THE

REAL PRESENCE,

&c.

SECTION I.

State of the Question.

nanòv

1. THE tree of knowledge became the tree of death to us; and the tree of life is now become an apple of contention. The holy symbols of the eucharist were intended to be a contesseration, and a union of Christian societies to God, and with one another; and the evil taking it, disunites us from God; and the evil understanding it, divides us from each other. Οὐκοῦν δεινὸν, εἰ γῆ χρηστὴ μὲν ἁμαρτοῦσ ̓ ὧν χρεὼν αὐτὴν τυχεῖν, κακὸν δίδωσι καρπόν. And yet if men would but do reason, there were in all religion no article, which might more easily excuse us from meddling with questions about it, than this of the holy sacrament. For as the man in Phædrus, that being asked what he carried hidden under his cloak, answered, it was hidden under his cloak; meaning, that he would not have hidden it, but that he intended it should be secret:-so we may in this mystery to them that curiously ask, what, or how it is? Mysterium est;' It is a sacrament, and a mystery;' by sensible instruments it consigns spiritual graces; by the creatures it brings us to God; by the body it ministers to the spirit. And that things of this nature are undiscernible secrets, we may learn by the experience of those men, who have, in cases not unlike, vainly laboured to tell us, how the material fire of hell should torment an immaterial soul, and how baptismal water should cleanse the spirit, and how a sacrament should nourish a body, and make it sure of the resurrection.

2. It was happy with Christendom, when she, in this article, retained the same simplicity which she always was bound to do in her manners and intercourse; that is, to believe the

thing heartily, and not to inquire curiously; and there was in this article for almost a thousand years together; peace and yet that transubstantiation was not determined, I hope to make very evident; "In synaxi transubstantiationem serò definivit ecclesia: diù satis erat credere, sive sub pane consecrato, sive quocunque modo adesse verum corpus Christi ;" so said the great Erasmusm: It was late before the church defined transubstantiation; for a long time together it did suffice to believe, that the true body of Christ was present, whether under the consecrated bread or any other way:" so the thing was believed, the manner was not stood upon. And it is a famous saying of Durandus"; "Verbum audimus, motum sentimus, modum nescimus, præsentiam credimus:" "We hear the word, we perceive the motion, we know not the manner, but we believe the presence;" and Ferus", of whom Sixtus Senensis P affirms that he was vir nobiliter doctus, pius et eruditus,' hath these words: "Cum certum sit ibi esse corpus Christi, quid opus est disputare, num panis substantia maneat, vel non?" "When it is certain that Christ's body is there, what need we dispute whether the substance of bread remain or no?" and therefore Cuthbert Tonstal, Bishop of Duresme, would have every one left to his conjecture concerning the manner: "De modo quo id fieret, satius erat curiosum quemque relinquere suæ conjecturæ, sicut liberum fuit ante concilium Lateranum":"Before the Lateran council, it was free for every one to opine as they please, and it were better it were so now.'-But St. Cyril' would not allow so much liberty; not that he would have the manner determined, but not so much as thought upon. "Firmam fidem mysteriis adhibentes, nunquam in tam sublimibus rebus, illud quomodo, aut cogitemus aut proferamus." For if we go about to think it or understand it, we lose our labour. "Quomodo enim id fiat, ne in mente intelligere, nec linguâ dicere possumus, sed silentio et firmâ fide id suscipimus:" "We can perceive the thing by faith, but cannot express it in words, nor understand it with our mind," said St. Bernard". Oportet igitur (it is at last, after the steps of the former progress, come to be a duty), nos in sumptionibus

66

m 1 Cor. vii. n Neand. Synops. Chron. p. 203.

• In Matt. xxvi.

P Biblioth. Sixt. Senensis, lib. 4. tit. Johannes Ferus.

6

divinorum mysteriorum, indubitatam retinere fidem, et non quærere quo pacto." The sum is this; The manner was defined but very lately: there is no need at all to dispute it; no advantages by it; and therefore it were better it were left at liberty to every man to think as he please; for so it was in the church for above a thousand years together; and yet it were better, men would not at all trouble themselves concerning it; for it is a thing impossible to be understood; and therefore it is not fit to be inquired after. This was their sense and I suppose we do, in no sense, prevaricate their so pious and prudent council by saying, The presence of Christ is real and spiritual;' because this account does still leave the article in his deepest mystery: not only because spiritual formalities and perfections are undiscernible and incommensurable by natural proportions, and the measures of our usual notices of things, but also because the word 'spiritual' is so general a term, and operations so various and many, by which the Spirit of God brings his purposes to pass, and does his work upon the soul, that we are, in this specific term, very far from limiting the article to a minute and special manner. Our word of spiritual presence' is particular in nothing, but that it excludes the corporal and natural manner; we say it is not this, but it is to be understood figuratively, that is, not naturally, but to the purposes and in the manner of the Spirit and spiritual things; which how they operate or are effected, we know no more than we know how a cherub sings or thinks, or by what private conveyances a lost notion returns suddenly into our memory, and stands placed in the eye of reason. Christ is present spiritually, that is, by effect and blessing; which, in true speaking, is rather the consequent of his presence than the formality. For though we are taught and feel that, yet this we profess we cannot understand; and therefore curiously inquire not. Eaqǹs theyχος, ἀπιστίας τὸ πῶς περὶ Θεοῦ λέγειν, said Justin Martyr; "It is a manifest argument of infidelity, to inquire, concerning the things of God, How, or After what manner?" And in this it was, that many of the fathers of the church laid their hands upon their mouths, and revered the mystery, but like the remains of the sacrifice, they burnt it; that is, as themselves expound the allegory, it was to be adored by faith, and not to be discussed with reason: knowing that, as

Solomon said, "Scrutator majestatis opprimetur à gloria:" "He that pries too far into the majesty, shall be confounded with the glory"

3. So far it was very well; and if error or interest had not unravelled the secret, and looked too far into the sanctuary, where they could see nothing but a cloud of fire, majesty and secrecy indiscriminately mixed together, we had kneeled before the same altars, and adored the same mystery, and communicated in the same rites, to this day. For, in the thing itself, there is no difference amongst wise and sober persons; nor ever was, till the manner became an article, and declared or supposed to be of the substance of the thing. But now the state of the question is this:

4. The doctrine of the church of England, and generally of the Protestants, in this article, is,-that after the minister of the holy mysteries hath rightly prayed, and blessed or consecrated the bread and the wine, the symbols become changed into the body and blood of Christ, after a sacramental, that is, in a spiritual real manner : so that all that worthily communicate, do by faith receive Christ really, effectually, to all the purposes of his passion: the wicked receive not Christ, but the bare symbols only; but yet to their hurt, because the offer of Christ is rejected, and they pollute the blood of the covenant, by using it as an unholy thing. The result of which doctrine is this: It is bread, and it is Christ's body. It is bread in substance, Christ in the sacrament; and Christ is as really given to all that are truly disposed, as the symbols are; each as they can; Christ as Christ can be given; the bread and wine as they can; and to the same real purposes, to which they are designed; and Christ does as really nourish and sanctify the soul, as the elements do the body. It is here, as in the other sacrament; for as there natural water becomes the lava of regeneration; so here, bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ; but, there and here too, the first substance is changed by grace, but remains the same in nature.

5. That this is the doctrine of the church of England, is apparent in the church-catechism; affirming "the inward part or thing signified" by the consecrated bread and wine to

Dum enim sacramenta violantur, ipse cujus sunt sacramenta violatur., S. Hieron. in 1 Malac.

be "the body and blood of Christ, which are verily and indeed taken and received of the faithful in the Lord's supper;" and the benefit of it to be," the strengthening and refreshing of our souls by the body and blood of Christ, as our bodies are by the bread and wine:" and the same is repeated severally in the exhortation, and in the prayer of the address before the consecration, in the canon of our communion; verily and indeed' is 'reipsâ,' that is, really enough;' that is our sense of the real presence; and Calvin affirms as much, saying, In the supper Christ Jesus, viz. his body and blood, is truly given under the signs of bread and wine." And Gregory de Valentia gives this account of the doctrine of the Protestants; that although Christ be corporally in heaven, yet is he received of the faithful communicants in this sacrament truly, both spiritually by the mouth of the mind, through a most near conjunction of Christ with the soul of the receiver by faith, and also sacramentally with the bodily mouth,' &c. And, which is the greatest testimony of all, we, who best know our own minds, declare it to be so.

6. Now that the spiritual is also a real presence, and that they are hugely consistent, is easily credible to them, that believe that the gifts of the Holy Ghost are real graces, and a spirit is a proper substance: and rà vontà are amongst the Hellenists Tà vra, intelligible things:' or things discerned by the mind of a man, are more truly and really such, and of a more excellent substance and reality, than things only sensible. And therefore, when things spiritual are signified by materials, the thing under the figure is called true, and the material part is opposed to it, as less true or real. The examples of this are not unfrequent in Scripture: " the tabernacle," into which the high-priest entered, was a type or a figure of heaven. Heaven itself is called oxnvǹ now, the true tabernacle *;' and yet the other was the material part. And when they are joined together, that is, when a thing is expressed by a figure, anon, true,' is spoken of such things, though they are spoken figuratively: "Christ, the true light, that lighteneth every man that cometh into the world ';" he is also the true vine2,' and ' verè cibus'' truly or really meat,' and 'panis verus è cœlo,' 'the true bread from

" Lib. 4. Inst. c. 7. sect. 32. De Missæ Sacrific.

a

* Heb. viii. 2.

y 1 John, ii. 8.

z John, xv. 1.

a John, vi, 32. 55.