XXVIII.

ART. sure that a thing cannot be one and three in the same respect; our reason assures us of this, and we do and must believe it; but we know that in different respects the same thing may be one and three. And since we cannot know all the possibilities of those different respects, we must believe upon the authority of God revealing it, that the same thing is both one and three; though if a revelation should affirm that the same thing were one and three in the same respect, we should not, and indeed could not believe it.

This argument deserves to be fully opened; for we are sure either it is true, or we cannot be sure that any thing else whatsoever is true. In confirmation of this we ought also to consider the nature and ends of miracles. They put nature out of its channel, and reverse its fixed laws and motions; and the end of God's giving men a power to work them, is, that by them the world may be convinced, that such persons are commissionated by him, to deliver his pleasure to them in some particulars. And as it could not become the infinite wisdom of the great Creator, to change the order of nature (which is his own workmanship) upon slight grounds; so we cannot suppose that he should work a chain of extraordinary miracles to no purpose. It is not to give credit to a revelation that he is making; for the senses do not perceive it; on the contrary, they do reject and contradict it; and the revelation, instead of getting credit from it, is loaded by it, as introducing that which destroys all credit and certainty.

In other miracles our senses are appealed to; but here they must be appealed from; nor is there any spiritual end served in working this miracle: for it is acknowledged, that the effects of this Sacrament are given upon our due coming to it, independent upon the corporal presence: so that the grace of the Sacrament does not always accompany it, since unworthy receivers, though, according to the Romish doctrine, they receive the true body of Christ, yet they do not receive grace with it: and the grace that is given in it to the worthy receivers, stays with them after that, by the destruction of the species of the bread and wine, the body of Christ is withdrawn. So that it is acknowledged, that the spiritual effect of the Sacrament does not depend upon the corporal presence.

Here then it is supposed, that God is every day working a great many miracles, in a vast number of different places; and that of so extraordinary a nature, that it must be confessed, they are far beyond all the other wonders,

even of omnipotence; and yet all this is to no end, that AR T. we can apprehend; neither to any sensible and visible XXVIII. end, nor to any internal and spiritual one. This must needs seem an amazing thing, that God.should work such a miracle on our behalf, and yet should not acquaint us with any end for which he should work it.

To conclude this whole argument, we have one great advantage in this matter, that our doctrine concerning the Sacrament, of a mystical presence of Christ in the symbols, and of the effects of it on the worthy and unworthy receivers, is all acknowledged by the Church of Rome; but they have added to this the wonder of the corporal presence so that we need bring no proofs to them at least, for that which we teach concerning it; since it is all confessed by them. But as to that which they have added, it is not necessary for us to give proofs against it; it is enough for us, if we shew that all the proofs that they bring for it are weak and unconcluding. They must be very demonstrative, if it is expected, that, upon the authority and evidence of them, we should be bound to believe a thing which they themselves confess to be contrary both to our sense and reason. We cannot by the laws of reasoning be bound to give arguments against it; it is enough if we can shew that neither the words of the institution, nor the discourse in the sixth of St. John, do necessarily infer it; and if we shew that those passages can well bear another sense, which is agreeable both to the words themselves, and to the style of the Scriptures, and more particularly to the phraseology to which the Jews were accustomed, upon the occasion on which this was instituted; and if the words can well bear the sense that we give them, then the other advantages that are in it, of its being simple and natural, of its being suitable to the design of a Sacrament, and of its having no hard consequences of any sort depending upon it; then, I say, by all the rules of expounding Scripture, we do justly infer, that our sense of those words ought to be preferred.

c. 16.

This is according to a rule that St. Augustin gives to Lib. iii. de judge what expressions in Scripture are figurative, and Doct. Chris. what not; "If any place seems to command a crime or "horrid action, it is figurative: and for an instance of "this he cites those words, Except ye eat the flesh and drink "the blood of the Son of man, you have no life in you: which 66 seems to command a crime and a horrid action; and "therefore it is a figure commanding us to communicate "in the passion of our Lord, and to lay up in our memory "with delight and profit, that his flesh was crucified and

ART.

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"wounded for us." As this was given for a rule by the great doctor of the Latin Church, so the same maxim had been delivered almost two ages before him, by the great Hom. 7. in doctor of the Greek Church, Origen, who says, "that

Levit.

"the understanding our Saviour's words of eating his "flesh and drinking his blood, according to the letter, is "a letter that kills." These passages I cite by an anticipation, before I enter upon the inquiry into the sense of the ancient Church, concerning this matter; because they belong to the words of the institution, at least to the discourse in St. John: now if the sense that we give to these words is made good, we need be at no more pains to prove that they are capable of no other sense; since this must prove that to be the only true sense of them.

So that for all the arguments that have been brought by us against this doctrine, arising out of the fruitfulness of the matter, we were not bound to use them: for, our doctrine being confessed by them, it wants no proof; and we cannot be bound to prove a negative. Therefore though the copiousness of this matter has afforded us many arguments for the negative, yet that was not necessary: for as a negative always proves itself; so that holds more especially here, where that which is denied is accompanied with so many and so strange absurdities, as do follow from this doctrine.

The last topic in this matter is the sense that the ancient Church had of it: for, as we certainly have both the Scriptures and the evidence of our senses and reason of our side, so that will be much fortified, if it appears that no such doctrine was received in the first and best ages; and that it came in not all at once, but by degrees. I shall first urge this matter by some general presumptions; and then I shall go to plain proofs. But though the presumptions shall be put only as presumptions; yet if they appear to be violent, so that a man cannot hold giving his assent to the conclusion that follows from them, then though they are put in the form of presumptive arguments, yet that will not hinder them from being considered as concluding ones.

By the stating this doctrine it has appeared how many difficulties there are involved in it: these are difficulties that are obvious and soon seen: they are not found out by deep inquiry and much speculation: they are soon felt, and are very hardly avoided: and ever since the time that this doctrine has been received by the Roman Church, these have been much insisted on; explanations have been offered to them all; and the whole principles of natural

philosophy have been cast into a new mould, that they ART. might ply to this doctrine: at least those, who have studied XXVIII. their philosophy in that system, have had such notions put in them, while their minds were yet tender and capable of any impressions, that they have been thereby prepared to this doctrine before they came to it, by a train of philosophical terms and distinctions, so that they were not much alarmed at it, when it came to be set before them.

They are accustomed to think that ubication, or the being in a place, is but an accident to a substance: so that the same body's being in more places, is only its having a few more of those accidents produced in it by God: they are accustomed to think that accidents are beings different from matter: like a sort of clothing to it, which do indeed require the having of a substance for their subject: but yet since they are believed to have a being of their own, God may make them subsist: as the skin of a man may stand out in its proper shape and colour, though there were nothing but air or vacuity within it.

They are accustomed to think, that as an accident may be without its proper substance, so substance may be without its proper accidents; and they do reckon extension and impenetrability, that is, a body's so filling a space, that no other body can be in the same space with it, among its accidents: so that a body composed of organs and of large dimensions, may be not only all crowded within one wafer, but an entire distinct body may be in every separable part of this wafer; at least in every piece that carries in it the appearance of bread.

These, besides many other lesser subtilties, are the evident results of this doctrine: and it was a natural effect of its being received, that their philosophy should be so transformed as to agree to it, and to prepare men for it.

Now to apply this to the matter we are upon, we find none of these subtilties among the ancients. They seem to apprehend none of those difficulties, nor do they take any pains to solve or clear them. They had a philosophical genius, and shewed it in all other things: they disputed very nicely concerning the attributes of God, concerning his essence, and the Persons of the Trinity: they saw the difficulties concerning the incarnation of the Eternal Word, and Christ's being both God and man: they treat of original sin, of the power of grace, and of the decrees of God.

They explained the resurrection of our bodies, and the different states of the blessed and the damned.

They saw the difficulties in all these heads, and were

ART. very copious in their explanations of them: and they may XXVIII. be rather thought by some too full, than too sparing in the

canvassing of difficulties: but all those were mere speculative matters, in which the difficulty was not so soon seen as on this subject: yet they found these out, and pursued them with that subtilty that shewed they were not at all displeased, when occasions were offered them to shew their skill in answering difficulties: which, to name no more, appears very evidently to be St. Augustin's character. Yet neither he nor any of the other Fathers seem to have been sensible of the difficulties in this matter.

They neither state them nor answer them; nor do they use those reserves when they speak of philosophical matters, that men must have used who were possessed of this doctrine for a man cannot hold it without bringing himself to think and speak otherwise upon all natural things than the rest of mankind do.

They are so far from this, that, on the contrary, they deliver themselves in a way that shews they had no such apprehensions of things.

They thought that all creatures were limited to one place: and from thence they argued against the heathens, who believed that their deities were in every one of those statues which they consecrated to them.

From this head they proved the Divinity of the Holy Ghost; because he wrought in many different places at once which he could not do if he were only a creature.

They affirm, that Christ can be no more on earth, since he is now in heaven, and that he can be but in one place.

They say, that which hath no bounds nor figure, and that can neither be touched nor seen, cannot be a body: that bodies are extended in some place, and cannot exist after the manner of spirits.

They argue against the eternity of matter, from this, that nothing could be produced, that had a being before it was produced; and on all occasions they appeal to the testimony of our senses as infallible.

They say, that to believe otherwise tended to reverse the whole state of life, and order of nature, and to reproach the providence of God; since it must be said, that he has given the knowledge of all his works to liars and deceivers, if our senses may be false: that we must doubt of our faith, if the testimony of hearing, seeing, and feeling, could deceive us.

And in their contests with the Marcionites and others, concerning the truth of Christ's body, they appeal always