1. Accidents subsisting without a subject follows hence necessarily, in the first place: so that there should be whiteness, and nothing white; length, and nothing long; breadth, and nothing broad; weight, and nothing heavy, — for all these accidents of bread remain, when you would have them say that the bread is gone, — so that there is left a white, sweet, long, broad, heavy nothing! This your countrymen cannot understand.
2. Besides, they say, you hereby teach them that one and the same body of Christ which is in heaven is also on the altar; not by an impletion of the whole space between heaven and earth, that some part of it should be in heaven and some on earth, but that the one body which is in heaven, and whilst it is there, is also on the altar, in the accidents of bread; which upon the matter is, that one and the same body is two, yea, a hundred or a thousand, according as in the mass you are pleased to multiply it. Now, that one and the same body should be locally divided or separated from itself, — that whilst that one body is on the altar, that other one body, which is the same, should be in heaven, — your countrymen think to imply a contradiction.
o. And so, also, they do that a body should be m any place, and yet not as a body, but as a spirit. For whereas you say that whole
MASS AND TKANSU13STANTIATI0N. 425
Christ is contained under each species of bread and wine, and under every the most minute part of eitlier species, as your council speaks, you make the body of Christ to be Avhole in the whole, and whole in every part ; when the very nature of a body requires that it have " partes extra partes," — its parts distinct from one another, and those occupying their distinct particular places. But you make the body of Christ neither to be compassed in nor to fill the place wherein it is ; that is, to he in a place and not to he in a place. For if it be a body, and be under the species of bread and wine upon the altar, it is in a place ; and if it be not comprehended in that space where it is, and doth fill it, it is not in a place: and therefore is there and is not there at the same time.
4. And, moreover, we all know that the consecrated wafer bears no proportion to the true natural hochj of Christ; and yet this is said to be contained under that : so that the body contained is much greater and farther extended than the body that contains it or the space wherein it is ; for it is so under the host as not to be elsewhere, unless in another host.
5. Nay, it is in every minute part of the host; which multiplies contradictions in your assertion.
6. Of the same nature is it that you are forced to feign the same body in ten thousand distant places at the same time, and that with all contradictory adjuncts and o.ffections. Now, your countrymen think that these and innumerable other consequences of your tran- substantiation, which you presuppose to your sacrifice, or rather make a principal part thereof, are such as overthrow the whole order of nature and being of things, and leave nothing certain among the sons of men.
III. Their sense is equally engaged against you with their reason. Your host is visible, tangible, gustable. When they see it, they see bread ; when they feel it, they feel bread ; when they taste it, they taste bread ; and yet you tell them it is not bread. Whom shall they believe? If things be not as they see them, feel them, taste them, it may be they are not men, nor do go on their feet, but are deceived in all these things, and suppose they see, perceive, and understand what they do not. You tell them, indeed, that the bread is changed into the body of Christ, that body that was born of the blessed Vir- gin, and was crucified at Jerusalem; that all taste, length, breadth, weight is taken away from it ; and that the taste and weight of the bread is continued, which are the things they see, feel, and taste. But they likewise tell you that your persuasion is an inveterate pre- judice, which you have blindly captivated your minds unto, and that if you would but give yourselves the liberty of exercising any reflex thoughts upon your own acts, you would find that, upon the suppo-
426 A VINDICATION OF THE ANIMADVERSIONS ON FIAT LUX.
sitions you proceed on, you have not any just grounds to conclude yourselves to be living men ; for you teach men to deny and ques- tion all that from reason or sense you can insist upon to prove that so you are. On these and the like accounts, the encomiums you give of your sacrifice will scarce prevail with your countrymen to relin- quish all the worship of God, wherein they find daily comfort and advantage to their souls, for the embracement of it
CHAPTER XX.
Of the blessed Virgin.
Unto the 15th chapter of the " Animadversions," directed to your paragraph of the blessed Virgin, you can find, it seems^ nothing to say, and therefore betake yourself to clamorous revilings. All that you say in your " Fiat" on this head is but a heap of false accusations against Protestants for dishonouring her ; and all that you say in your epistle in its vindication is railing at me for minding you of your miscarriage. My whole book, you say, is nothing but " calumnies, a bundle of slanders, a mere quiver of sharp arrows of desolation." I am not sorry that you are sensible that it hath arrows in it, tending to the desolation of your abominations; but I challenge you to give an instance of any one calumny or slander in it, from the beginning to the end. If you do not do so, I here declare you to be really and highly guilty of that which you would falsely impose upon another. Free yourself by some one instance if you can ; if you cannot, your reputation wUl follow your conscience whither it will be hard for you to find them again. The substance of that chapter is this, which is all that I shall now say to your nothing against it : — Protestants yield to the blessed Virgin all the honour that the Scripture allows them or directs them unto, or that the primitive church did ascribe unto her ; and the Papists give her the honour due to God alone, whereby they horribly dishonour God and her.