Rejoinder to Bristows Reply, Part 2 · Book 7 · Chapter 11
CAP. XI.
Sand.
Of the first author of the Sacramentarie heresie.
Hard.
Berengarius began first openly to shewe the Sacramentarie heresie, touching the veritie of Christes bodie in the sacrament.
Iew.
Before, master Harding said, the Messalians were the first fathers of this heresie, and so his tales hang not together.
Sand.
The Messalians began priuilie, by generall disgracing the sacrament: Berengarius began openly, by speciall denying the vertue thereof.
Fulk.
The Messalians spake as openly as Berengarius, and he that vtterly denieth the sacrament to be of any vertue, taketh away the special vertue also: wherefore Hardings tales agree not: but that is a small matter.
Iew.
Ioannes Scotus and Bertram, mainteined the same doctrine before Be…ngarius.
Sand.
If they barked in corners, at any ceremonie, (which is not euident to vsus) yet they mainteined it not. For then they had ben condemned of heresie, & by them you hauehave gained litle more then 200. yeres.
Fulke.
They preached and wrote openly, the one of them dedicating his booke to the Emperor, which is extant: the other condemned in the Councell of Vercells holden against Berengarius. But while they liued, their doctrine therein was not controlled. Two hundreth yeeres is small gaine to vsus, which count from the beginning, but it is great losse to you, that build vponupon antiquitie, not regarding how it came from the beginning.
Iewell.
It shalbe necessarie to open Berengarius iudgment.
Sand.
It is ynough, you are at a staye, and can bring your faith no higher then Ioannes Scotus and Berengarius.
Fulke.
We beginne at Christ, and bring downe the continuance of our faith herein, for 600. yeres and more, which you cannot impugne.
Iewell.
This is the enforced recantation of Berengarius. I beleeue that the body of our Lord Iesus Christ, sensiblie and in verie deede, is touched with the hande of the Priest, and broken and rent, and ground with ye teeth of the faithfull.
Sand.
You hauehave Englished the wordes very spightfully, you hauehave added Rent, of your own head. Atteri doth signifie to be broken in peeces, or to bee wasted, which may be done without grinding.
Fulk.
What great spight is in Rent, more then in Broken? and why should alteri signifie to be broken, whē we had the word broken before? and what honestie is it for you to say, ye body of Christ may be wasted wt the teeth? Finally, when you hauehave dentibus halteri. I meruaile why you dare not say, ground, except it be, yt you teach ye people to swallow the cake, and not to grind it wt their teeth.
Iewell.
The verie glosse saith: vnlesse you warely vnderstand these words of Berengarius, you will fall into a greater heresie then euer he helde any.
Sand.
The glosse telleth you, that al touching breaking, or washing, is to be referred to the formes of bread and wine.
Fulke.
Then the confession of Berengarius was false, that the body is touched, broken, grinded with teeth.
Iewel.
These fathers redresse the lesse error by the greater.
Sand.
They teach him to speake as Chrysostome hath spoken, in Ioan. Hom. 45. Non se &c: Christ permitteth himselfe not onelyonly to bee seene, to them that desire, but also to be touched, and to be eaten, and their teeth to be fastened in his flesh, & all men to be filled with desire of him.
Fulke.
Chrysostome speaketh figuratiuely, except you will say it is a proper speech, that Christ is seene in the Sacrament. These fathers abhorre all figuratiue speaches in this case, and it is nothing like, that a recantation of a figuratiue vnderstanding, should be expressed by figuratiue words.
Iewel.
That M. Harding calleth the catholike faith, is in deede a catholike error.
Sand.
No error can be catholike: because Christ said, Hell gates shal not preuaile against the Church, and it is a citie built vponupon an hill.
Fulke.
And yet all nations are made drunke with the furie of the wine of the whore of Babylons fornication. Wherefore an error may bee catholike, although not simply, yet in comparison of the small number that at sometime doe embrace the trueth.