Three Pillars and Arch-patriarchs of the Popish Synagogues, Treatise 1 · Book 2 · Part 57
Hesk.The seuen and fiftieth Chapter proceedeth in the exposition of the same wordes by S. Cyrill and S. Gregorie.
Cyrillus is cited, as he is often, ad Colosyrium. Non dubites an &c. Fulke.Doubt thou not whether this be true, when hee saith manifestly, This is my body: but rather receiue the worde of our Sauiour in faith. For seeing hee is the trueth, hee doth not lye. Maister Heskins inferreth, that the wordes of Christe are manifest, and so to be taken in the literall sense without figure, bicause he vseth these wordes, Christ saide manifestly, this is my body: but this is a childish mockerie. Christe saide manifestly, I am the doore. Doeth it therefore followe, that it is no figuratiue speach, and that the woordes of Christe are manifest, and therefore to bee taken in the literall sense? And yet I beleeue, bicause Christ saide manifestly, I am the doore, that he is in deede the doore, though not literally but figuratiuely taken. It greueth M. Hes. that the proclamer should play with Duns his indiuid…um vagum, saying, that by the like meanes, hee might disgrace the faith of the trinitie, to open the quiddities of distinctions, and relations of persons, that bee spoken thereof. And I thinke the same, if hee shoulde teach that holy mysterie after the schoole manner, & not after the word of God. But he returneth to an other place of Cyrill. Ne horreremus carnem & sanguinem. Bicause this place is already rehearsed more at large, and answered in the 51. Chap. of this booke, I will send the reader backe, to consider it in that place.
Gregorie is cited Lib. 4. dialog. cap. …8. Debemus ita que praesens sęculum &c. We ought therfore, seing we see this present world to be passed away, with al our mind to contemne it, to offer to god the daily sacrifices of teares, the daily sacrifices of his body and bloud. For this sacrifice doth singularly saue the soul from eternal destruction, which repayreth to vsus the death of the only begotten, by a mysterie. Who although since he arose from death, he doth not now dy, and death shal hauehave no more dominion of him: yet liuing in him self immortally & incorruptibly, is sacrificed againe for vsus in this mysterie of the holy oblation. For his body is there receiued, his flesh is diuided for the health of the people, his bloud is shed, not nowe vponupon the hands of the Infidels, but into the mouthes of the faithfull. Hereof therefore let vsus consider, what sacrifice this is for vsus, which for our deliuerance doeth followe the passion of the onelyonly begotten Sonne. For which of the faithfull ought to hauehave any doubt, that in the same houre of the immolation, the heauens are opened at the Priestes voyce? that the companies of Angels are present in the mysterie of Iesus Christ? That the lowest things are coupled to the highest: earthly things are ioyned to heauenly thinges, and that one thing is made of thinges visible and inuisible? Of these last wordes of ioyning high and lowe, heauenly and earthly thinges, he maketh a greate matter, which is (saith hee) that Christe is ioyned to the earthly formes of breade and wine. Where note (I praye you) that he nameth the accidents of things, for the thinges them selues, which is a toy to mocke an ape. And yet he pleaseth him selfe so well therein, that he would drawe Irenaeus, which is cleane contrarie to transubstantiation, to bee a great patrone thereof:Li. 4. ca. 34. Irenaeus saith as wee hauehave shewed before more at large, that Eucharistie consisteth of two thinges, earthly and heauenly. Nowe hee inquireth of vsus, what is the heauenly part of the sacrament? And he reasoneth that it is neither the grace of God, nor thanksgiuing, nor the worde of God, nor sanctification. Well: what is it then? Gregorie saith, it is the bodye of Christ, and so say we, spiritually receiued. But if I shuld aske M. Hes. what is the earthly part of the sacrament, hee wil say, the accidents of bread & wine, but sauing his wisdome, accidents be neither earthly not heauenly, but the earthly thing must needs be a substantiall thing, & what other earthly substance can there be, but the substance of bread and wine? He saith, that corporall receiuing is here auouched by Gregory. Then must he tel me how in these words, the sacrifice of teares, is matched with the sacrifice of his flesh and bloud, and how the death of Christe is repaired by a mysterie, howe the fleshe of Christ is diuided or parted, if this can not bee done, but spiritually, then Christes body can not be eaten, but spiritually.
The iudgement of Barnard which followeth, we leaue to be weighed according to the corruption of the age in which he liued.