be doing a Thing and at the fame Time not doing it to afcribe which to God is not to magnify, but mock his Power.

But they fay further, that Transubstantiation hath no more Difficulty than the Trinity hath. But furely the Difference is very vifible. The Doctrine of the Trinity indeed is a Mystery: that is, the whole of the Subject cannot be fully understood by us. But in Tranfubftantiation there is no Mystery at all. For the most evident Falfhoods are as juft clearly understood to be fo as the most evident, Truths. In the Trinity there is nothing we fee to be false; only we do not fee the particular Manner in which fome Things faid concerning it are true: but in Transubstantiation there are many Things we fee to be falfe, and which can in no Manner be true. Let them show us any Contradiction in the Doctrine of the Trinity, and we will believe it no longer. In the mean Time, fince we have fhown Contradiction in Tranfubftantiation, let them believe that no longer.

But they have Scripture to plead for it. Now if this were a Doctrine of Scripture, it would fooner prove Scripture to be falfe, than Scripture could prove it to be true; and therefore the Papifts, by making fuch a monftrous Ab

6

furdity

1

furdity an Article of Faith, have loaded their Religion with a Weight, which, did it belong to Chriftianity, were able to fink it. But, God be thanked, Scripture is no more on their Side than Reason. We know indeed that our Saviour faid when he gave the Sacrament, This is my Body. But fo at another Time he faid, Verily verily I am the Door of the Sheep: and at a third, I am the Vine. And fo have all Mankind always called a Representation of any Thing by the Name of what it reprefented. Why then is He not to be understood in the fame Figure here? How do we think the Apostles understood him but as they were used to do in fuch Cafes? They who were fo backward at comprehending difficult Things, and fo ready to afk Questions about them, did they without any Surprize or any Queftion apprehend that our Saviour then took his own Body in his own Hand, and gave that one Body to each of his twelve Apostles at the fame Time, and that each of them swallowed him down their Throats, though he was all the while fitting at the Table along with them? Such Things are too ridiculous to be mentioned in a ferious Place, and yet these Men force us to it by gravely requiring us to believe them. The only confiderable Paf

fage befides, that they plead, is in the fixth Chapter of St. John; where many Jews having followed our Saviour because he had fed them with the Miracle of the Loaves, he bids them labour not for the Meat which perisheth, but that which endureth unto everlasting Life, which He would give them who is the true Bread from Heaven. Now were this meant of the Sacrament, and to be understood literally, we muft conclude not Bread turned into Christ's Body, but his Body turned into Bread; which is quite the contrary to what they hold. But indeed the whole is only a figurative Way of saying that the Souls of Men receive from the Fruits of his Death a much more valuable Nourishment than their Bodies receive from their daily Food. Juft as he elsewhere fays ", Whoever drinketh of the Water that I shall give him, it shall be in him a Well of Water Springing up into everlasting Life; which no Body ever underftood literally and just as Wisdom fpeaks of herself in Ecclus xxiv. 21. They that eat me Shall yet be hungry, and they that drink me fall yet be thirty; that is, they who have tafted the Pleasures and Benefits of Virtue will always defire a ftill greater Experience of them. But the Jews, with their ufual Perverseness, cavilling

:

m John iv. 14.

at

at these Words of our Saviour's, he goes on very ftrongly to affert the Propriety of them, that his Flesh is Meat indeed, and his Blood Drink indeed, that he who eateth the one and drinketh the other, dwelleth in him and liveth by him, but he that doth not, hath no Life in him. But now these Words being spoken, you fee, concerning the present Time, My Flesh is Meat indeed, and so on, cannot principally relate to the Sacrament; for there was yet no such Thing, nor till a Year or two after. Befides; it is not true that he, and he only, who eateth the Sacrament, shall dwell in Christ and live by him. For Persons may poffibly have no Opportunity of receiving the Sacrament, and yet be very good Chriftians, and too many receive it frequently, and yet are very bad Chriftians. The Meaning therefore plainly is, that our Saviour's coming and fuffering in the Flesh, and fhedding his Blood for Mankind, is the fpiritual Life of the World: that whoever imbibes the Doctrine he taught in his Life, and partakes by Faith of the Benefits he procured at his Death, his Soul is inwardly ftrengthened by them, and shall be finally preserved to a happy Immortality. For in this fpiritual and figurative Senfe he immediately directs his Disciples to understand his

Words; when misunderstanding them in a grofs and literal one had fomewhat ftaggered them. Doth this, fays he, offend you? It is the Spirit that quickeneth: the Flesh profiteth nothing. The Words that I fpeak unto you, they are Spirit and they are Life. His Manner of Expreffion had the fame Intent with that Paffage of St. Paul ", where he fays, the Ifraelites did all eat the fame Spiritual Meat, and did all drink the fame Spiritual Drink. For they drank of the fpiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Chrift. The Papifts themselves do not think from hence, that the Jews did eat and drink Chrift literally and Chriftians do it in the fame Manner they did, only with a clearer and more diftinct Faith. For in this fpiritual Senfe, Christ himself explains his Words; we firmly believe His Body and Blood to be verily and indeed taken and received by the Faithful in the Lord's Supper; that is, an Union with him, to be not only represented, but really and effectually communicated to the worthy Receiver. But as for any other Senfe, if we did, or could do fo monftrous a Thing, as literally to eat the Flesh, and drink the Blood of our dear Lord, it is not that which could do our Souls any Good, * 1 Cor. x. 3,4.

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but