which your faith desires to be instructed in is, this the bread is the body of Christ, and the cup is his blood? or than that of Origen: That bread which is consecrated by the word of God, as to the matter of it, goes into the belly, and is cast out by the draught? or than that of Christ himself, who said, not only after the consecration, but after the finishing of the communion, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine? for it is certain the fruit of the vine is wine, and not blood. And yet when we speak thus, we do not so depress the esteem of the Supper of the Lord, as to teach that it is a mere cold ceremony, and that nothing is done in it which many falsely report of us; for we assert that Christ in his sacraments doth exhibit himself truly present, in baptism, that we may put him on; in his supper, that we may eat him by faith and in the spirit; and that by his cross and blood we may have life eternal: and this, we say, is not slightly and coldly, but really and truly done; for although we do not touch Christ with our teeth and lips, yet we hold and press him by faith, mind, and spirit. Nor is that faith vain which embraceth Christ, nor that participation cold which is perceived by the mind, understanding, and spirit; for so Christ himself is entirely offered and given to us in these mysteries as much as is possible, that we may truly know that we are flesh of his flesh, and bone of his bone, and that he dwells in us, and we in him. (John, vi. 56)

16. And therefore in the celebration of these mysteries, before we come to receive the holy communion, the people are fitly admonished to lift up their hearts, and that they should direct their minds to heaven, for there He is, by whom we are to be fed and live. And St. Cyril saith, that in partaking of the holy mysteries, all gross imaginations are to be excluded. And the Nicene council, as it is cited

2

by some in Greek, doth expressly forbid us to think only on the bread and wine that are set before us. And, as St. Chrysostom writes well: We say that the body of Christ is the carcass, and we are to be the eagles, that thereby we may learn to mount aloft, if we will approach the body of Christ; for this is the table of eagles, and not of jays. And St. Cyprian : This bread is the meat of the soul, and not of the belly. And St. Augustine: How shall I lay hold on Him who is absent? How shall I reach my hand into the heavens, and touch Him who sits there? Send thy faith thither (saith he), and thou hast him sure.

17. But then as to the fairs and sales of masses, and the carrying about and adoring the bread, and a number of such-like idolatrous and blasphemous follies, which none of them dare affirm to have been delivered to us by Christ or his Apostles, our church will not endure them; and we justly blame the bishops of Rome for presuming, without any command of God, without any authority of the holy fathers, and without any example, not only to propose the sacramental bread to be adored by the people with a divine worship; but also to carry it about before them upon an ambling nag wherever they go, as the Persian kings did heretofore their sacred fire, and the Egyptians their image of Isis and so have turned the sacraments of Christ into pageantry and pomp; that, in that very thing in which the death of Christ was to be celebrated and inculcated, and the mysteries of our redemption ought to be piously and reverently represented, the eyes of men should only be fed with a foolish show, and a piece of ludicrous levity. And then, whereas they say, and sometimes persuade fools, that they can by their masses distribute and apply to men (who very often think of nothing less, and never know what is then doing) all the merits of the death

of Christ; this pretence, I say, is ridiculous, heathenish, and silly; for it is our faith which applies the death and cross of Christ to us, and not the action of a priest. The faith of the sacraments (saith St. Augustine) justifies, and not the sacrament. And Origen saith, He (Christ) is the priest, and the propitiation, and the sacrifice; and that propitiation comes to every one by way of faith. And, therefore, agreeably hereunto, we say that the sacraments do not profit the living without faith, and much less the dead; for as to what they pretend concerning their purgatory, though that is no very late invention, yet it is nothing but a silly old wives story: St. Augustine sometimes saith there is such a place; sometimes he doth not deny but there may be such a place; sometimes he doubts if there be; and at other times he positively denies there is any such place at all, and thinks that men, out of human kindness to the dead, are deceived in that point. And yet from this one error there has sprung such a crop of small priests, that, masses being publicly and openly sold in every corner, they have turned the churches of God into mere shops, and deluded poor mortals into a belief that there was no commodity more useful; and, certainly, as to those sinall Levites, these masses were very advantageous.

18. We know that St. Augustine grievously complained of the vast number of impertinent ceremonies in his time, and therefore we have cut off a great many of them, because we know they were afflictive to the consciences of men, and burdensome to the church of God. Yet we still retain and religiously use not only all those which we know were delivered to the church by the Apostles, but some others which we saw might be borne without any inconvenience, because, as St. Paul commands, we desire all things in the religious assemblies should

be done decently and in order; but then, as to all those that were very superstitious or base, or ridiculous, or contrary to the Scripture, or did not seem to befit sober men, an infinite number of which are still to be found among Papists; we have rejected all these, I say, without excepting any one of them, because we would not have the service of God any longer contaminated with such fooleries.

19. We pray (as it is fit we should) in that tongue our people do all understand, that the people, as St. Paul admonisheth, may reap a common advantage by the common prayers, as all the holy fathers, and catholic bishops, not only in the Old, but in the New Testament also, did ever pray and teach the people to pray, lest, as St. Augustine saith, we should, like parrots, and other prating birds, seem to sound words which we did not understand.

20. We have no mediator and intercessor by whom we approach to God the Father but Jesus Christ, in whose name only all things are obtained. But that which we see done in their churches is base and heathenish; not only because they have set up an infinite number of intercessors, without any authority of the word of God; so that, as Jeremiah saith, according to the number of thy cities, so are thy gods; so that miserable men know not which to apply themselves to; and though they are innumerable, yet they have ascribed to each of them their office, and what was to be obtained, had, and received from each of them; but also because they have not only impiously, but impudently, solicited the Virgin Mary, that she would remember she is a mother; that she would be pleased to command her Son; and that she would make use of the authority she hath over him.

21. We say that man is born and does live in sin, and that no man can truly say his heart is clean ;

that the most holy man is an unprofitable servant ; that the law of God is perfect, and requires of us a full and perfect obedience; and that we cannot in any way keep it perfectly in this life; and that there is no mortal who can be justified in the sight of God by his own deserts; and therefore our only refuge and safety is in the mercy of God the Father by Jesus Christ, and in the assuring ourselves that he is the propitiation for our sins, by whose blood all our stains are washed out; that he has pacified all things by the blood of his cross; that he, by that only sacrifice which he once offered upon the cross, hath perfected all things; and therefore, when he breathed out his soul, said, IT IS FINISHED ; if by these words he would signify, now the price is paid for the sins of mankind.

22. Now if there be any who think not that this sacrifice is sufficient, let them go and find out a better; but as for us, because we know this is the only sacrifice, we are contented with it alone, nor do we expect any other; and because it was only once to be offered, we do not enjoin the repetition of it; and because it was full and in all its members and parts perfect, we do not substitute to it the perpetual successions of our own sacrifices.

23. Though we say there is no trust to be put in the merits of our works and actions, and place all the hopes and reason of our salvation only in Christ; yet we do not therefore say, that men should live loosely and dissolutely, as if baptism and faith were sufficient for a Christian, and there were nothing more required. The true faith is a living faith, and cannot be idle; therefore we teach the people, that God hath not called us to luxury and disorder, but, as St. Paul saith, unto good works, that we might walk in them (Eph. ii. 10). That God hath delivered us from the power of darkness, that we might