Exposition of the Principal Scriptures Used in our English Liturgy, Part 20
Cum spiritu tuo.
THe peoples answere, Cum spiritu tuo, is taken out of the secondhCap. 4. ver. 22. Epistle of Paul to Timothie: The Lord Iesus Christ be with thy spirit. It answereth the reapers answere to Boaz; The Lord blesse thee. These mutuall salutationsiDurandus rational. diuin. lib. 4. cap. 14. §. 5 insinuate sweete agreement and louelove betweene the Pastor and parishioners: it is the Ministers office to begin, and the peoples dutie to correspond in good affection and kindnes: for louelove is the adamant of louelove. When the Minister is a Paul, the people must be Galatians, if it werekGalat. 4. 15. possible, willing to pull out their eyes, and to giuegive them for his good: lCaluin. in loc. ad Galat.not only to reuerence his place, but also to louelove his person.
A Pastor cannot vse to the people a better wish then, The Lord be with you. FormRom. 8. 31. if God be with them, who can be against them? and the people cannot make a fitter reply, then, with thy spirit. For (as Plato diuinely said) eueryevery mans soule is himselfe.
Againe, forasmuch as God is a spirit nIob. 4. 24., and ought to bee worshipped in spirit; it is meete we should performe this spirituall seruice with all carnest contention and intention of spirit. See Magnificat.
Christ promised, Matth. 18. to bee with vsus in our deuotion, in the middest of vsus, when wee meete to pray. But,oSer. de eo, vbi duo aut tres. as Eusebius Emissenus obserueth, how shall God be in the middest of thee, when as thou art not in the middest of thy selfe? Quomodo erit deus in medio t…i, si tecum ipse non fueris? If the aduocate sleepe, how shall the Iudge awake? No maruell if thou lose thy suite, when as in praying thou losest thy selfe.
Prayer is the Christians gunshot (saithpLoc. com. tit. inuocat. Luther) Oratio, bombardae Christianorum. As then a bullet out of a gun: so prayers out of our mouth, can goe no further then the spirit doth carrie them: if they beqBernard. ser. 4. de Ieiunio & orat. Timidae, they cannot flie far: if Tumidae, not pearce much; only feruent and humble deuotion hitteth the marke; penetrating the walles of heauen, albeit they were brasse, and the gates iron.
The Church hath placed these mutuall responsories at the very beginning of our prayers after the Lessons and Confession of saith: becauserIohn 15. 5. Christ said, Without me ye can doe nothing. Wherefore the Church, as I hauehave shewed, begins her prayers at the first with, O Lord open thou our lips: and here praying afresh, The Lord be with you; begins, I say, with, The Lord bee with you, and ends with, through Iesus Christ our Lord. Signifying hereby that Christ issApocal. 1. 8. Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, without whom we can neither begin well, nor end well. And this is the reason why the Church after this interchangeable salutation, enioynes vsus to pray, Lord hauehave merciemercy vponupon vsus: Christ hauehave merciemercy vponupon vsus: Lord &c. vsing an earnest repetition (as I coniecture) rather to presse this one point, then (astBelethus lib. de Diuinis officij…, cap. 36. other write) to notifie the three diuine persons.
And it is worth obseruing, that we conclude these short Suffrages, as we began: for as in the first we desire the Lord to be with vsus and our spirit; so likewise in the last, that hee would not take his holie spirit from vsus, but accompanie the whole Church vntounto the end and in the end.
I am occasioned in this place iustly to defend the peoples answering the Minister aloud in the Church. The beginning of which interlocutorie passages, is ascribed byuIn vita Damasi. Platina to Damasus Bishop of Rome; byxLib. 2. hist. cap. 24. Magdeburg. cent. 4. col. 897. Theodoret to Diodorus Bishop of Antioch; byyLib. de rebus Eccles. cap. 25. alludens forsitan ad Hexam. Amoros. lib. 3. cap. 5. Walafridus Strabo to S. Ambrose Bishop of Millane: all which liued 1100 yeeres before the Church was acquainted with any French fashions: and yet Basil, epist. 63. alleageth that the Churches of Egypt, Libya, Thebes, Palestina, Phoenicians, Syrians, Mesopotamiās, vsed it long before.zEcclesiast. hist. lib. 6. cap. 8. Socrates andaVbi supra. Strabo write, that Ignaetius, a scholler vntountobHieron. catalog. script. Eccl. in vita Ignat. Muscul. in Mat. 26. 30. thinkes that Christ and his Apostles vsed it. Christs owne schollers, is thought to be the first author hereof. If any shall expect greater antiquitie and authoritie, wee can fetch this order euen from the quier of heauen: I saw the Lord (saidcCap 6. 3. Esay) set on an high Throne, the Seraphims stood vponupon it, and one cried to another saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hostes, all the world is full of his glorie.
Blessed spirits in praising God answere one another interchangeably: though vnhappie scornefull spirits vnmannerly terme this custome,dT. C. lib. 1. pag. 203. Tossing of seruice. But it may be said of them, aseLib. contra Heluidium in initio. H…erome wrote of Heluidius: Existimant loquacitatem esse facundiam, & maledicere omnibus bonae conscientiae signum arbitr…tur.