xxvi.

Bread and Cup are his Body and Blood, because they are causes instrumental upon the receipt whereof the participation of his Body and Blood ensueth. For that which produceth any certain effect, is not vainly nor improperly said to be that very effect whereunto it tendeth. Every cause is in the effect which groweth from it. Our souls and bodies quickened to eternal Life are effects, the cause whereof is the Person of Christ; his Body and Blood are the true wellspring out of which this life floweth. So that his Body and Blood are in that very subject whereunto they minister life; not only by effect or operation, even as the influence of the heavens is in plants, beasts, men, and in every thing which they quicken; but also by a far more divine and mystical kind of union, which maketh us one with him, even as he and the Father are one. The real presence of Christ's most blessed Body and Blood is not therefore to be sought for in the Sacrament, but in the worthy receiver of the Sacrament. And with this the very order of our Saviour's words agreeth, first, "Take and Matt. eat;" then, "This is my Body which was broken for you:" 36-28. first, "Drink ye all of this;" then, followeth, "This is my Blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins." I see not which way it should be gathered by the words of Christ when and where the Bread is his Body, or the Cup his Blood; but only in the very heart and soul of him which receiveth them. As for the Sacraments, they really exhibit, but for aught we can gather out of that which is written of them, they are not really, nor do really contain in themselves, that grace which with them, or by them, it pleaseth God to bestow. If on all sides it be confessed, that the grace of Baptism is poured into the soul of man; that by water we receive it, although it be neither seated in the water, nor the water changed into it; what should induce men to think, that the grace of the Eucharist must needs be in the Eucharist before it can be in us that receive it? The fruit of the Eucharist is the participation of the Body and Blood of Christ. There is no sentence of Holy Scripture which saith, that we cannot by this Sacrament be made partakers of his Body and Blood, except they be first contained in the Sacrament, or the Sacrament converted into them. "This is my Body,' and, "This is my Blood," being words of promise, sith we

all agree, that by the Sacrament Christ doth really and truly in us perform his promise, why do we vainly trouble ourselves with so fierce contentions, whether by Consubstantiation, or else by Transubstantiation, the Sacrament itself be first possessed with Christ, or no? A thing which no way can either further or hinder us, howsoever it stand, because our participation of Christ in this Sacrament dependeth on the co-operation of his omnipotent power which maketh it his Body and Blood to us; whether with change or without alteration of the element, such as they imagine, we need not greatly to care or inquire. Take therefore that wherein, all agree, and then consider by itself what cause why the rest in question should not rather be left as superfluous than urged as necessary. It is on all sides plainly confessed, first, that this Sacrament is a true and real participation of Christ, who thereby imparteth himself, even his whole entire Person, as a mystical Head, unto every soul that receiveth him, and that every such receiver doth thereby incorporate or unite himself unto Christ as a mystical member of him, yea, of them also whom he acknowledgeth to be his own. Secondly, that to whom the Person of Christ is thus communicated, to them he giveth by the same Sacrament his Holy Spirit to sanctify them, as it sanctifieth him which is their Head. Thirdly, that what merit, force, or virtue soever, there is in his sacred Body and Blood, we freely, fully, and wholly, have it by this Sacrament. Fourthly, that the effect thereof in us, is a real transmutation of our souls and bodies from sin to righteousness, from death and corruption to immortality and life. Fifthly, that because the Sacrament being of itself but a corruptible and earthly creature, must needs be thought an unlikely instrument to work so admirable effects in man, we are therefore to rest ourselves altogether upon the strength of his glorious power, who is able and will bring to pass, that the Bread and Cup which he giveth us shall be truly the thing he promiseth. It seemeth therefore much amiss, that against them whom they term Sacramentaries so many invective discourses are made, all running upon two points, that the Eucharist is not a bare sign or figure only, and that the efficacy of his Body and Blood is not all we receive in this Sacrament. For no man, having read their books and writings which are thus tra

duced, can be ignorant that both these assertions they plainly confess to be most true. They do not so interpret the words of Christ, as if the name of his body did import but the figure of his body; and to be, were only to signify his blood. They grant that these holy mysteries, received in due manner, do instrumentally both make us partakers of the grace of that Body and Blood which were given for the life of the world, and besides also impart unto us, even in true and real, though mystical, manner, the very Person of our Lord himself, whole, perfect, and entire, as hath been shewed. Now whereas all three opinions do thus far accord in one, that strong conceit which two of the three have embraced, as touching a literal, corporal, and oral manducation of the very substance of his flesh and blood, is surely an opinion no where delivered in Holy Scripture, whereby they should think themselves bound to believe it; and (to speak with the softest terms we can use) greatly prejudiced in that, when some others did so conceive of eating his flesh, our Saviour, to abate that error in them, gave them directly to understand how his flesh so eaten could profit them nothing, because the words which he spake were Spirit; that is to say, they had a reference to a mystical participation, which mystical participation giveth life. Wherein there is small appearance of likelihood that his meaning should be only to make them Marcionites by inversion, and to teach them, that as Marcion did think Christ seemed to be man, but was not; so they contrariwise should believe that Christ in truth would so give them, as they thought, his flesh to eat; but yet, lest the horror thereof should offend them, he would not seem to do that he did. When they which have this opinion of Christ in that blessed Sacrament, go about to explain themselves, and to open after what manner things are brought to pass, the one sort lay the union of Christ's Deity with his Manhood, as their first foundation and ground: from thence they infer a power which the Body of Christ hath, thereby to present itself in all places, out of which ubiquity of his Body they gather the presence thereof with that sanctified bread and wine of our Lord's Table; the conjunction of his Body and Blood with those elements they use as an argument to shew how the bread may as well in that respect be termed his

Body, because his Body is therewith joined, as the Son of God may be named Man, by reason, that God and Man in the Person of Christ are united; to this they add, how the words of Christ commanding us to eat must needs import, that as he hath coupled the substance of his flesh and the substance of bread together, so we together should receive both; which labyrinth as the other sort doth justly shun, so the way which they take to the same inn is somewhat more short, but no whit more certain. For through God's omnipotent power they imagine that transubstantiation followeth upon the words of consecration: and, upon transubstantiation, the participation of Christ's both Body and Blood, in the only shape of sacramental elements. So that they all three do plead God's omnipotency: Sacramentaries, to that alteration which the rest confess he accomplisheth; the Patrons of Transubstantiation, over and besides that, to the change of one substance into another; the Followers of Consubstantiation, to the kneading of both substances, as it were, into one lump. Touching the sentence of antiquity in this cause; first, forasmuch as they knew that the force of this Sacrament doth necessarily presuppose the verity of Christ's both Body and Blood, they used oftentimes the same as an argument to prove, that Christ hath as truly the substance of Man as of God; because here we receive Christ, and those graces which flow from him, in that he is Man: so that, if he have no such being, neither can the Sacrament have any such meaning as we all confess it hath. Thus Tertullian,* thus Irenæus,+ thus Theodoret,+ disputeth. Again, as evident it is how they teach that Christ is personally there present, yea present whole, albeit a part of Christ be corporally absent from thence;

Acceptum panem et distributum discipulis Corpus suum illum fecit, hoc est Corpus meum' dicendo, idest figura corporis mei. Figura autem non fuisset, nisi veritatis esset Corpus, cum vacua res, quod est phantasma, figuram capere non possit.' Tertull. contra Marc. lib. iv. cap. 40.

+ Secundum hæc (that is to say, if it should be true which Heretics have taught, denying that Christ took upon him the nature of man) nec Dominus sanguine suo redemit nos, neque calix Eucharistiæ communicatio sanguinis ejus erit, nec panis quem frangimus communicatio corporis ejus est. Sanguis enim non est, nisi a venis et carnibus et a reliqua quæ est secundum hominem substantia.' Iren. lib. v. cap. 2.

† Εἰ τοίνυν τοῦ ὄντος σώματος ἀντίτυπά ἐστι τὰ θεῖα μυστήρια, σῶμα ἄρα ἐστὶ καὶ νῦν τοῦ δεσπότου τὸ σῶμα, οὐκ εἰς θεότητος φύσιν μεταβληθὲν, ἀλλὰ θείας δόξης ἀναπλησθέν. Theodor. ArvyxUTOS, [Dial. ii. p. 84.]

that Christ,* assisting this heavenly banquet with his personal and true presence,+ doth by his own divine power add to the natural substance thereof supernatural efficacy, which ‡ addition to the nature of those consecrated elements changeth them, and maketh them that unto us which otherwise they could not be, that to us they are thereby made such instruments,§ as mystically yet truly, invisibly yet really, work our communion or fellowship with the Person of Jesus Christ, as well in that he is Man as God, our participation also in the fruit, grace, and efficacy of his Body and Blood; whereupon there ensueth a kind of transubstantiation in us, a true change both of soul and body, an alteration from death to life. In a word, it appeareth not, that of all the ancient Fathers of the Church any one did ever conceive or

'Sacramenta quidem, quantum in se est, sine propria virtute esse non possunt, nec ullo modo se absentat majestas mysteriis.' Cypr. de Cœn. cap. 7.

Sacramento visibili ineffabiliter divina se infundit essentia, ut esset Religioni circa Sacramenta devotio.' Idem cap. 6. Invisibilis sacerdos visibiles creaturas in substantiam corporis et sanguinis sui verbo suo secreta potestate convertit. In spiritualibus Sacramentis verbi præcipit virtus et servit effectus.' Euseb. Emissen. Hom. 5. de Pasch. [p. 560. par. i. t. v. Biblioth. Patr. Lat.]

+ [Eran.] Τὰ σύμβολα τοῦ δεσποτικοῦ σώματός τε καὶ αἵματος ἄλλα μέν εἰσι πρὸ τῆς ἱερατικῆς ἐπικλήσεως, μετὰ δέ γε τὴν ἐπίκλησιν μεταβάλλεται καὶ ἕτερα γίνεται. [Orth.] ̓Αλλ ̓ οὐκ οἰκείας ἐξίσταται φύσεως. Μένει γὰς ἐπὶ τῆς προτέρας οὐσίας καὶ τοῦ σχήματος καὶ τοῦ εἴδους, καὶ ὁρατά ἐστι καὶ ἑπτὰ, οἷα καὶ πρότερον ἦν· νοεῖται δὲ ἅπερ ἐγένετο καὶ πιστεύεται καὶ προσκυνεῖται ὡς ἐκεῖνα ὄντα ἅπερ πιστεύεται. Theodor. [Dial. ii. p. 85.] Ex quo a Domino dictum est,' Hoc facite in meam commemorationem, Hæc est caro mea, et Hic est sanguis meus, quotiescunque his verbis et hac fide actum est, panis iste supersubstantialis, et calix benedictione solenni sacratus, ad totius hominis vitam salutemque proficit.' Cypr. de Cœn. cap. 3. Immortalis alimonia datur, a communibus cibis differens, corporalis substantiæ retinens speciem, sed virtutis divinæ invisibili efficientia probans adesse præsentiam.' Ibid. cap. 2. Sensibilibus sacramentis inest vitæ æternæ effectus, et non tam corporali quam spirituali transitione Christo unimur. Ipse enim et panis et caro, et sanguis, idem cibus, et substantia et vita factus est Ecclesiæ suæ quam corpus suum appellat, dans ei participationem spiritus.' Cyprian. de Cœn. cap. 5. Nostra et ipsius conjunctio nec miscet personas, nec unit substantias, sed effectus consociat et confœderat voluntates.' Ibid. cap. 6. Mansio nostra in ipso est manducatio, et potus quasi quædam incorporatio.' Ibid. cap. 9. Ille est in Patre per naturam divinitatis, nos in eo per corporalem ejus nativitatem, ille rursus in nobis per Sacramentorum mysterium.' Hilar. de Trin. lib. viii. [§. 15.]

Panis hic azymus cibus verus et sincerus per speciem et sacramentum nos tactu sanctificat, fide illuminat, veritate Christo conformat.' Cypr. de Cœn. c. 6. Non aliud agit participatio corporis et sanguinis Christi, quam ut in id quod sumimus transeamus, et in quo mortui et sepulti et corresuscitati sumus, ipsum per omnia et spiritu et carne gestemus.' Leo de Pasch. Serm. 14. [c. 5. fin.]'Quemadmodum qui est a terra panis percipiens Dei vocationem (id est facta invocatione divini numinis) jam non communis panis est, sed Eucharistia ex duabus rebus constans, terrena et cœlesti: sic et corpora nostra, percipientia Eucharistiam, jam non sunt corruptibilia, spem resurrectionis habentia.' Îren. lib. iv. cap. 3. Quoniam salutaris caro verbo Dei quod naturaliter vita est conjuncta, vivifica effecta est; quando eam comedimus, tunc vitam habemus in nobis, illi carni conjuncti, quæ vita effecta est.' Cyril. in Iohan. lib. iv. cap. 14.