is understood, by Wine the bloud of Chrift is fhewn (or reprefented) but when in the Cup water is mingled with Wine the people is united to Chrift. So that according to this Argument Wine in the Sacramental Cup is no otherwife chang'd into the bloud of Chrift than the Water mixed with it is changed into the People, which are faid to be united to Chrift. * p. Pfal. Tom.8. p. 16. I omit many others, and pass to St. Austin in the fourth Age after Chrift. And I the rather infift upon his Teftimony, because of his eminent esteem and authority in the Latin Church; and he alfo calls the Elements of the Sacrament the figure and Sign of Chrift's body and bloud. In his Book against Adimantus the Manichee we have this expreffion, our Lord Aug.Tom.6. did not doubt to say, this is my Body, when he gave the P. 187. Edit. Bafil. 1569. Sign of his Body. And in his explication of the third Pfalm, fpeaking of Judas whom our Lord admitted to bis laft Supper, in which (fays he) † he commended and † Enarrat.in. delivered to his Difciples the figure of his Body; Language which would now be cenfur'd for Herefie in the Church of Rome. Indeed he was never accus'd of Herefie, as Cardinal Perron fays Origen was, but he talks as like one as Origen himself. And in his Comment on the 98 Pfalm fpeaking of the offence which the Dif ciples took at that faying of our Saviour, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his bloud, &c. he brings in our Saviour fpeaking thus to them, I ye must || Id. Tom. 9. 1. understand Spiritually what I have faid unto you; ye are P1105. not to eat this body which ye fee, and to drink that bloud which shall be shed by those that fhall crucify me. I have commended a certain Sacrament to you, which being Spiritually understood will give you life. What more oppofite to the Doctrine of Tranfubftantiation, than that the Disciples were not to eat that Body of Chrift which they faw, nor to drink that bloud which was thed C upon the the Cross, but that all this was to be understood fpiritually and according to the nature of a Sacrament? For that body he tells us is not here but in heaven, in his Comment upon these words, me ye have not always. *Id.Tra&.50.* He speaks (fays he) of the prefence of his body; ye in Johan. + Id. Tom. 2. p. 93. de Confecr. dift.2. Hoc eft. Shall have me according to my providence, according to Majefty and invifible grace; but according to the flesh which the word affumed, according to that which was born of the Virgin Mary, ye shall not have me therefore because he converfed with his Difciples fourty days, he is afcended up into heaven and is not here. In his 23d. Epiftle; † if the Sacrament (fays he) had not some resemblance of those things whereof they are Sacraments, they would not be Sacraments at all; but from this refemblance they take for the most part the names of the things which they reprefent. Therefore as the Sacrament of the body of Christ is in fome manner or sense Christ's body, and the Sacrament of his bloud is the bloud of Chrift; So the Sacrament of faith (meaning Baptifm) is faith. Upon which words of St. Austin there is this remarkable Glofs in their own Canon Law; the heavenly Sacrament which truly represents the flesh of Christ is called the body of Chrift; but improperly: whence it is faid, that after a manner, but not according to the truth of the thing but the mystery of the thing fignified; So that the meaning is, it is called the body of Christ, that is, it fignifies the body of Chrift: And if this be St. Auftin's meaning, I am fure no Proteftant can fpeak more plainly against Tranfubftantiation. And in the ancient Canon of the Mafs, before it was chang'd in complyance with this new Doctrine, it is exprefly call'd a Sacrament, a Sign, an Image and a figure of Chrift's body. To which I will add that remarkable *de Confecr. paffage of St. Austin cited by * Gratian, that as we reUtrum. ceive the fimilitude of his death in Baptifm, fo we may dift. 2. Se&t. alfo alfo receive the likeness of his flesh and bloud; that fo I will mention but one Teftimony more of this Father, but fo clear a one as it is impoffible any man in his wits that had believed Tranfubftantiation could have utter'd. It is in his Treatife * de Doctrina Chriftiana; * Lib.3. Tom. where laying down feveral Rules for the right under- 3. P. 53. ftanding of Scripture, he gives this for one. If (fays he) the Speech be a precept forbidding fome heinous wickedness or crime, or commanding us to do good, it is not figurative; but if it seem to command any heinous wickedness or crime, or to forbid that which is profitable and beneficial to others, it is figurative. For example, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his bloud, ye have no life in you: This feems to command a heinous wickedness and crime, therefore it is a figure; commanding us to communicate of the paffion of our Lord, and with delight and advantage to lay up in our memory that his flesh was crucified and wounded for us. So that, according to St. Auftin's best skill in interpreting Scripture, the literal eating of the flesh of Chrift and drinking his bloud would have been a great impiety; and therefore the expreffion is to be understood figuratively; not as Cardinal Perron would have it, onely in oppofition to the eating of his flesh and bloud in the grofs appearance of flesh and bloud, but to the real eating of his natural body and bloud under any appearance whatsoever: For St. Austin doth not say, this is a Figurative speech wherein we are commanded really to feed upon the natural body and bloud of Chrift under the fpecies of bread and wine, as the Cardinal would understand him; for then the fpeech would be literal and not figurative: But he fays, this is a figuC 2 rative rative speech wherein we are commanded Spiritually to feed upon the remembrance of his Paffion. To these I will add but three or four Testimonies more in the two following Ages. The first fhall be of Theodoret, who speaking of that *Gen.49.11. * Prophecy of Jacob concerning our Saviour, he washed his garments in Wine and his clothes in the bloud of + Dialog. 1. grapes, hath these words, † as we call the mystical fruit of the Vine (that is, the Wine in the Sacrament) after confecration the bloud of the Lord, so he (viz. Facob) calls the bloud of the true Vine (viz. of Chrift) the bloud of the grape but the bloud of Chrift is not literally and properly but onely figuratively the bloud of the grape, in the fame fenfe as he is faid to be the true Vine; and therefore the Wine in the Sacrament after confecration is in like manner not literally and properly but figuratively the bloud of Chrift. And he explains this afterwards, faying, that our Saviour changed the names, and gave to his Body the name of the Symbol or Sign, and to the Symbol or Sign the name of his Body; thus when he had call'd himself the Vine, he call'd the Symbol or Sign his bloud; fo that in the fame fenfe that he call'd himself the Vine, he call'd the Wine, which is the Symbol of his bloud, his bloud: For, fays he, he would have those who partake of the divine myfteries not to attend to the nature of the things which are seen, but by the change of names to believe the change which is made by grace; for he who call'd that which by nature is a body wheat and bread, and again likewife call'd himself the Vine, he honour'd the Symbols with the name of his body and bloud: not changing nature but adding grace to nature. Where you fee he fays exprefly, that when he call'd the Symbols or Elements of the Sacrament, viz. bread and Wine, his Body and Bloud, he made no change, in the nature of the things, onely added grace to na ture, ture, that is, by the Divine grace and bleffing he raifed them to a Spiritual and Supernatural virtue and efficacy. The Second is of the fame Theodoret in his fecond Dialogue between a Catholique, under the name of Orthodoxus, and an Heretique under the name of Eraniftes; who maintaining that the Humanity of Chrift was chang'd into the fubftance of the Divinity (which was the Herefie of Eutyches) he illuftrates the matter by this Similitude, As, fays he, the Symbols of the Lord's body and bloud are one thing before the invocation of the Priest, but after the invocation are changed and become another thing; So the body of our Lord after his afcenfion changed into the divine fubftance. But what fays the Catholique Orthodoxus to this? why, he talks juít like one of Cardinal Perron's Heretiques, Thou art, fays he, caught in thy own net: because the mystical Symbols after confecration do not pass out of their own nature; for they remain in their former fubftance, figure and appearance and may be feen and handled even as before. He does not onely deny the outward figure and appearance of the Symbols to be chang'd, but the nature and fubftance of them, even in the proper and strictest sense of the word fubftance; and it was neceffary fo to do, otherwise he had not given a pertinent answer to the fimilitude urg'd against him. Patr. Tom. The next is one of their own Popes, Gelafius, who brings the fame Inftance against the Eutychians; * fure- * Biblioth. ly, lays he, the Sacraments which we receive of the body and bloud of our Lord are a divine thing, so that by them we are made partakers of a divine nature, and yet it ceafeth not to be the fubftance or nature of bread and Wine; and certainly the image and resemblance of Christ's body and blond are celebrated in the action of the mysteries, that is, in the Sacrament. To make this In stance 4. |