Answer unto a Crafy and Sophistical Cavillation, Debate · Confutation of book 3 · Section 71
Caunterbury.
I HaueHave so playnly aunswered vntounto Emissene in my former booke, partly in this place, and partely in the second parte of my booke, that he that readeth ouer those two places, shall see most clearly yt you hauehave spēt a greate many of wordes here in vayne, and nede no further answer at all. And I had then such a care what I sayd, that I sayd nothing but according to Emissenus owne mind, and which I proued by his owne wordes. But if you finde but one word that in speach soundeth to your purpose, you sticke to that word tooth and nayle, caring nothing what the authors meaning is.
And here is one great token of sleight and vntruth to be noted in you that you write diligently eueryevery word,A sleight. so long as they seme to make with you. And when you come to the very place, where Emissene declareth the meaning of his wordes, there you leaue all the rest out of your booke, which can not be without a great vntruth and fraud, to deceaue the simple reader. For when you hauehave recited these wordes of Emissene, that the inuisible priest by the secret power with his word, tourneth the visible creatures into the substaunce of his body and bloud, and so further as serueth to your affection, when you come euen to the very place where Emissen declareth these words, there you leaue and cut of your writing.
But because the reader may know, what you hauehave cut of, and thereby know Emissens meaning, I shall here rehearse Emisenes words, which you hauehave left out. If thou wilt know (sayth Emissene) how it ought not to seeme to thee a thing new and impossible, that earthly and incorruptible things be tourned into the substance of Christ, looke vpō thy self which art made new in baptisme. When thou wast far from life, and banished as a stranger from mercy, and from the way of saluation, and inwardly wast dead, yet sodenly thou beganst an other new life in Christ, and wast made new by holesome misteries, and wast tourned into the bodye of the church, not by seing, but by beleuing, & of the child of damnatiō, by a secret purenes thou wast made the sonne of God. Thou visibly didst remayne in the same measure that thou haddest before, but inuisibly thou wast made greater, without any encrease of thy body. Thou wast the self same person and yet by encrease of fayth thou wast made an other man. Outwardly nothing was added, but all the change was inwardly. And so was mā made the sonne of Christ, and Christ formed in the mind of man. Therefore as thou putting away thy former vilenes diddest receiue a new dignity, not feling any chaunge in thy body, and as the curing of thy disease, the putting away of thine infection, the wiping away of thy filthines, be not seene with thine eyes, but beleued in thy minde: so likewise when thou doost goe vp to the reuerend aulter to feed vponupon the spirituall meat, in thy fayth, looke vponupon the body and blud of him that is thy God, honour hym, touch him with thy minde, take him in the hand of thy hart, and chiefly drink him with the draught of thy inward man. These be Emissens own wordes. Upon which words I gather his meaning in his former words by you alleadged. For where you bring in these wordes, that Christ by his secret power with his word turneth ye visible creatures into the substance of his body and bloud, straightwaies in these wordes by me now rehearsed, he sheweth what maner of turning that is, & after what maner the earthly and corruptible things be turned into the substance of Christ, euē so (saith he) as it is in baptisme, wherin is no Transubstantiation. So that I gather his meaning of his own playne words, and you gather his meaning of your own imagination, deuisyng such phantasticall things, as neither Emissen sayth, nor yet be catholike.
Truth.And this word (truth) you hauehave put vntounto ye wordes of Emissen of your own head, which is no true dealing. For so you may proue what you lift, if you may adde to the authors what words you please. And yet if Emissē had vsed both the wordes, substaunce and trueth, what should that helpe you? For Christ is in substaunce and truth present in baptisme, aswell as he is in the Lords supper, and yet is he not there carnally, corporally, and naturally.
OnelyOnly.I will passe ouer here to aggrauate yt matter, how vntruely you adde to my wordes this word (onelyonly) in an hundred places, where I say not so: what true and sinsere dealing this is, let all men iudge.
Now as concerning my coupling togither of the ii. sacraments of baptisme, and of the body and bloud of Christ, Emissene himself coupleth thē both together in this place, & sayth, that the one is like the other, without putting any difference, euen as I truely recited him. So that there appereth neither malice nor ignorāce in me, but in you adding at your pleasure such things, as Emissen saith not, (to deceaue the simple reader) and adding such your own inuentions, as be neither true nor catholick, appereth much shift and craft ioyned with vntruth and infidelity.
For what christian man would say (as you do) that Christ is not inded (which you call really) in baptisme?Errours. Or that we be not regenerated both body and soule as well in baptisme, as in the sacrament of the body and bloud of Christ? Or that in baptisme we be not vnited to Christes diuinity by his manhood? Or that baptisme represēteth not to vsus the high state of our glorification and the perfect redemption of our bodies in the generall resurrection? In which thinges you make difference betweene baptisme and the sacrament (as you call it) of the aultare. Or what man that were learned in gods word would affirme, that in the general resurrection our bodies and soules shalbe all spirituall? I know that S. Paule sayth, that in the resurrection our bodies shalbe spirituall,Spirituall. meaning in the respect of such vilenes, filthines, sinne, and corruption, as we be subiect vntounto in this miserable world. Yet he sayth not that our bodies shalbe all spirituall. For not withstanding such spiritualnes as S. Paule speaketh of, we shall hauehave all such substantiall partes and members, as pertaine to a very naturall mans body. So that in this part our bodyes shall be carnall, corporall, reall, and naturall bodies, lacking nothing that belongeth to perfect mens bodies. And in the respect is the body of Christ also, carnall and not spirituall. And yet we bring none other carnall imaginations of Christes body, nor, meane none other, but that Christes body is carnall in this respect, that it hath the same flesh and naturall substaunce which was borne of the virgine Mary, and wherin he suffered and rose agayne, and now sitteth at the right hand of his father in glory, and that the same his naturall body now glorified, hath all the naturall partes of a mans body in order, proportion & place distinct, as our bodies shalbe in these respects carnall after our resurrection. Which maner of carnalnes and diuersitie of partes and members, if you take away now from Christ in heauen, & from vsus after our resurrectiō, you make Christ now to hauehave no true mās body but a phantasticall body, as Martion & Ualentine did: & as concerning our bodies, you run into the error of Origen, which phansied & imagined, that at the resurrection all things should be so spiritual, that women should be turned into men, and bodies into soules.
And yet it is to be noted by the way, that in your aunswere here to Emissene, you make spiriturally, and a spirituall manner all one.
Now followeth myne aunswere to S. Ambrose in this wise.
And now I will come to the saying of S. Ambrose,The aunswere to Ambrosius de sacramentie lib. 4. cap. 4. which is alwayes in their mouthes. Before the consecration sayth he (as they alleage) it is bread, but after the wordes of the consectation, it is the body of Christ.
For answere herevnto, it must be first knowen what consecation is.
Consecration is the seperation of any thing from a prophane and worldlyConsecration. vse, vntounto a spirituall and godly vse.
In i…. Roffeam. 2. cap. 25.And therfore when vsuall and common water is taken from other vses, and put to the vse of baptisme, in the name of the father & of the sonne, and of the holy ghost, then it may rightly be called Consecrated water, that is to say, water put to an holy vse.
Euen so when common bread and wine be taken and seuered from other bread and wine, to the vse of the holy communion, that portion of bread and wine, although it be of the same substaunce that the other is, from the which it is seuered, yet it is now called consecrated or holy bread and holy wine.
Not that the bread and wine hauehave or can hauehave any holines in thē, but that they be vsed to an holy work, and represent holye and godlye thinges. And therfore S. Dionise calleth the bread,De ecc. Hierar. cap. 3. holy bread and the cup an holy cup, as soone as they bebe set vponupon the aultare to the vse of the holy communion.
But specially they may be called holy and consecrated, when they be seperated to that holy vse by Christes owne wordes, which he spake for that purpose saying of the breade:Math. 26. Marc. 14. Luc. 22. This is my bodye, And of the wine: This is my bloud.
So that cōmōly the authors, before those wordes be spokē, do take the bread and wine but as other cōmon bread and wine, but after those wordes be pronounced ouer thē, then they take thē for consecrated & holy bread & wine.
Not that the bread and wine can be partakers of any holines or godlinesse, or can be the body and bloud of Christ, but that they represent the very body and bloud of Christ, and the holy foode and nourishment, which we hauehave by him. And so they be called by the names of the body and bloud of Christ, as the signe, token and figure is called by the name of the very thing, which it sheweth and signifieth,
And therfore as S. Ambrose in the wordes before cited by the aduersaries saith, that before the consecration, it is bread, and after the consecration it is Christes body, so in other places he doth more playnly set forth his meaning saying these wordes:De his qui misterij… in iciantur cap. Vlt. Before the benediction of the heauenly wordes, it is called an other kind of thing, but after the consecratiō, is signisied the body of christ Likewise before the consecartion it is called an other thing, but after the consecration, it is named the bloud of Christ. And agayne he sayth: When I treated of the sacraments, I tolde you, that that thing which is offered, before the words of Christ,De sacramentis lib. 5. cap. 4 is called breade, but when the wordes of Christ bee pronounced, then it is not called breade, but it is called by the name of Christes body.
"By which wordes of S. Ambrose, it appereth playnely, that the bread is called by the name of Christes body, after the consecratiō, & although it be still bread, yet after consecration it is dignified by the name of the thing, which it representeth: as at length is declared before in the proces of Transubstantiation, and specially in the words of Theodoretus.
And as the bread is a corporall meat, and corporally eaten, so sayth S. Ambrose, is the body of Christ a spirituall meat,De sacramentis lib. 6. cap. 1. and spiritually eaten, and that requireth no corporall presence.