Scripture mistaken the ground of Protestants and common plea of all new reformers against the ancient Catholicke religion of England : many texts quite mistaken by Nouelists are lay'd open and redressed in this treatis[e] by Iohn Spenser.

Answer.

I haue before giuen the reason of this diffe∣rence,

for certaine it is that in this proposition ••n protestant doctrine by the word this, is ••ignified reall and materiall bread, and by my Body the reall body of Christ, where of they wil haue this materiall bread to be a signe now ••n the other proposition: my flesh is meat, or I am ••he bread &c. though the words my flesh and I signifie really and truly our Sauiour and his sacred body; yet the word bread cannot any way signifie true and materiall bread: for he expressely calles it the bread that came down from heauen: the bread that giues life to such as worthyly eate it, and liuing bread. which can by ••oe meanes agree with bread made of wheat or any other corne.

Hence therefore apeares that the flesh of our Sauiour;, or he himselfe are neither a Sa∣cramēt, nor a signe of visible and vsuall bread: ••or it would want little of blasphemy to say ••hat our Sauiour or his sacred body were a signe ••f a loafe of bread which seeing it is so, there can ••e thence noe argument drawn that bread is called the body of our Sauiour because it is a ••igne of his body: but rather the quite contrary our Sauiour or his blessed flesh are tuly and ••eally liuing bread, life giuing bread, heauenly ••read, spirituall bread. Therefore that which ••ur Sauiour gaue his disciples was truly and ••eally his reall and naturall body: or thus, that ••read of our Lord, that heauenly, liuing spiri∣tuall

which the Apostles receaued from the hands of our Sauiour, was his true substantiall body.

But if by the words: this is my Body: should be vnderstood true visible bread, as in the ob∣jection they are, there will be noe other pa∣rity or consequence saue this: or Sauiour calls his flesh bread because it is true liuing, hea∣uenly bread: therefore a peece of cōmon bread is called the body of Christ because it is a signe of his body: which is quite out of ioynt.

Now certainely (to answer the question he••e propounded) it is much lesse strange for our Sauiour to call himselfe meat, or liuing spirituall bread &c. then to call a piece of wheaten bread his true and reall body; for he is truely the one, but naturall bread can neuer be the other.

Concerning the other question first pro∣pounded, why may not bread be his body figuratiuely? if it had been set down in this manner: why might not bread haue beene his body, figuratiuely? I would haue answered that there is no reason but it might, as were the figures of the old law and amongst them the bread of proposition, and of Mel∣chisedech, and many such like types of the old Testament: but the reason why it may not now be so in this Sacrament is be∣cause I haue shewed that according to the

first institution, it was our Sauiours will to change bread into his body: and so not being at all, it could not be his body figuratiuely: neither can a figuratiue sense stand with the truth of this proposition: This is my Body which is giuen for you. That which is lastly added that bread is a Sacrament of his body, cannot stand with the Protestant doctrine: for they define in the little catechisme in the common prayer booke a Sacrament to be an outward visible signe of an in∣ward spirituall grace. now certaine it is that our Sauiours body was as outward and visible to the Apostles in the first institution as was the bread it selfe, and so neither an inward nor spirituall grace, and consequently it could not be a Sacrament of it. and if noe Sacrament, it could be noe signe of it. for Protestants ack∣nowledge noe other signe here then a sacra∣mentall signe: and though after our Sauiours ascension we cannot actually see his body by reason of the distance betwixt vs, yet that makes it not an inward spirituall grace, for then Rome and Constantinople would be spirituall to those that liue in these climates because for the same reason they cannot see them. and yet much lesse could the body of our Sauiour, either in the first institution or at any time after, be termed an inward grace according to Protestants: and yet we are not cōstrained to acknowledge that there is not a

Sacrament, for it signifies that heauenly an•• diuine grace which by vertu of it is giuen to nourish our soules which is truly inward an•• spirituall: and that which sensibly appeares in it, and is called by diuines Sacramentum tan∣tum, is a sacramentall signe of our Sauiour sacred body inuisibly but truly existent vnder those shewes or species in this Sacrament, and nourishing our soules and bodyes (and so may be truly and properly called a spirituall grace or gift) and that inward also when it is sacra∣mentally receiued. And noe lesse is it now •• sacramentall commemoratiue signe of the passion, death and sufferings of our Sauiour which are long since past, and so become now inuisible, working mysteriously and merito∣riously in this holy Sacrament.

If here should be replyed that hence would follow that this Sacrament might also in the first institution haue been a signe of our Sa∣uiours death & sufferings representing them as presently to follow: and so these words (This is my Body) might haue this sense: this bread is a representatiue signe of my body as instantly suffering and dying vppon the Crosse: which death and sufferings were then inuisible be∣cause they were not then existent. I answer that our Sauiour might haue pleased accord∣ing to his absolute power to haue instituted such a Sacrament, but because we haue neither

••n Scripture nor tradition that he instituted ••ere any such: and the words of the institu∣••ion, This is my Body, are properly and litterally ••o be vnderstood when there is nothing that ••onstraines vs to the contrary; we denye that ••ny such typicall or empty signe as this was ••ctually constituted by our Sauiour in the in∣••titution of this Sacrament; especially seeing ••hat the paschall lamme represented much ••ore liuely and perfectly the passion of Christ ••hen the bread and wine: and that such typi∣••all representations were proper to the old ••aw which was the shadow of things to come. And for Protestants they must confesse that ••hey haue noe ground in Scripture for any other signe of our Sauiours passion, then by way of commemoration or remembrance, which supposes his suffering and death past, ••nd not to come, as I haue already prouued. And though it were gratis admitted that in this Sacrament such a prefiguratiue signe of our Sauiours passion was exhibited in the first institution, yet this would noe more hinder the reall presence necessarily required by vertu of this proposition, this is my Body &c. ••hen its being now a commemotatiue signe of his said passion, as I haue declared and proued already.