this mystery frequently in the same forms of words; and we are so certain that to eat Christ's body spiritually is to eat him really, that there is no other way for him to be eaten really, than by spiritual manducation.

5. Fifthly: When the fathers, in this question, speak of the change of the symbols in the holy sacrament, they sometimes use the words of μεταβολὴ, μεταρρύθμισις, μετασκεύασμος, μεταστοιχείωσις, μεταποίησις, in the Greek church : 4 conversion, mutation, transition, migration, transfiguration,' and the like in the Latin; but they by these do understand accidental and sacramental conversions, not proper, natural, and substantial. Concerning which, although I might refer the reader to see it highly verified in David Blondel's familiar elucidations of the eucharistical controversy, yet a shorter course I can take to warrant it, without my trouble or his; and that is, by the confession of a jesuit, and of no mean fame or learning amongst them. The words of Suarez, whom I mean, are these: "Licet antiqui Patres,' &c. "Although the ancient fathers have used divers names, yet all they are either general, as the names of conversion, mutation, transition; or else they are more accommodated to an accidental change, as the name of transfiguration, and the like: only the name of 'transelementation,' which Theophylact did use, seems to approach nearer to signify the propriety of this mystery, because it signifies a change even of the first elements; yet that word is harder, and not sufficiently accommodate for it may signify the resolution of one element into another, or the resolution of a mixed body into the elements." He might have added another sense of μETασTaxεiwσis, or 'transelementation.' For Thophylact uses the same word to express the change of our bodies to the state of

a See article 28 of the Church of England.

d

• Μεταποιήσει νόμους.—Suid. Αἱ φυλακαὶ τῶν ἀρχόντων μετεποιοῦντο εἰς ἐκκλησίας. - Georg. Alex. Vit. Chrys. c. 55. Οὐδείς ἐστιν ὁ διασκεδάσαι, ἢ τὴν βουλὴν μεταwoińca, duváμevos. — Chrys.Vit. Auctor. Anon. Id. in μɛraboλò, et reliquis observare est μεταποιέω, μεταβάλλω. — Suidas. Μεταστοιχείουσα, μετασχηματίζουσα, μεταπλάττουσα. — Suidas. Πάντας πρὸς τὴν ἀλήθειαν μεταστοιχείου μεταῤῥυθμίζων. — Auctor Vitæ Chrysost. Anon. c. 52. et de corpore Chrysostomi dixit, siç aidov φύσιν μετεσκευάσθη. ̓Αναγεννήσας ἡμᾶς, ἤτοι μεταποιήσας. — Ecumen. in 1 Pet. i. Η διδαχὴ μεταρρυθμίζει τὸν ἄνθρωπον. — Clem. Αlex. Strom. 4. Idem. lib. iii. Pedag. c. 2. Μετασκευάζει τὰς γυναῖκας εἰς πόρνας.

Chap. 5. in 3. disp. 50. sect. 3.

Theoph. in St. Luc. xxiv. et in St John, vi.

incorruption, and the change that is made in the faithful, when they are united unto Christ. But Suarez proceeds: "But transubstantiation does most properly and appositely signify the passage and conversion of the whole substance, into the whole substance." So that by this discourse we are quitted, and made free from the pressure of all those authorities of the fathers which speak of the mutation, conversion, transition, or passage, or transelementation, transfiguration, and the like,' of the bread into the body of Christ; these do, or may, only signify an accidental change; and come not home to their purpose of transubstantiation; and it is as if Suarez had said, the words, which the fathers use in this question, make not for us, and, therefore, we have made a new word for ourselves, and obtruded it upon all the world.' But against it, I shall only object an observation of Bellarmine, that is not ill. "The liberty of new words is dangerous in the church, because out of new words, by little and little, new things arise, while it is lawful to coin new words, in divine affairs."

6. Sixthly: To which I add this, that if all the fathers had more unitedly affirmed the conversion of the bread into Christ's body,' than they have done, and had not explicated their meaning as they have done indeed, yet this word' would so little have helped the Roman cause, that it would directly have overthrown it. For in their transubstantiation' there is no conversion' of one thing into another, but a local succession of Christ's body into the place of bread. A change of the ubi' was not used to be called 'a substantial conversion.' But they understood nothing of our present anpißua; they were not used to such curious nothings, and intricate falsehoods, and artificial nonsense, with which the Roman doctors troubled the world in this question. But they spake wholly another thing, and either they did affirm a substantial change, or they did not. If they did not, then it makes nothing for them, or against us; but if they did mean a proper substantial change, then, for so much as it comes to, it makes against us, but not for them; for they must mean a change of one substance into another, by conversion,- or a change of substances, by substitution of one in the place of another. If they meant the latter, then it was no conversion of one into another; and then they expressed not what they

meant; for conversion,' which was their word, could signify nothing of that; but if they meant the change of substance into substance, properly by conversion, then they have confuted the present doctrine of transubstantiation; which though they call a substantial change, yet an accident is the ' terminus mutationis,' that is, it is, by their explication of it, wholly an accidental change, as I have before discoursed; for nothing is produced but ubiquity or presentiality; that is, it is only made present, where it was not before. And it is to be observed, that there is a vast difference between conversion and transubstantiation; the first is not denied; meaning by it a change of use, of condition, of sanctification; as a table is changed into an altar, a house into a church, a man into a priest, Matthias into an apostle, the water of the river into the laver of regeneration; but this is not any thing of transubstantiation. For in this new device, there are three strange affirmatives, of which the fathers never dreamed. 1. That the natural being of bread is wholly ceased, and is not at all neither the matter nor the form. 2. That the accidents of bread and wine remain without a subject, their proper subject being annihilated, and they not subjected in the holy body. 3. That the body of Christ is brought into. the place of the bread, which is not changed into it, but is succeeded by it. These are the constituent propositions of transubstantiation, without the proof of which, all the affirmations of conversion signify nothing to their purpose, or against ours.

7. Seventhly: When the fathers use the word 'nature' in this question, sometimes saying the nature is changed,' sometimes that the nature remains,' it is evident that they either contradicted each other, or that the word nature' hath, amongst them, diverse significations. Now in order to this, I suppose, if men will be determined by the reasonableness of the things themselves, and the usual manners of speech, and not by prejudices and prepossessions, -it will be evident, that when they speak of the change of nature, saying that bread changes his nature, it may be understood of an accidental change: for that the word nature' is used for a change of accidents, is, by the Roman doctors, con

• Vide sect. 11. n. 34.

tended for, when it is to serve their turns (particularly in their answer to the words of pope Gelasius): and it is evident in the thing; for we say, a man of a good nature, that is, of a loving disposition. It is natural to me to love or hate this or that; and it is against my nature,' that is, my custom or my affection.' But then, as it may signify accidents, and a natural change may yet be accidental, as when water is changed into ice, wine into vinegar; yet it is also certain that' nature' may mean 'substance:' and if it can, by the analogy of the place, or the circumstances of speech, or by any thing, be declared, when it is that they mean a substance' by using the word 'nature;' it must be certain, that then substance' is meant when the word 'nature' is used distinctly from, and in opposition to, accidents; or when it is explicated by, and in conjunction with, substance; which observation is reducible to practice, in the following testimonies of Theodoret, Gelasius, and others: "Immortalitatem dedit, naturam non abstulit," says St. Austin.

8. Eighthly; So also, whatsoever words are used by the ancient doctors seemingly affirmative of a substantial change, cannot serve their interest, that now most desire it; because themselves being pressed with the words of natura,' and 'substantia,' against them, answer, that the fathers using these words, mean them not φυσικῶς, but θεολογικῶς, not 'naturally,' but theologically,' that is, as I suppose, not 'properly,' but 'sacramentally:' by the same account, when they speak of the change of the bread into the substance of Christ's body, they may mean the change of substance, not naturally, but sacramentally; so that this ought to invalidate the greatest testimony, which can be alleged by them; because themselves have taken from the words that sense, which only must have done them advantage; for if substantia' and natura,' always mean naturally,' then their sentence is oftentimes positively condemned by the fathers: if this may mean sacramentally,' then they can never without a just answer, pretend from their words to prove a 'natural, substantial change.'

9. Ninthly; But that the words of the fathers, in their most hyperbolical expressions, ought to be expounded sacra

f Ad Dardanum.

mentally and mystically, we have sufficient warrant from themselves, affirming frequently that the name of the thing signified is given to the sign. St. Cyprian affirms "ut significantia et significata eisdem vocabulis censeantur," "the same words represent the sign and the thing signified."The same is affirmed by St. Austin, in his epistle ad Bonifacium. Now upon this declaration of themselves, and of Scripture, whatsoever attributes either of them give to bread after consecration, we are, by themselves, warranted against the force of the words by a metaphorical sense; for if they call the sign by the name of the thing signified, and the thing intended is called by the name of a figure, and the figure by the name of the thing, then no affirmative of the fathers can conclude against them, that have reason to believe the sense of the words of institution to be figurative; for their answer is ready; the fathers and the Scriptures too, call the figure by the name of the thing figurated; the bread by the name of flesh, or the body of Christ, which it figures and represents.

10. Tenthly; The fathers in their alleged testimonies, speak more than is allowed to be literally and properly true, by either side, and, therefore, declare and force an understanding of their words different from the Roman pretension. Such are the words of St. Chrysostom; "Thou seest him, thou touchest him, thou eatest him, and thy tongue is made bloody, by this admirable blood,- thy teeth are fastened in his flesh, thy teeth are made red with his bloodi:" and the author of the book De Cœnâ Domini,' attributed to St. Cyprian," Cruci hæremus," &c. "We stick close to the cross, we suck his blood, and fasten our tongue between the very wounds of our Redeemer :" and under this head may be reduced very many other testimonies; now how far these go beyond the just positive limit, it will be in the power of any man to say, and to take into this account, as many as he please, even all that go beyond his own sense and opinion, without all possibility of being confuted.

11. Eleventhly; In vain will it be for any of the Roman doctors, to allege the words of the fathers proving the con

VOL. X.

Serm. de Unit.

h Vide infra, n. 30.

Hom. 83. in S. Mat. Hom. 60, et 6. ad Antioch. pop.

F