomon did when he built a Temple for him or God himself did circumscribe himself when he commanded a Tabernacle to be set up for him to dwell in Neither was it in his heart that men hereby should have such a conceit of him as if he could be limited or contained in any place Nor indeed had they any such conceipt for saith Solomon The Heaven of Heavens is not able to contain thee how much less the house that I have built Now if we do not imagine that God cannot be confined to any Church why should any dream that we confine him to some place in the Church more than another Do you think God is confined in the Church when you go out of your Houses thither to worship him would you think well of them that should so judge of you Why should you then judge of us that we tye God to one place in the Church because we worship him toward one place rather than another Nor that it is Will-worship Nor Will worship I shall prove by shewing it consonant to God's word which thus I do That which is decent and orderly But Consonant to Gods word is not only Consonant to but Commanded by Scripture But to Specify our worship to one place is Decent and Orderly Ergo. If the promiscuous and in different Worship of God towards any place left to every ones discretion be indecent and disorderly and a confusion then the determining of it to one place is Orderly and Decent But c. Ergo. For tell me is there any Order where there is not Conformity and Uniformity Is there any Conformity or Uniformity that when Men come into the Church one should bow towards the Font another toward the Pulpit a third towards the Table a fourth towards the Windows one one way and another another Surely this is not Conformity or Uniformity and therefore not Decency and therefore a breach of the Apostles command and a disorderly Service of the God of Order If any think this various worship Orderly I ask whether he thinks it would be orderly for one to come into the Church creeping another going another reeling another dancing one Covered another bare If not Order in this neither in the other for the Ground of Order is Uniformity but there is no more Uniformity in such Worship than in such coming into the Church 2 It is Lawful to determine our worship toward the Altar or Holy Table Lawful to Adore towardsâ— the Altar proved Negâ—tively That it is neither Idolatry nor Superstition is apparent by what I said before for we neither tender any worship to the Table nor Circumscribe Gods presence there When a man pulls off his Hat at his coming into the Church he may as well be said to adore the Stones or Walls and to Confine Gods presence there for he doth not come into his own House in that manner And that it is not will-worship Affirmatively Rom. 12.1 I prove because it is agreeable to the analogy of Faith that requires our worship or service should be reasonable and such is this For if we adore Necessity enforceth us to bow to some place Decency requires to bow to one place and Reason would that place should be the that fittest place One place in the Church is more Holy then another Now the fitness of this place is to be judged by the Dignity and Excellency of it and that is to be measured by the Degree of Relation it hath to God and the Highness of the use whereunto it is appointed Now what part of all the Church or what thing in the Church hath so near a Relation to God as the Holy Table or what is appointed for so high and Holy an Use as that That which hath a nearer relation to God a higher use than other things must needs participate of more External Sanctity and Dignity than other things Else you may say the Belfry is as Holy as the Pulpit or Communion Table The H. Table more Holy then the rest and as excellent But the H. Table hath nearer relation unto God is destined to an higher use than any other thing in the Church Ergo it is more Holy excellent consequently the fittest place to tender our Devotions toward There is nothing likely to stand in competition with it Than the Pulpit but the Pulpit or the Font but neither of these have so near a Relation or so high an use First the Pulpits dignity proceeds from the Word of God therein read or preached but Gods Spirit hath not made so near a Union between the word it self as the Son of God hath done at the Sacrcement celebrated on the Altar As for the Font True it is Then the Fonâ— the Scripture calls it the Laver fo Regeneration the New-birth and that by the washing thereof we receive remission of Sins Baptisme the Analogy of it But the Analogy of that Sacrament is only thus that as in our first birth when we come out of our Mothers Womb we are
washed from the pollutions thereof with water so in our second or new birth they that were born into the Church and made Members of the same were washed from the pollutions of their Sins by the Sanctifying of the Holy Spirit who in Holy Scripture is frequently Signified under the name of Water John 7.38 39. Now though our blessed Saviours death and blood-shed be the ground of that Sacrament yet it is not his Blood that is represented by the water but the Sanctifying of the Holy Spirit whence our Saviour said to Nicodemus Vnlhss a man be born again of Water and of the Spirit c Besides Baptisme is the Sacrament of our Initiation the Lords Supper of our Conformation Baptisme might be Administred to Infants the Lords Supper only to men of Ripe years By Baptisme we have only the beginning of our Spiritual Life by the Lords Supper we have our Conservation in it and Continual food and nourishment This is the Commemoration Representation Exhibition and Application of that one most perfect Sacrifice of our Lord once offered upon the Cross So that upon this Table is prepared God's Heavenly Banquet for our Souls our Manna the Bread of Life in Comparison whereof all Earthly Feasts and Dainties are but poor Course and despicable From hence we drink the Cup of Salvation and Heavenly Benediction yea we eat and drink the very Body and Blood of our Saviour in a Mistery Whence the Antient Fathers are wont to call them Reverend and Dreadful Mysteries the Viands of Immortality the earnest of our Inheritance and the place in Reference thereto The Holy Altar the Sacred Table the Seat and Throne and Chair of Estate of our Lord Christ Jesus Thus I hope I have proved this Table to be the Highest and most Honourable part of the Church and therefore the fittest towards which our Devotions to God should be tendred Now I shall prove it to be Consonant to Scripture and approved by the Constant practice of the Saints in all Ages Perhaps you expect some place of Scripture containing this Proposition in express terms But this Demand were unreasonable For if we should believe no more than what we have express words of Scripture for in the New-Testament Then we shall be never able to prove our Baptizing of Infants The Analogy of the H. T. a Rule in many things or our substituting the Lords day in place of the Jewish Sabbath which are two points of main Consequence and yet we have no Rule given expresly concerning them in the New-Testament Nor was it needful for in such things where God hath not given or prescribed to us any new Rule to guide us In Tithes he hath refered us to the Analogy of the Old This the Apostle teacheth us where he proves the due of the Ministers miantainance under the Gospel from the Analogy of the Old Law Do ye not know that they that Minister about Holy things live of the Holy things of the Temple 1 Cor 9.13 and they that waitat the Altar are Partakers of the Altar even so hath the Lord Ordained that they that preach the Gospel would live of the Gospel But where hath God Ordained that but in the Old Law whence the Apostle proveth this for what need God give a new Commandment concerning Tithes in the New-Testament while the Reason and Ground of the Commandement first given doth as much concern us as them It was reason that they who waited at the Altar should live of it It is as much reason that they who Preach the Gospel should live by it God hath reserved to himself the Tithes to bestow upon his Ministers in the Old-Testament for their maintainance and it was not needful he should give any new Command for Tithes under the Gospel seeing he never abolish't them that he hath not abolish't them is plain because he hath not abolish't the cause for which he did at first Ordain them viz the mainitainance of his Ministers as the Apostle here shews Thus you see the folly of those that will admit of no proofs out of the Old-Testament for any thing even there where is the same ground and reason which the Apostle confutes here by his own practice and by citing a place out of Deuterinomy 25.4 Thou shalt not muzzel the mouth of the Oxe which treadeth out the Corn. which saith the Apostle God spake altogether for our sakes that are Ministers of the Gospel And whence arose the Auncient practise of the Church in Baptising Infants I Pedo Baptiand the Lords day but from the Analogy of Circumcision or the Hallowing of every first day in the week as one in seven but from the Analogy of the Jewish Sabath By the same reason it was not necessary for God or Christ in the Gospel to give us any new rule for the manner of our worship of him in his house Euseb line 3. line 14 Ir. line line 3. line 3. or to specify the place towards which we should Adore him in express words having therein left us to the Analogy of the Old Law there being the same reason to tye us to worship God towards this place that there was to tye the Jews to worship him towards the Altar I might alledge to this purpose a place out of Clemens a man of the Apostolique age and whose name saith St. Paul was written in the Book of Life in his true and genuine Epistle to the Corinthians We p. 52. where he saith ought to do all things rightly and orderly which our Lord hath Commanded us to Celebrate our oblations and Lyturgyes at appointed times for he would not have these things done rashly and out of order but at set times and hours He hath likewise defined by his most High will where and by whom he would have these things performed But where I pray do we find any of these things Specified by God unless he hath left us to the Analogy of the Old-Testament For the only reason that moved the Jews to worship toward the Ark was the Memorial of his Name that is The same Reason ties us to worâ—ship God towards the Altar that tied the Jews to worship towards the Ark. of his Special presence The whole Temple was the Place of Gods Special Presence but the Ark was as it were his Front or Face where he did most chiefly testify his Presence Simil. as the whole Chamber where the King manifests himself to his Subjects is called the Presence Chamber but the Chair of Estate doth most principally represent the Kings Person But first I will shew that places in the Old Testament set a part for Gods Worship were places set a part for the Memorial of his Name and therefore Sacred and also that God did promise a special Exhibition of his presence and blessings in those places This I prove out of Exod. 20.24 where God after the promulgation of the Decalogue forbidding the People by Moses to make with him gods of Silver
deny that he is there really So neither must we deny the Table to be an Altar because they hold Transubstantion and say Mass at it For this is to refuse Gold because of Dross Wheat because of Tares Corn because of Chaff which is mere folly But come we now to shew the use of these words out of Scripture The use of the word Altar in Scripture Hebr. 13.10 The Apostle saith expresly we have an Altar we under the Gospel for he makes an Antithesis or Opposition between the legal Altars and this in that those who Minister at the Tabernacle have not right to eat of things offered upon this And why so Because while they retain the Ceremonical observances now abolished they argue Christ the true Sacrifice not to be exhibited and therefore have no right to eat of the Sacrifices of our Altar which commemorate Christ already Sacrificed or else I know no reason but the Jews should have as much interest in Christ as the Gentiles and be as much partakers of this Altar would they believe in him as we do But to wait at the Tabernacle that is to observe legal Rites cannot consist with our eating of Christ in the Sacrament or participating of our Altar because the one makes Christ not come the other commemorates him already come That this is the meaning of the Apostle is evident because in the following verses he compares the Type with the Antitype and shews how Christ did answer and fulfil all the Jewish Sacrifices and instead thereof appoint his own and consequently abolish the former together with the Ministery of the Jewish Priests which the Apostle makes the reason of this Speech We have an Altar whereof they have not right to eat c. Besides And that Altar is the Communion-Table what other thing can be meant hereby but the Communion-Table For it is an Altar from which some thing is eaten that was Sacrificed for nothing was eaten on the Altar but what was offered to God in Sacrifice But what other Altar can that be but the Holy-Table whereat we eat the Lords Supper and commemorate his Sacrifice You see by this then that the Holy-Table was thus called even by Saint Paul If you say he called it so improperly and Anologically in reference to the Jewish Altars This I have disproved in shewing that those were rather improperly termed Altars and Sacrifices in reference to ours whereof they were but Types Now having proved an Altar by your own consequence we must have a Sacrifice too and a Priesthood for these you say infer one another as Correlates But I will not be beholden to you to make this my Argument but will prove out of Scripture The word Sacrifice to be applied in Scripture to our Sacrament Matt. 1.10 the word Sacrifice to be applied to our Sacrament God by his Prophet foretels the Jews that whereas they had polluted his Altars he had also rejected them and their Sacrifices and would appoint himself a new People and new Sacrifice In every place that is not in Jerusalem only and in one place Incense shall be offered unto his Name and Sacrificium Purum a pure Sacrifice or Offering for so the word signifies in the Hebrew Now what other Incense have we but Prayer What other Sacrifice but the Lords Supper Which he calls a pure Sacrifice or Offering which God hath appointed to commemorate the Death and Sacrifice of his Son instead of the Jewish Sacrifice which only Typified it This is the Interpretation of the most and most Antient Fathers For among all the Antient Fathers both Greek and Latin there is nothing more frequent than the use of these words Sacrifice Priests Altar when they speak of the Sacrament Holy-Table and the Ministers of the Gospel No man can deny this that hath but cast his Eyes upon their Writings who are every where full of these expressions He that shall vilifie their Authority in this let him give me better for the contrary or I shall conclude him ignorant and impudent Add the constant use of these words in the Church even to this day both of the Eastern Church of the Greeks who have no Communion with the Church of Rome and the Western Churches besides the Roman i. e. the Reformed Lutheran Churches and our own wherein these words were never out of use but that of late some Novellists who love to antiquate all things that are Antient that their own modern intentions might be more in credit have laboured to possess men with an ill opinion of them by telling them they were Popish names a simple reason For if these names be therefore naught because the Papists use them then seeing a quatenus ad de omnis valet consequentia as Logitians speak then all other names which the Papists use are naught and we must not call the Lords Supper a Sacrament because of them nor Christen onr Children John Thomas Robert c. because they do so Must we run from the Papists in every thing because they err in many things This is to run from Sense and Reason Thus have I shewed how the Sacrament of the Lords Supper is a Commemorative Sacrifice and the Holy Table an Altar ' that it is so called in Scriptures Fathers and all Churches Now why are the Ministers of the Gospel called Priests The word Priest if we look to the Notation and Original of it is the only proper word for the Ministers of the Gospel Priest the proper name of the Minister of the Gospel 1 Pet. 5.1 for it is nothing but the contraction or corruption of the word Presbyter which signifies an Elder So that Priest and Elder is all one and wheresoever we read the word Elder we may as well read it Priest as the Elders I exhort that is the Priests I exhort who am also a Priest Now Christ would have the Ministers of the Gospel called Priests or Elders not in respect of their Age but in regard of their Function and Preheminence over the People as being their Teachers and Instructors in which respect also the People though for their Age they may be Elder than the Priest yet in regard of their subordination to him are called Younger Again Ministers of the proper name of the Priests of the Law as the word Priest is the term proper to the Ministers of the Gospel so is the word Minister proper to those whom we call Priests of the Law For the word in the Old Testament which the Translators were pleased to render Priest not observing this notion which I have told you doth not indeed signify any such thing though that also be a word of Dignity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we translate Priest signifies one that Ministers about Holy things and therefore the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Latin sacerdos do more truly express the meaning of that word than our English Priest for we should rather render it a Holy Minister or