Three Pillars and Arch-patriarchs of the Popish Synagogues, Treatise 1 · Book 2 · Part 8 – Part 9
The eyght Chapter declareth, by whose authoritie and power, the sacrament is consecrated & Christes bodie made present.Hesk.
As though such blasphemous speaches as I hauehave touched imediatly before, had neuer ben vttered by Papists,Fulk. M. Heskins stomaketh the matter, & rayleth throughout this Chapter against his aduersarie, for charging ye priests with such arrogancie, as though they tooke vponupon them to make God. Nowe concerning the purpose of the Chapter we agree, that God & no man, Christ and not the minister, doth consecrate the sacrament, and make Christes bodie and bloud to be present. I might therefore passe ouer his authorities, but that out of some of them he gathereth also his corporall presence & transubstantiation. The first is Damascen: De Orth. Fid. Lib. 4. Ca. 14. If thou aske now how the bread is made the bodie of Christ, and the wine and water the bloud of Christ? I also answere thee: The holy Ghost euer shadoweth, and worketh these things aboue speech and vnderstanding: The bread and wine are transsumed. This place Maister Heskins noteth for a plaine place, both for the presence and for transubstantiation. If it were as plain as he would hauehave it, yet is Damascen but a Burgesse of the lower house, out of the compasse of the challenge. But whatsoeuer his opinion was of the presence, certaine it is that he knew not transubstantiation, which the Greekes long after did not acknowledge. And though we take the word of transuming for changing, turning, transmuting, or transelementing, which wordes the olde writers doe sometimes vse, yet meane they not chaunge of one substance into another, but of the nature and propertie of the foode to be chaunged from corporall to spirituall and not otherwise.
Next followeth Chrysostome in 2: Tim. Ho. 2. Volo quiddam, &c. I will adde a certeine thing plainely wonderfull, and maruell ye not, neither be you troubled. And what is this? The holy oblation whether Peter or Paul, or a Priest of any maner of life do offer it, is euen the same, which Christ gaue vntounto his disciples, and which the priestes do now make. This hath nothing lesse then that. Why so? because men do not sanctifie it but Christ which had hallowed it before. For as the wordes which Christ spake are the same which the priests do now pronoūce so also is the oblation. Here M. Hesk. cutteth of ye taile of this sentence, for Chrysostoms wordes are: Ita & oblatio eadem est, eadem que baptismi ratio est, adoe omnia in fide consistunt. So the oblation is the same, and the same reason is of baptisme, so all thinges consist in faith. Marke here that M. Heskins conceleth that the change and consecration is the same yt is in baptisme, and the thing is receiued onelyonly by faith as in baptisme. And nothing else meaneth Chrysostome in the seconde place by M. Heskins cited, Hom. 30. de prod. The same Christ is nowe present which did beutifie that table, hee doth also consecrate this. For it is not man, which by consecration doeth make the thinges set foorth on the table, the bodie and bloude of our Lorde, but euen Christ which was crucified for vsus, The wordes are spoken by the mouth of the Prieste, but by the power & grace of God they are consecrated. This is (saith hee) my bodye, with this worde the thinges set foorth are consecrated. Here we must note that Christ maketh the bread and wine his bodie and bloude. Wee acknowledge he doth so, for the faith of the worthy receiuer, as in the former sentence it is manifest.
Nowe commeth S. Ambrose De benedict. Patr. c. 9. Who is then rische, but he in whome is the depth of wisdome and knowledge? This rich man then is the treasure of this fatte breade, which who shall eate, he cannot hunger. This breade he gaue to his Apostles, that they should deuide it to the beleeuing people. And now hee giueth the same to vsus, which hee beeing the Priest doeth consecrate with his owne wordes. This bread then is made the meate of the Sainctes. Here againe M. Heskins cutteth off that which liketh him not for it followeth: Possumus & ipsium Dominum accipere qui suā carnem nobis dedit. Sicut ipse ait, ego sunt panis vitae. Ille enim accipit qui scipsum probat: qui autem accipit, non moritur peccatoris morte, quia panis hic remissio peccatorum est. Wee may receiue euen the Lorde himselfe which hath giuen vsus his fleshe, euen as he himselfe saith, I am ye bread of life. For he receiueth him, yt examineth himselfe, & he which receiueth him dyeth not the death of a sinner, for this bread is the remission of sinnes. This place doth first ouerthrowe M. Heskins dreame of two breades. Secondly, the Papistes assertion, that wicked men receiue the bodie of Christ. And thirdly teacheth, that to eate Christ & his fleshe, is to receiue forgiuenesse of sinnes, which M. Heskins and the Papistes denye.
Another place of Ambrose is alledged. li. 4. de sacra. Ca. 4. Let vsus then teach this. How can that which is bread be the bodie of Christ? By consecration. By what and whose wordes then is the consecration? Of our Lorde Iesus. For all the other things that be sayed, praise is giuen to God, petition is made in prayer for the people, for Kings, and for the rest: but when it is come to that, the honourable sacrament is made, now the Priest vseth not his owne wordes, but he vseth the wordes of Christe. Therefore the worde of Christ maketh this sacrament. This is noted to be a plaine place for M. Iuell, but for what purpose, I cannot tell, except it be to proue that he will not denye, that the sacrament is consecrated and made the bodie of Christ to the worthie receiuer, by the wordes of Christe, as before. Eusebius Emissenus hath the next place in Hom. Pasc. The inuisible Priest with his worde, by a secreat power, turneth the visible cratures into the substance of his body & bloud. This place being more apparant for his transubstantiation then any that he hath alledged, he vrgeth not, nor gathereth of it, but onelyonly that Christ is the author of the consecration and conuersion. As for ye conuersion, I thinke his conscience did tell him, that it was not of the substance, but of the vse of things, a spirituall and not a corporall change, as both Eusebius and other writers do sufficiently expound what maner of mutation it is. The last man is Cyprian De Caen Dom. It were better for them a milstone to be tyed to their neckes, and to be drowned in the Sea, then with an vnwashed conscience to take the morsell at the hande of our Lorde, who vntil this day doeth create, and sanctifie, and blesse, and to the godly receiuers diuide this his most true, and most holy bodie. Here M. Heskins vrgeth, that he createth not an imaginatiue bodie, but his moste true bodie. But ye blinde man seeth not, that either this creation is figuratiue, or else it ouerthroweth transsubstantiation. For to create, is not to change one substance into another, but to make a substance of nothing. Secondly, that Christ diuideth his bodie, but to ye godly receiuers. Finally, in the same Sermon he saith: that all this mysterie is wrought by faith. Haec quotie… agimus, &c. So often as we do these things, wee do not sharpen our teeth to byte, but with a syncere faith, we breake and deuide this holy breade.
To conclude this Chapter, seeing M. Heskins hath laboured so well to proue that Christ onelyonly & not ye priest doth consecrate, and so often chargeth vsus with slaundering them, to make God & the bodie of Christ, I would demaunde, wherefore the Bishop, when he giueth them the order of Priesthood, giueth them power to consecrate, saying: Accip… potestatem consecrandi, & offerend… pro vinit & defunctis: Take authoritie to consecrate, to offer for the quick and the dead. If the Priest cannot consecrat, whereto serueth this power? If the Priest take vponupon him to consecrat Christ God and man, howe are we charged with slaundering of them?
Hesk.The ninth Chapter expoundeth the next text that followeth in Saint Iohn.
Fulk.The text which he taketh vponupon him to expound in this Chapter is this: The Iewes stroue among them selues, saying: How can this fellowe giuegive vsus his flesh to eat? And first he sayth, that they being carnall, could not vnderstande the spirituall talke of Christe, wherein as he saith truely, so hee speaketh contrarie to him selfe. For he will hauehave those words to be spokē carnally. They could not vnderstand, (sayth he) because they did not beleeue, & therefore they questioned how it might be, euen as the Pseudochristians do. How can the bodie of Christ be in the sacrament vnderunder so litle a peece of bread? &c. But the aunswere to all their questions is, that they be don by the power of God. And if you proceede, to enquire of his will, he hath declared it in these wordes, the breade which I will giuegive is my fleshe, not a fantasticall, nor a mathematicall, or figuratiue flesh, but that same flesh… that I will giuegive for the life of the worlde. But if wee proceede to demaund further, how he proueth, that he will giuegive yt flesh to be eaten with our mouth, carnally in the sacrament: then is he at a staye; he can go no further. Wee doubt not of the power of God, we will extend his will no further then his worde. For to eat the fleshe of Christe is not to eat it with our mouthes, but with our hearts, by faith, as Augustine vppon the same text teacheth vsus. Hoc est ergo manducare illam escam, & illum bibere ponum, in Christo manere, & illum manentem in se habere. Ac per hoc qui non manet in Christo, & in quo non manet Christus, procul dubio nec manducat spiritualiter carnem eius, nec bibit cius sanguinē, licèt carnaliter & visibiliter premat dentibus sacramentum corporis & sanguinis Christie sed magis tantę rei sacramentum ad iudicium sibi manducat & bibit. This is therefore to eate that meate, & to drinke that drinke, to abide in Christe, and to hauehave him abyding in them. And by this, he that abydeth not in Christ, and in whome Christe abydeth not, out of doubt doth neither spiritually eat his flesh, nor drinke his bloud, although carnally, & visibly he presse with his teeth the sacrament of the bodie and bloud of Christ: but rather he eateth and drinketh the sacrament of so great a thing to his owne condemnation. Thus Augustine teacheth, how the flesh of Christe is eaten, and by whome, and what difference betweene the flesh & bloud of Christ, and the sacrament thereof, in all those points directly contrarie to the Papistes, which affirme, that the flesh of Christ is eaten with the mouth, and that it is eaten of the wicked, and last of all, that the sacrament of the flesh of Christ, & his flesh is all one.