Vindication of the Animadversions on Fiat Lux, Chapter 19 – Chapter 20
CHAP. 19.
Of preaching the Mass: And the Sacrifice of it. Transubstantiation. Service of the Church.
WE are arrived at length unto the Consideration of those particulars in your Roman faith, which in your Fiat you chose out either to adorn and set off the way in Religion which you invite your Countreymen to embrace, or so to gild it, as that they may not take any prejudice from them against the whole of what you profess. The first of these is that which you entituled Messach, which you now inform us to be a Saxon word, the same with Mass. But why you make use of such an absolete word to amuze your Readers withal, you give us no account. Will you give me leave to guess? for if I mistake not▪ I am not far from your fancy. Plain downright Mass is a thing that hath gotten a very ill name amongst your Countreymen, especially since so many of their forefathers were burned to death for refusing to resort unto it. Hence it may be you thought meet to wave that name, which both the thing known to be signified by it in its own nature, and your procedure about it had rendred obnoxious to suspicion. So you call it by a new old name, or an old new name, that men might not at first know what you intended upon your invitation to entertain them withal: and yet it may be, that they would like it under a new dress, which the old name might have startled them from the Consideration of. But Mass or Messach let it be as you please, we shall now consider what it is, that you offer afresh concerning it, and hear you speak out your own words. Thus you say, p. 81.
Having laughed at my admiration of Catholick Service, you carp at me for saying that the Christians were never called together to hear a Sermon; to convince me you bring some places out of St. Pauls Epistles, and the Acts which commend the Ministry of the Word. This indeed is your usual way of refuting my Speeches. You flourish copiously in that which is not at all against me, and never apply it to my words, least it should appear as it is, impertinent. I deny not that Converts were further instructed, or that the preaching of Gods Word is good and usefull; but that which I say, is, that Primitive Christians were never called together for that end, as the great work of their Christianity. This I have clearly proved.
Well Sir, without retorsion, which just indignation against this unhandsome management of a desperate Cause is ready to suggest, be pleased to take a little view of your own words once more, pag. 279. you tell us, that the Apostles and Apostolical Christians placed their Religion not in hearing, or making Sermons, FOR THEY HAD NONE, but in attending to their Christian Lyturgie; and the Sermons mentioned in the Acts, were made to the Jews and Pagans for their Conversion, not to any Christians at all. Could I now take any other course to confute these false and impious Assertions, then what I did in the Animadversions? I proved unto you, that Sermons were made unto Christians by the Apostles for their edification; that order is given by them for the instant preaching of the Word, in and unto the Churches unto the end of the world; and that those are by them signally commended who laboured in that work; and what can be spoken more directly to the confutation of your Assertion? You would now shrowd your self under the ambiguity of that expression, the great work of their Christianity, which yet you make no use of in your Fiat. The words there from which you would get countenance unto your present evasion are these. Nowhere was ever Sermon made to formal Christians either by St. Peter or Paul or any other, as the work of their Religion that they came together for; nor did the Christians ever dream of serving God after their Conversion by any such means, but ONLY by the Eucharist or Liturgy. Here is somewhat of the work of their Religion which they came together for, nothing of the great work of their Christianity. Now that preaching was a work of their Religion that they came together for, though not the only work of it, no… only end for which they so convened, which no man ever dreamed that it was, and that the Primitive Christians did by, and in that work serve God, hath been proved unto you from the Scripture. And all Antiquity with the whole story of the Church, gives attestation to the same Truth. Sir it were far more honourable for you to renounce a false and scandalous Assertion when you are convinced that such it is, then to seek to palliate it, and to secure your self by such unhansome evasions. Preaching of the word unto believers is an Ordinance of Christ, and that of indispensible necessity unto their edification or growth in Grace and knowledge which he requireth of them. In the practice of this ordinance were the Apostles themselves sedulous, and commanded others so to be. So were they in the Primitive following times, as you may learn from the account given us of Church meetings by Justin Martyr, and Tertullian in their Apologies, and all that have transmitted any thing unto Posterity concerning their Assemblies. For this end, to hear the word preached, Christians came together, not only, or solely, or exclusively to the administration of other Ordinances, but as to a part of that worship which God required at their hands, and wherein no small of their spiritual advantage was enwrapped. To deny this, as you do in your Fiat, is to deny that the Sun shines at noon day, and to endeavour to dig up the very roots of P…ety, Knowledge, and all Christianity; to what ends and purposes, and for the enthroning of what other thing in your room, let all indifferent men judge. And I shall take leave to say, that to my best observation, I never met with an Assertion in any Author of what Religion so ever more remote from truth, sobriety and modesty then that of yours in your Fiat, pag. 275. Nor did the Primitive Christians for 300. years ever hear a Sermon made unto them upon a Text, but meerly flocked together at their Priests appointment unto their Messachs. This I say is so loudly and notoriously untrue, and so known to be so, to all that have ever looked into the stories of those times, that I am amazed at your confidence in the publishing of it. It may be you will hope to shelter your self under the ambiguity of that expression made unto them upon a text. Supposing that an instance cannot be given of that mode of preaching, wherein some …ertain Text is read at the entrance of a Sermon and principally insisted upon. But this Fig leaf will not cover you from the just Censure of knowing men. For 1. Their following adversative, but meerly, is perfectly exclusive of all preaching be it of what Mode it will be. 2. The reading of one certain Text before Preaching is not necessary unto it, but all preaching is and ever was upon some Text or Texts, that is, it consisted in the explication and application of the word of God, that is, some part of portion of it. 3. Whereas it is certain that our Saviour himself preached on a Text, Luk. 4. 17, 18, 19, 20, 21. as also did his Apostles, Act. 8. 35. and the Fathers of the following Ages, it is sufficiently evident that that was also the constant mode of preaching in the first 300. years, as may be made good in the instance of Origen and sundry others.
You go on, and except against me for saying, that we hear nothing of your Sacrifice of the Mass in the Scripture; and say you will neither hear nor see; say you the passion of our Lord is our Christian Sacrifice? do not I say s… too? but that this incruent Sacrifice was instituted by the same Lord before his death to figure out daily before our eyes, that passion of his which was then approaching in commemoration of his death so long as the world should last.
I must desire you to stay here a little; This Sacrifice you make the main of Christian Religion. Protestants for the want of it, you esteem to have no Religion at all. We must therefore consider, what it is that you intend by it, for I suppose you would not have us accept of we know not what, and you seem both in your Fiat and in your Epistola to obscure it as much as you are able. 1. You call it an incruent Sacrifice, which (1.) Shews only what it is not, and that in one only instance which is a very lame description of any thing; and this also may be affirmed of any Metaphorical Sacrifice what ever; as offering unto God, the calves of our lips; it is an incruent Sacrifice. 2. Your Expression implyes a contradiction. Every proper Propitiatory Sacrifice was bloody; and an incruent proper Sacrifice, such as you would have this to be, is a proper improper Propitiatory Sacrifice. 2. You say it was instituted by our Lord to figure out his Passion. (1.) This is a weighty proof of what you have in hand, being the only thing to be proved. (2.) I suppose in the examination of it, it will appear that you Sacrifice that very body and blood of Christ in your own conceits, which himself offered unto God; and how you can make any thing, to be a figure of it self, as yet I do not perfectly understand. (3.) That the Lord Christ appointed the Sacrament of his body and blood, and our Eucharistical Sacrifice therein to be a Commemoration of his death and Passion, is the Doctrine of Protestants, where with your Sacrifice hath a perfect inconsistency, as we shall find in the Consideration of it. This is the substance of what you are pleased to acquaint us with about this great business of our Religion. But because you shall perceive that it was not without good grounds and reasons that I affirmed the Scripture to be utterly silent of this that you make the great work of Christianity, I shall a little further enquire after the nature of it; that I mean which by you it is fancied to be, for it is a mere creature of your own imagination.
1. You alwayes contend that it is a proper Sacrifice which you intend. The first Canon of your Council accurseth them who deny it to be verum & proprium Sacrificium, a True and proper Sacrifice, wherein as they say before Christus inimolatur, Christ is Sacrificed. Many things in the New Testament in respect of their Analogy unto the Institutions of the old, are called Sacrifices, even almost all spiritual actions that are acceptable unto God in Christ. The preaching of the Gospel unto the conversion of sinners, is termed Sacrificing, Rom. 15. 16. So is Faith it self, Phil. 2. 17. So Prayers and Thanksgiving are an oblation, Heb. 5. 7. chap. 13. 15. and good works are called Sacrifices, Heb. 13. 16. Phil. 4. 18. And our whole Christian Obedience is intimated by Peter so to be. In the Sacrament of the Eucharist it is that you seek for your Sacrifice. And if you would be contented to call it, and esteem it so, upon the account of its comprizing some of the things before mentioned, or meerly as a spiritual action appointed by God and acceptable unto him, there would be an end of this contest. But you must have it a proper Sacrifice, like those of Aaron of old: not a remembrance of the Sacrifice of Christ, but a Sacrifice of Christ himself, wherein Christus immolatur, Christ is sacrificed, as the Council speaks.
2. The Secrifices of old were of two sorts, 1. Eucharistical, or Oblations of the fruits of the earth or other things, whereby the Sacrificers acknowledged God as the Lord and Author of all good things and mercies, with thanksgiving. 2. Propitiatory for the atoning of God, the reconciling him unto sinners; for the turning away of his wrath and the impetration of the pardon of sin. This was done typically and Sacramentally by virtue of their respect unto the oblation of Christ, by the old bloody Sacrifices of the Law; really and effectually by that bloody Sacrifice which the Lord Jesus Christ once offered for all. Now because in the Sacrament of the Eucharist it is our Duty to offer up unto God our thankeful prayers for his unspeakable love in sending his only Son to dye for us, we do not contend with any, who on that accont, and with respect unto that peculiar act of our duty in it, shall call it an Eucharistical Sacrifice, yea affirm it so to be. But you will have it a propitiatory Sacrifice, a Sacrifice of Atonement like that made by Christ himself; a Sacrifice for the sins of the living and the dead, making reconciliation with God, obtaining Pardon of sin, and eternal life, things peculiar to the one Sacrifice of Christ in his death and passion.
3. Though you usually exclude the communion from it, wherein you do wisely, that it may have no affinity with the Institution of Christ, yet you do not precisely determine your Sacrifice unto any one act or action in your Mass, but make it comprize the whole with the manner of its celebration, from the first setting forth of the Elements of bread and wine mixed with water, unto the end of the Offertory after their Transubstantiation and religious adoration thereupon, and their offering up unto God the body and blood of Christ under the accidents of bread and wine. The presentation of the bread and wine, you would prove to belong unto your Sacrifice from the example of Melchisedeck. Your Transubstantiation is also of the essence of it: for it is required in a Sacrifice sayes your Bellarmine, that the sensible thing to be offered unto God be changed and plainly destroyed. de Miss. Lib. 1. cap. 2. which you esteem the substance of your bread and wine to be in your Transubstantiation. Your religious adoration of the consecrated …st belongs also unto it, for that in the Canon of the Mass immediately ensues your Transubstantiating Consecration, before the oblation it self, and so must necessarily be a part of your Sacrifice: Your offering up unto God of Jesus Christ, praying him to accept of him at the Priests hands (supra quae propitio & sereno vultu respicere digneris & accepta habere) belongs also unto it. So doth your direction of it to the propitiating of God, and the expiation of the sins of the Quick and the Dead; The Ceremonies also wherewith your Masse is celebrated, as I suppose, most of them belong to your Sacrifice; and those who believe them not to be duties of Piety, are accursed by your Council of Trent. The Priests eating of the Host belongs to the Sacrifice, yea saith Bellarmine, it is pars essentialis Sacrificii, though not tota essentia, an essential part of the Sacrifice, though the whole Essence of it doth not consist therein. I know you are at a great loss and variance among your selves to find out what it is, that is properly your Sacrifice, or wherein the essence of it doth consist. Some of your discrepant opinions are given us by your Azorius Lib. 10. Chap. 19. Sunt saith he, qui putant rationem sacrificii totam constitui in verbis, precibus, ceremoniis & ritibus, qui in cons…oratione adhibentur, eo quod Sacrificii ratio, inquiunt, nequit in ipsa consecratione consistere, quin è contrario consecratio ad rationem Sacramenti potius quam ad naturam Sacrificii pertinet. Alii existimant Sacrificii rationem tribus Sacerdotis actionibus constare, consecratione, oblatione & sumptione. Alii quidem se…sere ad rationem hujus Sacrificii quat uor imo quinque actiones concurrere, Consecrationem, oblationem, fractionem, sumptionem. Alii rationem S…crificii ponunt in duobus actibus, consecratione & oblatione. Alii constituunt totam rationem. Sacrificii in … actione, viz. Consecratione. There are who think the nature of the Sacrifice to consist in the words, rayers, ceremonies and rites which are used in the Consecration, because say they the nature of the Sacrifice cannot consist in the Consecration it self, which rather belongs unto the nature of a Sacrament then of a Sacrifice. Others think that the Sacrifice consists in three actions of the Priest, Consecration, Oblation and Sumption, or receiving of the Host. Others in four or five, as Consecration, Oblation, Fraction, Sumption. Others in two, Consecration and Oblation; and some in one, Consecration. And is not this a brave business to impose on the Consciences of all men, when you know not your selves what it is that you would so impose? A Sacrifice must be believed, and they are all accursed by you that believe it not; but what the Sacrifice is, and wherein it doth consist, you cannot tell. And an easie matter it were to manifest that all the particulars which you assign as those that either belong necessarily unto the integrity of a Sacrifice, or those wherein some of you, or any of you, would have its essence to consist, are indeed of no such nature or importance; but that is not my present business. I am only enquiring what your Sacrifice is according unto you own sense and imagination. And that we may not mistake, I shall set down such a general description of it, as the Canon of the Mass, the general rubrick of the Missal, the rites and cautels of its celebration, will afford unto us. Now in these it is represented as a sacred action, wherein a proper Priest or Sacrificer, arrayed with various consecrated attire, standing at the Altar, taketh bread and wine, about which he useth great variety of …ostures and gestures, inclinations, bowings, kneelings, stretching out and gathering in his arms, with a multitude of Crossings, at the end and in the midst of his pronunciation of certain words of Scripture, turns them into the real natural body and blood of Christ the Son of God, worshiping them so converted with religious adoration, shewing them to the people for the same purpose, and then offering that body and blood unto God, praying for his acceptance of them so offered, and that it may be available for the living and the dead, for the pardoning of their sins, and saving of their souls; after which he takes that body of Christ so made, worshipped and offered, and eats and deavours it, by all which Christ is truly and properly Sacrificed.
This is the Sacrifice of your Church, wherein as you inform us, the main of your Devotion and Worship doth consist. Of this Sacrifice I told you formerly the Scripture is silent; and I now add that so also is Antiquity. You cannot produce any one approved writer for the space of 600. years that gives testimony to this your Sacrifice. For what ever florish you may make with the ambiguity of the word Sacrifice, which we cleared before, your Transubstantion and other things asserted by you to belong unto the integrity, if not the Essence of your Sacrifice, are strangers unto Antiquity, as hath been lately proved unto you, and will no doubt be yet further confirmed so to be.
I told you as you observe, that this Sacrifice is an utter stranger to Scripture, as also that it is inconsistent with what is therein delivered. The Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews plainly affirms that the Sacrifice of the Church of the Christians is but one, and that once offered for all; whereas those of the Jews by reason of their imperfection were often repeated; which you choose out to reply unto, and say, It is true the Sacrifice of our Lords Passion of which the Apostle in that whole discourse intends only to treat in opposition unto that of Bulls and goats, was so done but once, that it could not be done twice. But as the Sacrifices of the Old Law were instituted by Almighty God to be often iterated, before the Passion of the Messias for a continual exercise of Religion; so did the same Lord for the very same purpose institute another to be iterated after his death, unto which it was to have reference when it should be past, as the former had to the same death when it was to come. So you.
But first, This begs the Question; for you only repeat and say that such a Sacrifice was institued by Christ, which you know is by us utterly denyed. (2.) It plainly contradicts the Apostle, and overthrows his whole argument and design. 1. It contradicts him in express terms; for whereas he sayes not only that Christ once offered himself, but also that he was once offered for all, that is, no more to be offered, you affirm that he is often offered, and that every day. 2. His design is to demonstrate the excellency of the Condition of the Church of the New Testament and the worship of God therein above that of the Old. And this he proves to consist here in a special manner, that they had many Sacrifices which were of necessity to be reiterated because they could not take away sin; for saith he, if they could, then should they not have been repeated, nor would there have been need of any other Sacrifice. But, now saith he, this is done by the one Sacrifice of Christ, which hath so taken away sin, as that it hath made the repetition of its self, or the institution of any other Sacrifice needless; and therefore we have no more but that one, and that one once performed. Now unless you will deny the Apostles Assertions, either (1.) That if one Sacrifice can take away sin, there is no need of another; or (2.) That the one Sacrifice of Christ did perfectly take away sin as to Attonement: and also (3.) assert that the condition of the Gospel Church is still the same with that of the Jews, and that we have need of a Sacrifice to be repeated, not only as theirs was year by year, from whence he argues the imperfection of the greatest solemn Sacrifice of Expiation, but day by day with a further and greater weakness, (repetition in the judgement of the Apostle being an evidence thereof) there will be no place left for your Sacrifice; that is, your main worship belongs not to the Church of God at all. (4.) You pretend that in this worship Christ himself is Sacrificed unto God, but incruenter, and without suffering: but the Apostle plainly tells us, that if he be often offered, he must often suffer, Heb. 9. 26. And the Sacrifice of Christ, without his passion, his offering without suffering, evacuates both the one and the other.
But what of all this? if the Apostles used the Sacrifice you talk of, that of the Mass, is it meet we should do so also? Hereof you say, were not the Apostles according to this rite foreign Sacrificing to our great Lord God, when Paul was by imposi…ion of hands segregated from the Layity to his Divine Service, as I clearly in my Paragraph … out of the History of the Acts of the Apostles? … you, the Apostles were not then about any Sacrifice, but only preaching Gods word or some such thing to the people in the name and behalf of God. But Sir, is this to be in earnest or jest? the sacred text says they were Sacrificing to our Lord, liturgying and ministring unto him; you say they were not Sacrificing to God, but only preaching to the people. And now the Question is whither you or I more rightly understand that Apostolical Book; for my sense and meaning I have all Antiquity as well as the plain words of the sacred Text; You have neither.
How empty and vain this Discourse of yours is, wherein you seem greatly to triumph, will quickly be discovered. And you are a merry man if you think by such arguments as these to perswade us that the Apostles Sacrificed to God according to the rite of your Mass, as though we did not know by whom the chief parts of it, particularly those wherein you place your Sacrifice, were invented many hundreds of years after they fell asleep. 1. You say they were foreign, Sacrificing to our great Lord God, as though it were God the Father, or God absolutely that is intended in that expression foreign to the Lord. foreign the Lord is Sir peculiarly donotative of the Person of the Mediator, Jesus Christ, God and Man, according to that Rule given us …y the Apostle; 1 Cor. 8. 6. To us there is one God the Father, foreign and one Lord Jesus Christ. And this is the constant denotation of the word, wh… used absolutely as here it is, throughout the wh… New Testament. To Christ the Mediator were … Churches ministring, Act. 13. That is in his na… and Authority, according to his appointment, and unto his service. And this one observation suffic… ently discovers the vanity of your Argument: for you will not say that they offered Sacrifice to the Lord Christ emphatically and reduplicatively, seeing if you may be believed it is he whom they offered in Sacrifice. Of such force is the Sophism wherein you boast. And (2.) You wisely observe that Paul by the imposition of hands there mentioned was segregated from the Layity, whereas he tells you, that he was an Apostle, (wherein certainly he was segregated from the Layity) neither of men, nor by men, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, Gal. 1. 1. that is, there was no intimation or interposition of the Ministry or Authority of any man in his call to that office, which he had for sundry years exercised before this his peculiar separation to the work of preaching anew to the Gentiles. So well are you skilled in the sense of that Apostolical Book. 3. And not to insist on the repetition of my former Answer, which in your wonted manner you lamely and unduly represent, could you by other Arguments and on other testimonies, prove that the Sacrifice you plead for was instituted by Christ, and offered by the Apostles, there might possibly be some colour for a man to think that they performed that duty also when they were said foreign in the service of God. But from that general expression intimating any kind of publick Ministery whatever, and never used in any Author sacred or Prophane precisely and absolutely to signifie sacrificing, to conclude that they were offering Sacrifice, and to use no other testimony to prove they had any such Sacrifice, is such a fondness as nothing but insuperable prejudice can perswade a man in his right wits to give countenance unto. St. Paul tells us that the Magistrate is foreign; doth he mean that he is Gods Sacrificer? or his Minister? And he sayes of himself that he was foreign, doth he intend that he was Christs Sacrificer? or his Servant? Rom. 15. 16. & v. 27. he sayes that it was the duty of the Gentiles foreign, doth he mean to Sacrifice in your carnal things, or to minister of them to the Jews? (1.) But you will it may be except that they were not said foreign, as those here (that is the Prophets of the Church of Antioch and not the Apostles as you mistake) are said to do, to liturgie to the Lord; it must needs be Sacrificing, because it was to the Lord. But 1. I have shewed you how this pretence is perfectly destructive of your own intendment, in that it is the Lord Christ that is especially meant, unto whom distinctly you will not say they were sacrificing. And (2.) Were it …ot so, yet the expression would not give you the least colour of advantage. What think you of, 1 Sam. 3. 1. foreign, and the child Samuel was Liturgying (seeing you will have it so) unto the Lord before Eli. Do you think that the child, which was not of the family of Aaron, nor yet called to be a Prophet was offering Sacrifice to God, and the high Priest looking on? Do you not see the fondness of your pretension? (3.) I told you before, but now begin to fear that you are too old to learn what you do not like, that the 70. never translated foreign Sacrifice, or to Sacrifice by foreign or foreign, nor intimate any Sacrifice anywhere by that word. And you may if you please now learn by the Instance of Samuel, that what men perform in the worship of God according to his command, they may be said therein to Minister unto or before the Lord in. (4.) The note of your own Cajetan upon the place is worth your Consideration, non explicatur species Ministerii, sed ex to qu…d di…rant (prophetae & doctores) insinuatur … Domino, docendo & prophetando; … Ministery is spoken of is not explained, but … they were Prophets and Teachers (that … in it) it is insinuated that they ministred … Lord by teaching and prophesying. What have … phets and Teachers to do with Sacrifice? if as … they administred unto the Lord, they did it by prophesying and teaching which were accompanied by prayer. Here is no mention of Sacrifi…e nor work for Priests, so that the context excludes your sense. The same is the interpretation of Erasmus. (5.) Your vulgar Latine reads the words, administrantibus Domino, as they were ministring unto the Lord, excluding their notion of Sacrificing. And (6.) The Syriack transposeth the words and interprets the Sacrifice intended in them foreign and when they were fasting and praying unto the Lord. Praying (together with prophesying and preaching) was their Ministry, not Sacrificing. To the same purpose all antient Translations, not one giving countenance unto your fancy. So well have you the plain words of the sacred Text for you. (7.) Are you not ashamed to boast that you have all Antiquity for your sense and meaning? Produce any one antient Author, if you can, that gives the least countenance unto it. This boasting is uncomely because untrue. Bellarmine out of whom you took your Plea from this place, and your q…otation of Erasmus in your Fiat, cannot produce the suffrage of any one of the Antients for your interpretation of the words, no more can any of your Commentators. The Homilies of Chrysostom on that passage are lost. Oecumenius is quite blank against you; so is Cajetan, Erasmus, and Vatablus of your own: and do you not now see what is become of your boasting? And are not your Countrymen beholding unto you, for endeavouring so industriously to draw them off from the Institution of Christ, to place their Confidence and devotion in that which hath not the least footstep in Scripture or Antiquity, but is expresly condemned by them both? But to tell you my judgement, you will prevail with very few of them to answer your desires. Will they judge it meet and equal think you to change a blessed Sacrament that Christ hath appointed, to embrace a Sacrifice that you have invented? to leave calling upon God according to the sense of their wants with understanding, as they do in that Celebration of the Eucharist which now they enjoy, to attend unto a Priest sometimes muttering, sometimes saying, sometimes singing a deal of Latine whereof they understand never a word? To forego that internal humility, self abasement, and prostration of soul unto God which they are enured unto in that Sacrament, to become spectators of the Theatrical gestures of your Sacrificers? Besides they are not able to comply with your request, and to make your Mass the sum of their Devotion and worship of God, without offering the highest violence to their Faith as they are Christians, their Reason as they are men, and that Sense which they have in common with other Creatures. And what are you, or what have you done for them that you should at once expect such a profuse largeness at their hands?
I. For your Faith, if it be grounded on the Scripture as every true Protestants is, your Sacrifice if admitted, will unquestionably evert it; To accept of a worship pretended to be of such huge importance, as to be available for the impetration of Grace, Mercy, Pardon of sins, removal of punishment, life eternal, for the living and the dead, destitute of all foundation in, or countenance from the Scripture, absolutely inconsistent with their faith.
2. It is no less to have a Sacrament which is given unto us of God as a pledge and token of his Love and Grace, turned into a Sacrifice, which is a thing by us offered unto God and accepted by him, so that they differ as in other things, so in their terms, à quo and ad quem, from what they proceed, and by whom they are accepted.
3. Besides they will quickly discover your pretensions to be contrary unto what the Scripture teacheth them, both concerning the Sacrifice of Christ and also his institution of his last supper, which is your Rule and comprizeth the whole of your Duty in the administration of it. They do not find that therein Christ offered himself unto his Father, but to his Disciples; not to him to be accepted of him, but to them to be by faith received.
4. And whereas the Apostle expresly affirms that he offered himself but once, if he offered himself a Sacrifice in his last Supper, you must maintain that he offered himself twice, unless you will deny his Sacrifice on the Cross.
5. Moreover it is greatly opposite to your Countreymens faith about the Priesthood of Christ and his real Sacrifice, which are to them things of that moment, that whosoever shakes their faith in and about them, shakes the very foundations of their hope, consolation and salvation. They have been taught that Christ remains an High Priest for ever, and the multiplication of Priests in succession arising meerly from the mortality and death of them that preceded, they believe that no Priest can be sustituted unto him in his office to offer a proper Sacrifice unto God, the same which he offered himself, without a supposition of an insufficiency in him for his work. It is true there are persons who in his name and Authority, as he is the great Prophet of the Church, do Minister unto it, whom some of them, either as the word may be an abreviation of Presbyter, or out of analogy unto them who of old served at the altar, do call Priests; but that any should intervene between God and Christ in Sacrificing, or the discharge of his Priestly office, you will not find your Countrymen ready to believe. For they are perswaded there are as many Mediators, and Sureties as Priests or Sacrificers of the New Covenant.
6. Moreover they believe that the Sacrifice of the Mass is an high derogation from the vertue and efficacy of the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, and to be set up in competition with it.
7. They are at a stand at the whole matter; to see you turning bread and Wine into that very body and blood of Christ which suffered on the Cross, and then to worship them, and then to pray to God to accept at your hands that Christ which you have made, and then to eat him. But when they consider that by so doing, you suppose your selves to effect that which they believe to be wrought only by the blood of the Cross of Christ once offered for all, and therein fancy a Sacrifice of Christ, wherein he dyeth not, contrary to so many express Testimonies of Scripture, they are utterly averse from it. For whereas they look for Redemption, Forgiveness of sins, and Reconciliation with God by the one Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross, wherein consists the foundation of their hope and consolation, because it being absolutely perfect was every way able and sufficient without any repetition, as the Apostle teacheth them, to take away sin, and for ever to consummate them that are Sanctified, you teach them now to look for the same things from this Sacrifice of yours, which would make them question the validity and perfection of that of Christ.
8. And when they have so done, yet they would still be forced to question the validity of yours, because it is a pretended Sacrifice of Christ without his death, which they know to have been indispensably required to render his Sacrifice valid and effectual.
9. And they cannot but think that this repeated Sacrifice being pretended to be for the very same ends and purposes with that of Christ himself, is very apt to take off the minds and confidence of men from that one Sacrifice performed so long ago, which they have not seen, and to fix them on that which their eyes daily look upon, as the praesens numen that they can immediately apply themselves unto▪ Thus they fear that insensibly all faith of the true Propitiation wrought by Christ is obliterated, and that which they think an Idol set up in the room of it.
10. And which further troubles them, they are jealous that by this your fiction you quite overthrow the Testament of Christ, which certainly no man ought to endeavour the disannulling of. For whereas in this Sacrament believers come to receive from him the great Legacy of his body and blood, with all the fruits of his death and Passion, you direct them to be offering and Sacrificing of them unto God, which quite alters the Will of our great Testator. And very many other things there are, wherein your Countreymen affirm that your Sacrifice is contrary to the faith wherein from Scripture they have been instructed, and that in things of the greatest importance to their Consolation here, and Salvation hereafter.
II. Neither is this all: your request also lies cross to your Reason, no less then to your Faith. For your Sacrifice cannot be performed, without a Supposition of a change of the substance of the bread and wine into the substance of the body and blood of Christ, and the substance of that body and blood, in every consecrated Host under the species of Bread and Wine, Christ himself alive being in every Host and every particle of it. Hence many things they say ensue, which no man can possibly admit of, without offering violence unto the main Principles of that Reason whereby we are distinguished from the beasts that perish. Some few of them may be instanced in.
1. Accidents subsisting without a Subject, follows hence necessarily in the first place; so that there should be whiteness, and nothing white; length, and nothing long; bredth, and nothing broad; weight, and nothing heavy. For all these accidents of Bread remain, when you would have them say that the bread is gone; so that there is left a white, sweet, long, broad, heavy nothing. This your Countreymen cannot understand.
2. Besides they say you hereby teach them, that one and the same body of Christ which is in heaven, is also on the Altar, not by an impletion of the whole space between heaven and earth, that some part of it should be in heaven, and some on earth; but that the one body which is in heaven, and whilest it is there, is also on the Altar in the Accidents of Bread, which upon the matter is, that one and the same body is two, yea an hundred or a thousand, according as in the Mass you are pleased to multiply it. Now that one and the same body should be locally divided or separated from its self, that whilest that one body is on the Altar, that other one body which is the same, should be in heaven, your Countreymen think to imply a Contradiction.
3. And so also they do that a body should be in any place, and yet not as a body, but as a Spirit. For whereas you say that whole Christ is contained under each Species of Bread and Wine, and under every the most minute part of either Species, as your Council speaks, you make the body of Christ to be whole in the whole, and whole in every part; when the very nature of a body requires that it have partes extra partes, its parts distinct from one another, and those occupying their distinct particular places. But you make the body of Christ neither to be compassed in, nor to fill the place wherein it is, that is, to be in a place, and not to be in a place. For if it be a body, and be under the Species of bread and wine upon the Altar, it is in a place; and if it be not comprehended in that space where it is, and doth fill it, it is not in a place, and therefore is there, and is not there at the same time.
4. And moreover we all know that the Consecrated wafer bears no proportion to the true natural body of Christ, and yet this is said to be contained under that. So that the body contained is much greater and farther extended, then the body that contains it, or the space wherein it is; for it is so under the Host as not to be elsewhere, unless in another Host.
5. N…y it is in every minute part of the Host, which multiplies contradictions in your Assertion.
6. Of the same nature is it that you are forced to feign the same body in 10000. distant places at the same time, and that with all contradictory adjuncts and affections. Now your Countreymen think that these and innumerable other consequences of your Transubstantiation which you presuppose to your Sacr…fice, or rather make it a principal part thereof, are such as overthrow the whole order of nature, and being of things, and leave nothing certain among the Sons of men.
III. Their sense is equally engaged against you with their Reason. Your Host is visible, tangible, gustible; when they see it, they see bread; when they feel it, they feel bread; when they taste it, they taste bread; and yet you tell them it is not bread: whom shall they believe? if things be not as they see them, feel them, taste them, it may be they are not men, nor do go on their feet, but are deceived in all these things, and suppose they see, perceive and understand what they do not. You tell them indeed that the bread is changed▪ into the body of Christ, that body that was born of the blessed Virgin, and was crucified at Jerusalem; that all taste, length, breadth, weight is taken away from it, and that the taste and weight of the bread is continued, which are the things they see, feel and taste; but they likewise tell you, that your perswasion is an inveterate prejudice which you have blindly captivated your minds unto, and that if you would but give your selves the liberty of exercising any reflex thoughts upon your own acts, you would find that upon the suppositions you proceed on, you have not any just grounds to conclude your selves to be living men. For you teach men to deny and question all that from Reason or Sense you can insist upon to prove that so you are. Ou these and the like accounts the Encomiums you give of your Sacrifice will scarce prevail with your Countreymen to relinquish all the worship of God, wherein they find daily comfort and advantage to their souls for the embracement of it.
CHAP. 20.
Of the Blessed Virgin.
UNto the sixteenth Chapter of the Animadversions directed to your Paragraph of the Blessed Virgin, you can find it seems nothing to say, and therefore betake your self to clamorous revilings. All that you say in your Fiat on this head, is but an heap of false accusations against Protestants for dishonouring her; and all that you say in in your Epistle in its Vindication is railing at me for minding you of your miscarriage. My whole Book you say is nothing but calumnies, a bundle of slanders, a meer quiver of sharp arrows of desolation. I am not sorry that you are sensible that it hath arrows in it, tending to the desolation of your Abominations. But I challenge you to give an instance of any one calumny or slander in it, from the beginning to the end. If you do not do so, I here declare you to be really and highly guilty of that which you would falsly impose upon another. Free your self by some one instance if you can: if you cannot, your reputation will follow your Conscience whether it will be hard for you to find them again. The substance of that Chapter is this, which is all that I shall now say to your nothing against it. Protestants yield to the blessed Virgin all the honour that the Scripture allows them, or direct them unto, or that the Primitive Church did ascribe unto her, and the Papists give her the honour due to God alone, whereby they horribly dishonour God and her.