Chapter 17. Of the Holy Supper of Christ, and What It Avails Us

After God has once received us into his family, and not only to take us as his servants, but as his children: that he may fulfill the office of a most good Father, and careful for his issue, he takes also upon him to nourish us throughout the whole course of our life. And not contented therewith, it pleased him by a pledge given, to assure us of this continual liberality. To this end therefore he has given his Church another Sacrament by the hand of his only begotten Son, namely a spiritual banquet, wherein Christ testifies himself to be the quickening bread, with which our souls are fed to true and blessed immortality. But forasmuch as the knowledge of so great a mystery is very necessary, and according to the greatness thereof, requires a diligent declaration: and Satan, that he might bereave the Church of this inestimable treasure, has long ago spread mists, and since that time darkness, to obscure the light of it, and then has stirred strifes and battles that might estrange the minds of the simple from tasting of this holy food, and has also in our time attempted the same craft: therefore when I shall have briefly knit up the sum for the capacity of the unlearned, I will undo those knots, with which Satan has endeavored to snare the world. First, bread and wine are signs, which represent to us the invisible food, which we receive of the flesh and blood of Christ. For as in Baptism God again begetting us does graft us into the fellowship of his Church, and by adoption does make us his own: so we have said that he performs the office of a provident Father of the household, in this that he continually ministers to us food, that he sustains and preserves us in that life into which he has by his word begotten us. Now the only food of our soul is Christ, and therefore the heavenly Father calls us to him, that being refreshed with common partaking of him, we may from time to time gather lively force, until we attain to heavenly immortality. But forasmuch as this mystery of the secret uniting of Christ with the godly is by nature impossible to be comprehended, he gives the figure and image thereof in visible signs most fit for our small capacity: yes, as it were by earnests and tokens given, he makes it so assured to us as if it were seen with our eyes, because this so familiar a similitude enters even into the grossest minds, that souls are so fed with Christ, as bread and wine do sustain the bodily life. Now therefore we have it declared, to what end this mystical blessing tends — namely to assure us, that the body of the Lord was so once offered for us, that we now eat it, and in eating it do feel in us the effectual working of that only sacrifice: that his blood was so once shed for us, that it is to us continual drink. And so sound the words of the promise there adjoined. Take, this is my body, which is delivered for you. The body therefore which was once offered up for our salvation, we are commanded to take and eat: that when we see ourselves to be made partakers of this, we may certainly determine that the power of his death which brings life shall be effectual in us. Whereupon also he calls the cup, the covenant in his blood. For after a certain manner it renews, or rather continues the covenant which he has once established with his blood, so much as pertains to the confirming of our faith, so often as he reaches to us that holy blood to be tasted of.

A great fruit verily of assurance and sweetness may godly souls gather of this Sacrament, because they have a witness, that we are grown together into one body with Christ, so that whatever is his we may call ours. Hereupon follows that we may boldly promise to ourselves, that everlasting life is ours, whereof he is heir: and that the kingdom of heaven, into which he is now entered, can no more fall away from us than from him: again that we can not now be condemned by our sins, from the guiltiness whereof he has acquitted us, when he willed them to be imputed to himself as if they were his own. This is the marvelous exchange, which of his immeasurable bountifulness he has made with us: that he being made with us the Son of Man, has made us with him the sons of God: that by his coming down into earth, he has made us a way to go up into heaven: that putting upon him our mortality, he has given us his immortality: that taking on him our weakness, he has strengthened us with his power: that taking our poverty to himself he has conveyed his riches to us: that taking to him the weight of our unrighteousness, with which we were oppressed, he has clothed us with his righteousness.

Of all these things we have so full a witnessing in this sacrament, that we must certainly determine, that Christ is truly given to us, as if Christ himself were set present before our eyes, and handled with our hands. For this word can neither lie to us, nor mock us: Take, eat, drink: this is my body which is delivered for you: this is the blood, which is shed for the forgiveness of sins. Whereas he commands to take, he signifies that it is ours. Whereas he commands to eat, he signifies that it is made one substance with us. Whereas he says of the body, that it is delivered for us: of the blood, that it is shed for us: therein he teaches that both are not so much his as ours: because he took and laid away both, not for his own benefit, but for our salvation. And truly it is to be diligently noted, that the chief and in a manner whole substance of the sacrament stands in these words, Which is delivered for you, Which is shed for you. For, otherwise it should not much profit us, that the body and blood of the Lord are now distributed, unless they had been once given forth for our redemption and salvation. Therefore they are represented under bread and wine, that we should learn that they are not only ours, but also ordained for the nourishment of spiritual life. This is what we before said, that from the corporal things which are showed forth in the sacrament, we are by a certain proportional relation guided to spiritual things. So when bread is given to us for a sign of the body of Christ, we ought at once to conceive this similitude: As bread nourishes, sustains, and maintains the life of our body: so the body of Christ is the only food to quicken and give life to our soul. When we see wine set forth for a sign of his blood: we must call to mind what uses wine brings to the body, that we may consider that the same are brought to us spiritually by the blood of Christ: those uses are, to cherish, to refresh, to strengthen, to make merry. For if we sufficiently weigh, what the delivering of this holy body, what the shedding of this holy blood, has profited us: we shall plainly perceive that these things which are spoken of bread and wine, according to such proportional relation do very well accord with them toward us when they are communicated to us.

Therefore the chief parts of the sacrament are not, simply and without higher consideration to reach to us the body of Christ: but rather the same promise, by which he testifies, that his flesh is truly food, and his blood is drink, with which we are fed into eternal life: by which he affirms himself to be the bread of life, of which whoever eats, he shall live forever: to seal (I say) and confirm that promise: and for bringing the same to pass, to send us to the cross of Christ, where that promise has been truly performed, and in all points fulfilled. For we do not well and healthfully eat Christ but crucified, when we do with lively feeling conceive the effectiveness of his death. For whereas he called himself the bread of life, he did not borrow that name from the sacrament, as some do wrongfully expound it: but because he was given to us such by the Father, and performed himself such, when being made partaker of our human mortality, he made us partners of his divine immortality: when offering himself for sacrifice, he took our accursedness upon himself, that he might fill us with blessing: when with his death he devoured and swallowed up death: when in his resurrection he raised up this our corruptible flesh which he had put on, to glory and incorruption.

It remains that by application all the same may come to us. That is done, both by the Gospel, and more clearly by the holy Supper, where both he offers himself to us with all his good things, and we receive him by faith. Therefore the sacrament does not cause Christ to first begin to be the bread of life: but when it brings into remembrance that he was made the bread of life, which we continually eat, and when it gives to us the taste and savor of that bread, then it makes us to feel the strength of that bread. For it promises us that whatever Christ did or suffered, the same was done to give life to us. Then, that this giving of life is everlasting, by which we may without end be nourished, sustained, and preserved in life. For as Christ should not have been to us the bread of life, unless he had been born and had died for us, unless he had risen again for us: so now he should not be the same unless the effectiveness and fruit of his birth, death, and resurrection were an everlasting and immortal thing. All which Christ has very well expressed in these words: "The bread which I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world." By which words without doubt he signifies that his body should therefore be to us for bread, to the spiritual life of the soul, because it should be given forth to death for our salvation: and that it is delivered to us to eat of it, when by faith he makes us partakers of it. Once therefore he gave it, that he might be made bread, when he gave forth himself to be crucified for the redemption of the world: daily he gives it, when by the word of the Gospel he offers it to us to be received, so far as it was crucified: where he seals that deliverance with the holy mystery of the Supper: where he inwardly fulfills that which he outwardly betokens. Now herein we must beware of two faults, that neither doing too much in abasing the signs, we seem to pluck them from their mysteries to which they are in a manner fastened: nor that being immeasurable in advancing the same, we seem in the meantime somewhat to darken the mysteries themselves. That Christ is the bread of life, with which the faithful are nourished into eternal salvation, there is no man but he grants, unless he be altogether without religion. But this point is not likewise agreed upon among all men, what is the manner of partaking of him. For there are those who in one word define that to eat the flesh of Christ, and to drink his blood, is nothing else but to believe in Christ himself. But I think that Christ meant some more certain and higher thing, in that notable sermon where he commends to us the eating of his flesh: namely, that we are quickened by the true partaking of him: which also he therefore expressed by the words of eating and drinking, lest any man should think that the life which we receive of him is conceived by bare knowledge only. For as not the sight, but the eating of bread suffices the body for nourishment: so it behoves that the soul be truly and thoroughly made partaker of Christ, that by the power of him it may be quickened into a spiritual life. But in the meantime we confess that there is no other eating, but of faith: as there can no other be imagined. But this is the difference between my words and theirs, that with them to eat is only to believe: but I say that the flesh of Christ is eaten with believing, because by faith he is made ours, and I say that eating is the fruit and effect of faith. Or, if you will have it plainer, with them eating is faith: and I think it rather to follow of faith. In words truly the difference is but small: but in the thing itself, not small. For though the Apostle teaches that Christ dwells in our hearts by faith: yet no man will expound this dwelling to be faith: but all men do perceive that there is expressed a singular effect of faith, for that by it the faithful obtain to have Christ dwelling in them. After this manner, the Lord meant, in calling himself the bread of life, not only to teach that in the faith of his death and resurrection, salvation is reposed for us: but also that by true partaking of himself it is brought to pass, that his life passes into us, and becomes ours: like as bread, when it is taken for food, ministers liveliness to the body.

Neither did Augustine, whom they bring in for their patron, in any other meaning write that we eat by believing, than to show that this eating is of faith, not of the mouth. Which I also deny not: but yet therewith I add, that we do by faith embrace Christ, not appearing afar off, but making himself one with us, that he may be our head, and we his members. Yet do I not utterly disallow that manner of speaking: but only I deny it to be a full declaration, if they mean to define what it is to eat the flesh of Christ. Otherwise I see that Augustine has often used this form of speech: as when he says in the third book of Christian doctrine, 'Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man: this is a figure teaching that we must communicate with the passion of the Lord, and must sweetly and profitably lay up in remembrance that for us his flesh was crucified and wounded.' Again when he says, that the three thousand men which were converted at Peter's sermon, did drink the blood of Christ by believing, which they had shed by cruel dealing. But in many other places he honorably sets out that benefit of faith, that by it our souls are no less refreshed with the communicating of the flesh of Christ, than our bodies are with the bread which they eat. And the same is it which in a certain place Chrysostom writes, that Christ does not only by faith, but also in deed make us his body. For he means not that we do from any other place than from faith, obtain such a benefit: but this only he means to exclude, that none when he hears faith to be named, should conceive a naked imagination. As for them that will have the Supper to be only a mark of outward profession, I do now pass them over: because I think that I have sufficiently confuted their error, when I treated of Sacraments generally. Only this thing let the readers mark, that when the cup is called the covenant in the blood, there is a promise expressed that may be of force to confirm faith. Whereupon follows, that unless we have respect to God, and embrace that which he offers, we do not rightly use the holy Supper.

Moreover they also do not satisfy me, which acknowledging that we have some communion with Christ, when they mean to express it, do make us partakers only of the Spirit, without making any mention of flesh and blood. As though all those things were spoken of nothing, that his flesh is truly meat, that his blood is truly drink: that none has life, but he that eats that flesh, and drinks that blood: and such other sayings that belong to the same end. Therefore if it is certain that the full communicating of Christ proceeds beyond their description, as it is too narrowly strained: I will now go about to knit up in few words, how large it is and how far it extends itself, before that I speak of the contrary fault of excess. For I shall have a longer disputation with the excessive teachers, which, when according to their own grossness they frame a manner of eating and drinking full of absurdity, do also transfigure Christ stripped out of his flesh into a fantasy: if yet a man may with any words comprehend so great a mystery, which I see that I cannot sufficiently comprehend with mind: and therefore I do willingly confess it, that no man should measure the highness thereof by the small proportion of my childishness. But rather I exhort the readers, that they do not restrain the sense of their mind within these too narrow bounds: but endeavor to rise up much higher than they can by my guiding. For I myself, so often as I speak of this thing, when I have traveled to say all, think that I have yet said but little in respect of the worthiness thereof. And although the mind can do more in thinking, than the tongue in expressing: yet with greatness of the thing, the mind also is surmounted and overwhelmed. Finally therefore nothing remains, but that I must break forth into admiration of that mystery, which neither the mind can suffice to think of, nor the tongue to declare. Yet after such manner as I can, I will set forth the sum of my meaning: which as I nothing doubt to be true, so I trust that it will not be disallowed of godly hearts.

First of all, we are taught out of the Scripture, that Christ was from the beginning the life-bringing word of the Father, the fountain and origin of life, from where all things ever received their having of life. Therefore John sometimes calls him the word of life, and sometimes writes that life was in him: meaning that he even then flowing into all creatures, poured into them the power of breathing and living. Yet the same John adds afterward, that the life was then and not until then openly shown, when the Son of God, taking upon him our flesh, gave himself to be seen with eyes and felt with hands. For though he did before also spread abroad his power into the creatures: yet because man, being by sin estranged from God, having lost the communion of life, saw on every side death hanging over him: that he might recover hope of immortality, it was necessary that he should be received into the communion of that word. For how small a confidence may you conceive of it, if you hear that the word of God indeed, from which you are most far removed, contains in itself the fullness of life, but in yourself and round about you nothing offers itself and is present before your eyes but death? But since that fountain of life began to dwell in our flesh, now it lies not far off hidden from us, but presently delivers itself to be partaken of by us. Indeed it makes the very flesh, wherein it rests, to be of power to bring life to us, that by partaking of it we may be fed to immortality. I am (says he) the bread of life, that am come down from heaven. And the bread which I will give, is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. In which words he teaches, not only that he is life, in respect that he is the eternal word of God which came down to us from heaven, but that in coming down he poured the same power into the flesh which he did put on, that from there the communicating of life might flow forth to us. Hereupon also these things now follow, that his flesh is truly meat, and his blood is truly drink, with which sustenance the faithful are fostered into eternal life. Herein therefore consists singular comfort to the godly, that now they find life in their own flesh. For so they do not only with easy passage attain to it, but have it of itself laid abroad for them and offering itself to them. Only let them hold open the bosom of their heart, that they may embrace it being present, and they shall obtain it.

But although the flesh of Christ has not so great power of itself, that it can give life to us, which both in the own first estate of it was subject to mortality, and now being endued with immortality, lives not by itself: yet it is rightly called life-bringing, which is filled with fullness of life, to pour it into us. In which meaning I do with Cyril expound that saying of Christ: As the Father has life in himself, so he has also given to the Son to have life in himself. For there he properly speaks of his gifts, not which he from the beginning possessed with the Father, but with which he was garnished in the same flesh in which he appeared. Therefore he shows that in his manhood also dwells the fullness of life, that whoever partakes of his flesh and blood, may therewith also enjoy the partaking of life. Of what sort that is, we may declare by a familiar example. For as out of a fountain water is sometimes drunk, sometimes is drawn, sometimes by furrows is conveyed to the watering of grounds which yet of itself does not overflow into so many uses, but from the very spring itself which with everlasting flowing yields and ministers to it from time to time new abundance: so the flesh of Christ is like a rich and unwasted fountain which pours into us the life springing from the Godhead into itself. Now who sees not, that the communion of the flesh and blood of Christ is necessary to all that aspire to heavenly life? Hereunto tends that saying of the Apostle, that the Church is the body of Christ and the fulfilling of it: and that he is the head out of which the whole body coupled and knit together by joints, makes increase of the body: that our bodies are the members of Christ. All which things we understand to be impossible to be brought to pass, but that he must wholly cleave to us in Spirit and body. But that most near fellowship whereby we are coupled with his flesh, he has yet set out with a more glorious title, when he said that we are members of his body, and are of his bones and of his flesh. At the last, to declare it to be a matter greater than all words, he concludes his saying with an exclamation, This is (says he) a great secret. Therefore it should be a point of extreme madness, to acknowledge no communion of the faithful with the flesh and blood of the Lord, which the Apostle declares to be so great, that he had rather wonder at it than express it.

Let the sum be, that our souls are so fed with the flesh and blood of Christ, as bread and wine do maintain and sustain the bodily life. For otherwise the proportional relation of the sign should not agree, unless souls did find their food in Christ. Which can not be done, unless Christ does truly grow into one with us, and refresh us with the eating of his flesh and drinking of his blood. But although it seem incredible, that in so great distance of places the flesh of Christ reaches to us that it may be meat to us: let us remember how much the secret power of the Spirit surpasses above all our senses, and how foolish it is to go about to measure his immeasurableness by our measure. That therefore which our mind comprehends not, let our faith conceive, that the Spirit truly knits into one those things that are separated in places. Now that same holy communion of his body and blood, by which Christ pours his life into us, even as if he [reconstructed: pierced] it into our bones and marrows, he in the Supper also testifies and seals [reconstructed: and this] not with setting before us a vain or void sign, but bringing forth there the effectual working of his Spirit, by which he fulfills that which he promises. And truly he there offers and delivers the thing signified to all them that sit at that spiritual banquet: although it be received with fruit of the faithful only, which receive so great bountifulness with true faith and thankfulness of mind. After which manner the Apostle said, that the bread which we break is the communion of the body of Christ: and that the cup which we consecrate with the word and prayers to that purpose, is the communion of his blood. Neither is there any cause why any man should object, that it is a figurative speech, by which the name of the thing signified is given to the sign. I grant truly that the breaking of the bread is a sign, not the thing itself. But this being admitted, yet we shall rightly gather of the delivery of the sign, that the thing itself is delivered. For unless a man will call God a deceiver, he can never be so bold to say that he sets before us an empty sign. Therefore if by the breaking of bread the Lord does truly represent the partaking of his body, it ought to be out of doubt that he truly performs and delivers it. And this rule is always to be held of the godly, that so often as they see the signs ordained of the Lord, they certainly think and persuade themselves that the truth of the thing signified is there present. For to what purpose should the Lord deliver to you into your hand the sign of his body, but to assure you of the true partaking of it? If it be true, that a visible sign is given us, to seal the gift of an invisible thing: when we receive the sign of the body, let us no less certainly believe that the body itself also is given us.

I say therefore (which both has always been received in the Church, and all they teach at this day that think right) that the holy mystery of the Supper consists of two things: that is to say, of the bodily signs, which being set before our eyes do represent to us invisible things according to the capacity of our weakness: and of spiritual truth, which is by those signs both figured and delivered. Of what sort that is, when I mean to show it familiarly, I use to set three things: the signification, the matter which hangs of the signification, the virtue or effect which follows of both. The signification consists in the promises, which are after a certain manner wrapped together with the sign. The matter or substance I call Christ with his death and resurrection. By effect I understand the redemption, righteousness, sanctification, and eternal life, and whatever other benefits Christ brings us. Now although all these things have respect to faith: yet I leave no place to this caviling: as though when I say that Christ is received by faith, I would have him conceived with understanding only and imagination. For the promises offer him, not that we should stick fast in the sight alone and in bare knowledge: but that we should enjoy the true communion of him. And truly I see not how any man may have confidence that he has redemption and righteousness in the cross of Christ, and life in his death, but principally standing upon the true communion of Christ himself. For those good things should not come to us, unless Christ first made himself ours. I say therefore, that in the mystery of the Supper, by the signs of bread and wine Christ is truly delivered to us, indeed and his body and blood, in which he has fulfilled all obedience for purchasing of righteousness to us: namely that first we should grow together into one body with him: and then being made partakers of his substance, we may also feel his power in the communion of all his good things.

Now I come down to the excessive mixtures, which superstition has brought in. For herein Satan has played with marvelous subtlety, that withdrawing the minds of men from heaven, he might fill them with perverse error, as though Christ were fastened to the element of bread. And first we must not dream such a presence of Christ in the Sacrament, as the craftsmen of the court of Rome have feigned: as though the body of Christ were made present with presence of place, to be handled with hands, to be bruised with teeth, and swallowed with mouth. For this form of recantation Pope Nicolas indited to Berengarius, to be a witness of his repentance: namely with words so far monstrous, that the author of the gloss cries out that there is danger, if the readers do not wisely take heed to themselves, lest they should suck out of them a heresy worse than was that of Berengarius. In the second distinction, in the chapter beginning thus, Ego Berengarius. But Peter Lombard, although he labors much in excusing the absurdity, yet more inclines to the contrary sentence. For as we nothing doubt that it has limits according to the perpetual nature of the body of men, and is held in heaven, into which it was once received, until he return to judgment: so to draw it back under these corruptible elements or to imagine it present everywhere, we account it to be utterly unlawful. Neither truly is it so needful to this that we may enjoy the partaking of it: inasmuch as the Lord gives us this benefit by his Spirit, that we be made one with him in body, Spirit, and soul. The bond therefore of this joining is the Spirit of Christ, by the knitting of which we are coupled together, and as it were a certain conduit, by which whatever Christ himself both is and has, is conveyed to us. For if we behold the sun shining forth with his beams upon the earth after a certain manner to cast forth his substance to it to engender, nourish, and quicken the fruits thereof: why should the extending of beams of the Spirit of Christ be inferior to convey the communion of his flesh and blood into us? Therefore the Scripture, when it speaks of our partaking with Christ, refers the whole force thereof to the Spirit. Yet instead of many, one place shall be sufficient. For Paul in the 8th chapter to the Romans, says that Christ dwells in us none otherwise than by his Spirit: by which yet he takes not away that communion of his flesh and blood of which we now speak, but teaches that the Spirit alone works that we possess whole Christ and have him dwelling in us.

The Schoolmen thought more modestly, who were withheld with horror of so barbarous ungodliness. Yet they also themselves do nothing but mock with subtler deceits. They grant that Christ is not contained there by way of circumscription nor after a bodily manner: but afterward they invent a way, which neither themselves do understand, nor they can declare to others: yet it is such as falls to this point that Christ must be sought in the form of bread as they call it. For what is it? When they say that the substance of bread is turned into Christ, do they not fasten him to the whiteness which they there leave? But (say they) he is so contained in the Sacrament, that he abides in heaven: and we determine no other presence but of habitude. But whatever words they bring in to cloak it with a deceitful color, this is the end of all, that that is by consecration made Christ, which before was bread: that from there forward Christ lies hidden under that color of bread. Which also they are not ashamed in plain words to express. For these are the words of Lombard: that the body of Christ, which in itself is visible, when the consecration is ended, lies hidden and is covered under the form of bread. So the form of that bread is nothing else but a mask, that takes away the sight of the flesh from the eyes. Neither need we many conjectures, to find what snares they minded to lay with these words, since the thing itself plainly speaks it. For it is to be seen with how great superstition in certain ages past, not only the common sort of men, but also the very chief of them have been held, and at this day are held in popish churches. For having little care of true faith (by which alone we both come into the fellowship of Christ, and do cleave together with him) so that they have a carnal presence of him, which they have framed beside the word, they think that they have him present enough. Therefore in sum, we see that this has been gotten by this witty subtlety, that bread was taken for God.

From here proceeded that same feigned transubstantiation, for which at this day they fight more earnestly than for all the other articles of their faith. For the first builders of that local presence could not unwind themselves from this doubt how the body of Christ should be mingled with the substance of bread, but that by and by many absurdities did thrust themselves in place. Therefore they were driven of necessity to flee to this invention, that there is made a turning of bread into the body: not that the body is properly made of bread, but because Christ, that he might hide himself under the form, brings the substance to nothing. But it is marvelous, that they fell to so great ignorance, yes senseless dullness, that not only the Scripture but also the consent of the old Church fighting against it, they brought abroad that monster. I grant indeed that some of the old writers sometimes used the name of turning: not for that they would destroy the substance in the outward signs, but that they might teach that the bread dedicated to the mystery differs far from common bread and is now other. But everywhere they all plainly declare, that the holy Supper consists of two parts, an earthly part, and a heavenly: and the earthly part they do without controversy expound to be bread and wine. Truly whatever they babble, it is plain that in confirming of this doctrine they want the defense of antiquity, which they oftentimes presume to set against the evident word of God. For it is not so long ago since it was invented: it was verily unknown not only to those better ages, in which the purer doctrine of religion yet flourished, but also even when that same pureness was much defiled. There is none of the old writers that does not in express words confess that the holy signs in the Supper are bread and wine: although, as we have said, they sometime set it out with diverse titles, to advance the dignity of the mystery. For whereas they say that in the consecration is made a secret turning, that now it is another thing than bread and wine. I have even now given warning that they do not thereby mean that the things themselves are brought to nothing, but that they are now to be otherwise esteemed than common meats, which are appointed only to feed the belly: inasmuch as in them is delivered to us the spiritual meat and drink of the soul. This we also deny not. If (say these men) there be a turning, it must needs be that there is of one thing made another thing. If they mean that there is something made which before was not, I agree with them. If they will draw it to that their own imagination, let them answer me what change they think to be made in Baptism. For herein the Fathers also do determine a marvelous turning, when they say that of a corruptible element is made a spiritual washing of the soul, yet none of them denies that water remains. But (say they) there is no such thing in Baptism, as is that in the Supper. This is my body. As though the question were of those words, which have a meaning plain enough: and not rather, of that word of turning, which ought to signify no more in the Supper than in Baptism. Therefore farewell to these snares of syllables, by which they do nothing else but betray their own emptiness. For otherwise the signification would not agree together, unless the truth which is there figured, had a lively image in the outward sign. Christ's will was by the outward sign to testify that his flesh is meat. If he did set before us only an empty imaginative form of bread not true bread, where were the correlation or similitude which should lead us from the visible thing to the invisible? For, that all things may agree together, the signification shall extend no further, but that we be fed with the form of the flesh of Christ. As if in Baptism the form of water should deceive our eyes, it should not be to us a certain pledge of our washing: yes by that deceitful show there should be given us an occasion of wavering. Therefore the nature of the Sacrament is overthrown, unless in the manner of signifying, the earthly sign answer to the heavenly thing. And therefore we lose the truth of this mystery, unless true bread represent to us the true body of Christ. I repeat it again: Since the Supper is nothing else, than a visible testifying of that promise which is in the sixth chapter of John, namely that Christ is the bread of life, which came down from heaven: there must be visible bread used for a means, by which that same spiritual bread may be figured: unless we will that we lose all the fruit, which in this behalf God tenderly grants to sustain our weakness. Now by what reason should Paul gather, that all we are one body and one bread, which do together partake of one bread, if there remained only an imaginative form and not rather a natural truth of bread? (1 Corinthians 10:17)

But they could never have been so foully beguiled with the deceits of Satan, but because they were already bewitched with this error, that the body of Christ enclosed under bread was by the bodily mouth sent down into the belly. The cause of so brutish imagination was, that consecration signified as much among them as a magical enchantment. But this principle was unknown to them, that bread is a Sacrament to none but to men, to whom the word is directed: like as the water of Baptism is not changed in itself, but as soon as the promise is adjoined, it begins to be that to us which it before was not. This shall better appear by example of a like Sacrament. The water springing out of the rock in the desert was to the fathers a token and sign of the same thing, which the wine does figure to us in the Supper. For Paul teaches that they drank the same spiritual drink. But it was a common watering for the beasts and cattle of the people. From which it is easily gathered, that in earthly elements, when they are applied to a spiritual use, there is made no other turning but in respect of men, in so much as they are to them seals of the promises. Moreover since God's purpose is (as I often repeat) as it were by handsome chariots to lift us up to himself, they do by their waywardness wickedly disappoint the same, which do indeed call us to Christ, but lurking invisibly under bread. For it is not possible that the mind of men, uncumbering itself from the immeasurableness of places, should attain to Christ even above the heavens. That which nature denied them, they attempted to amend with a more hurtful remedy: that abiding in earth, we should need no heavenly nearness of Christ. [reconstructed: Lo], this is the necessity, that compelled them to transfigure the body of Christ. In Bernard's time, although a harder manner of speaking had grown in use, yet transubstantiation was not then known. And in all ages before that, this similitude did fly about in every man's mouth, that there is with bread and wine a spiritual thing joined in this mystery. Of the words they answer, as they think, wittily: but bringing nothing fit for this present cause. The rod of Moses (say they) being turned into a Serpent, although it did get the name of a Serpent, yet keeps still the old name, and is called a rod. So in their opinion it is as probable, that although the bread passes into a new substance, it may be abusively and yet not unaptly called that which it appears to the eyes. But what likelihood or nearness find they between a clear miracle, and their feigned illusion, of which no eye in earth is witness? The magicians had mocked with deceits, so that the Egyptians were persuaded, that they excelled in divine power to change creatures above the order of nature. Moses came forth, and driving away all their deceits, showed that the invincible power of God was on his side, because his own rod consumed all the rest. But since that was a turning discernible with eyes, therefore as we have said, it pertains nothing to this present cause: and in a little time after, the rod visibly returned into its own form. Besides that it is not known, whether that sudden turning was of substance or not. Also the alluding to the rods of the magicians is to be considered, which the Prophet therefore would not call Serpents, lest he should seem to signify a turning where none was: because those deceivers had done nothing but cast a mist before the eyes of the beholders. What likeness herewith have these forms of speech: The bread which we break, So often as you shall eat this bread, They communicated in breaking of bread, and such other? It is certain that their eyes were only deceived with the enchantment of the magicians. As concerning Moses, the matter is more doubtful, by whose hand it was no more hard for God to make of a rod a Serpent, and again of a Serpent to make a rod, than to clothe Angels with fleshly bodies, and soon after to unclothe them. If the nature of this mystery were the same or like, there were some color for their solution. Let this therefore remain certain, that it is not truly nor fitly promised us that in the Supper the flesh of Christ is truly to us for meat, unless the true substance of the outward sign agrees with it. And (as one error grows of another) the place of Jeremiah is so foolishly wrested to prove transubstantiation, that it irks me to rehearse it. The Prophet complains that wood is put in his bread: meaning that by the cruelty of his enemies, his bread was infected with bitterness. As David with a like figure bewails that his meat was corrupted with gall, and his drink with vinegar. These men will have it that the body of Christ was by way of allegory fastened to the cross. But some of the old fathers thought so. As though we ought not rather to pardon their ignorance, and to bury their shame, than to add shamelessness to compel them yet still to fight like enemies with the natural meaning of the Prophet.

Others, who see that the proportional relation of the sign and the thing signified cannot be overthrown without the truth of the mystery failing, confess that the bread of the Supper is truly a substance of an earthly and corruptible element, and suffers no change in itself, but has under itself the body of Christ enclosed. If they did so declare their meaning, that when the bread is delivered in the mystery, there is adjoined the delivering of the body, because the truth is inseparable from the sign, I would not much contend with them. But because they, placing the body in the bread, feign for it a being everywhere contrary to the nature thereof, and in adding under the bread, they will have it lie there hidden, it is necessary a little while to draw such subtleties out of their dens. For my mind is not yet as of set purpose to go through with all this point, but only that I may lay the foundations of the disputation which shall by and by follow in a place fit for it. They will therefore have the body of Christ to be invisible and immeasurable, that it may lie hidden under the bread, because they think that they do not otherwise share with him than if he descend into bread; but they do not comprehend the manner of descending, by which he lifts us upward to himself. They lay upon it all the colors that they can, but when they have said all, it sufficiently appears that they stay upon the local presence of Christ. From where does that come? Even because they can abide to conceive no other partaking of the flesh and blood, but that which consists either of joining and touching of place, or of some gross enclosing.

And, that they may obstinately defend the error once rashly conceived, some of them stick not to say that the flesh of Christ had never any other measurements, but so far and wide as heaven and earth is broad. Whereas he was born a child out of the womb, whereas he grew, whereas he was spread abroad on the cross, whereas he was enclosed in the sepulcher, the same was done by a certain dispensation, that he might be born and die, and perform the other duties of man. Whereas after his resurrection he was seen in his accustomed form of body, whereas he was taken up to heaven, whereas last of all also after his ascension he was seen of Stephen and Paul, it was done by the same dispensation, that it might appear to the sight of men that he was made a king in heaven. What is this else, but to raise up Marcion out of hell? For no man can doubt that the body of Christ was a fantasy or a fantastical thing, if he was of such a state. Some slip away somewhat more subtly, with saying that this body which is given in the Sacrament is glorious and immortal, and that therefore it is no absurdity if it be contained in many places, if in no place, if with no form, under the sacrament. But I ask what manner of body Christ gave to the disciples the day before that he suffered: do not the words sound that he gave the same mortal body, which was within a little after to be delivered? He had already before (say they) shown his glory to be seen by three of the disciples. That is true indeed, but his will was by that brightness to give them a taste of immortality for an hour. In the meantime they shall not there find a double body, but that one body which Christ did bear, garnished with new glory. But when he distributed his body at his first Supper, the time was now at hand when he, being stricken of God and humbled, should lie without glory as a leprous man — so far is it from being the case that he then would show forth the glory of his resurrection. And how great a window is here opened to Marcion, if the body of Christ was seen in one place mortal and base, and in another place was held immortal and glorious? However, if their opinion takes place, the same happens daily, because they are compelled to confess that the body of Christ, being visible in itself, lies hidden invisibly under the sign of bread. And yet they that vomit out such monstrousness are so unashamed of their own shame, that they do unprovoked heinously rail at us, because we do not subscribe to them.

Now if they wish to fasten the body and blood of the Lord to bread and wine, the one shall of necessity be pulled asunder from the other. For as the bread is delivered separately from the cup, so the body united to the bread must needs be divided from the blood enclosed in the cup. For when they affirm that the body is in the bread and the blood in the cup, and the bread and wine are by spaces of place distant the one from the other, they can by no shift escape, but that the body must be separated from the blood. But whereas they are accustomed to allege that by accompanying (as they feign) in the body is the blood, and likewise in the blood is the body, that truly is too trifling, since the signs in which they are enclosed are so separated. But if we be lifted up with our eyes and minds to heaven, that we seek Christ there in the glory of his kingdom, as the signs do allure us to him whole, so under the sign of bread we shall be fed with his body, under the sign of wine we shall separately drink his blood, that at length we may enjoy him whole. For although he has taken away his flesh from us, and in his body is ascended up into heaven, yet he sits at the right hand of the Father — that is to say, he reigns in the power and majesty and glory of the Father. This kingdom is neither bounded with any spaces of place, nor compassed about with any measurements, but that Christ may show forth his might wherever it pleases him, both in heaven and in earth; but that he may show himself present with power and strength; but that he may always be at hand with those that are his, breathing his life into them, may live in them, strengthen them, give life to them, preserve them safe, even as if he were present in body; finally but that he may feed them with his own body, the communion of which he does by the power of his Spirit pour into them. After this manner the body and blood of Christ is delivered to us in the Sacrament.

But we must appoint such a presence of Christ in the Supper, as may neither fasten him to the element of bread, nor shut him up in the bread, nor by any means compass him in (for it is plain that all these things abate his heavenly glory), finally such as may neither take from him his own measure, nor diversely draw him in many places at once, nor feign to him such an unmeasurable greatness as is spread abroad throughout heaven and earth, for these things are plainly against the truth of the nature of manhood. Let us (I say) never suffer these two exceptions to be taken away from us. The one, that nothing be abated from the glory of Christ, which is done when he is brought under the corruptible elements of this world, or is bound to any earthly creatures. The other, that nothing be by feigning applied to his body, that agrees not with the nature of man: which is done when it is either said to be infinite, or is set in many places at once. But these absurdities being taken away, I willingly receive whatever may avail to express the true and substantial communicating of the Body and Blood of the Lord, which communicating is delivered to the faithful under the holy signs of the Supper: and so that they may be thought not to receive it by imagination only or understanding of mind, but to enjoy it indeed to the food of eternal life. Why this sentence is so hateful to the world, and all defense taken away from it by the unjust judgments of many, there is no cause at all, but for that the devil has with horrible bewitching maddened their minds. Truly that which we teach does in all points very well agree with the Scriptures: it contains neither any absurdity, nor darkness, nor doubtfulness: it is not against true godliness and sound edification: finally it has nothing in it, that may offend, except that in certain ages past, when that ignorance and barbarousness of sophists reigned in the Church, so clear light and open truth has been unworthily oppressed. Yet because Satan at this day also travails by troublesome spirits to spot it with all the slanders and reproaches that he can, and bends himself to no other thing with greater endeavor: it is profitable to more diligently defend and rescue it.

Now before we go any further, we must treat of the very institution of Christ: specially because this is the most glorious objection that our adversaries have, that we depart from the words of Christ. Therefore that we may be discharged of the false charge of malice wherewith they burden us, our fittest beginning shall be at the exposition of the words. Three Evangelists and Paul recount that Christ took bread, when he had given thanks he broke it, gave it to his disciples and said, Take, eat: this is my Body which is delivered, or broken, for you. Of the cup Matthew and Mark say thus: This cup is the blood of the new testament, which shall be shed for many to forgiveness of sins. But Paul and Luke say thus: This cup is the new testament in my blood. The patrons of transubstantiation will have by the pronoun (this) the form of bread to be signified, because the consecration is made in the whole content of the sentence, and there is no substance that can be shown. But if they are held with religious care of the words, because Christ testified that what he reached into the disciples' hands was his body: truly this their device, that what was bread is now the body, is most far from the proper meaning of them. That which Christ took into his hands and gave the Apostles, he affirms to be his body: but he took bread: who therefore cannot understand that bread is yet shown? And therefore there is no greater absurdity, than to remove to the form what is spoken of the bread. Others, when they expound this word (is) for (to be transubstantiated), do flee to a more forced and violently wrested gloss. Therefore there is no cause why they should pretend that they are moved with reverence of words. For this was unheard of among all nations and languages, that the word (is) should be taken in this sense, namely for to be turned into another thing. As for them that leave bread in the Supper, and affirm that there is the body of Christ, they much differ among themselves. They who speak more modestly, although they precisely exact the letter, This is my body, yet afterward swerve from their preciseness, and say that it is as much in effect as that the body of Christ is with bread, in bread, and under bread. Of the matter itself which they affirm, we have already touched somewhat, and we shall shortly have occasion yet to speak more. Now I dispute only of the words, by which they say they are restrained that they cannot admit bread to be called the body, because it is a sign of the body. But if they shun all figures, why do they leap away from the plain showing of Christ, to their own manners of speaking far differing from it? For there is great difference between this — that bread is the body, and this — that the body is with bread. But because they saw it to be impossible that this simple proposition might stand, that bread is the body: they have attempted to escape by those forms of speech, as it were by crooked turnings. Some more bold stick not to affirm that even in proper speaking, bread is the body, and by this means they truly prove themselves to be literal men. If it be objected that therefore the bread is Christ, and is God: this verily they will deny, because it is not expressed in the words of Christ. But they shall nothing prevail by denying it: forasmuch as all do agree that whole Christ is offered us in the Supper. But it is an intolerable blasphemy, that it be without figure spoken of a frail and corruptible element, that it is Christ. Now I ask of them, whether these two propositions are both of one effect, Christ is the Son of God, and bread is the body of Christ. If they grant that they are diverse, (which we will force them to grant whether they will or no) then let them answer from where the difference comes. I think they will bring none other but that the bread is after the sacramental manner called the body. From which it follows that Christ's words are not subject to the common rule, nor ought to be tried by Grammar. Also I ask of all the precise and stiff requirers of the letter, where Luke and Paul do call the cup the testament in the blood, whether they do not express the same thing which they did in the first part, where they call bread the body. Truly the same reverence was in the one part of the mystery that was in the other: and because shortness is dark, longer speech does better open the meaning. So often therefore as they shall affirm by one word that the bread is the body: I will out of more words bring a fit exposition, that it is the testament in the body. For why shall we need to seek a more faithful or surer expositor than Paul and Luke? Neither yet do I tend hereto, to diminish anything of that communicating of the body of Christ which I have confessed: only my purpose is to confute that foolish waywardness, whereby they do so hatefully brawl about words. I understand, by the authority of Paul and Luke, that the bread is the body of Christ, because it is the covenant in the body. If they fight against this, they have war not with me, but with the Spirit of God. However they cry out that they are touched with reverence of the words of Christ, whereby they do not figuratively understand those things that are plainly spoken: yet this is not a pretense rightful enough, why they should so refuse all the reasons which we object to the contrary. In the meantime, as I have already given warning, it is convenient to learn what manner of thing this is. The testament in the body and blood of Christ: because the covenant established with the sacrifice of death, should otherwise not profit us, unless there were adjoined that secret communicating whereby we grow into one with Christ.

It remains therefore, that for the affinity which the things signified have with their signs, we confess that the very name of the thing was given to the sign: figuratively indeed, but not without a most fit proportional agreement. I leave allegories and parables, lest any man should quarrel that I seek starting holes, and wander out of the present purpose. I say that this is a speech by figure of transnomination which is commonly used in the Scripture, when mysteries are treated of. For neither can you otherwise understand that which is said: that circumcision is a covenant: that the lamb is the Passover: that the sacrifices of the law are expiations: finally that the rock, out of which water flowed in the desert, was Christ: unless you take it to be spoken by way of transferring of names. Neither are names transferred only from the higher name to the lower: but contrariwise the name of the visible sign is also given to the thing signified: as when it is said that God appeared to Moses in the bush: when the ark of covenant is called God, and the face of God: and the dove is called the Holy Spirit. For though the sign differ in substance from the thing signified: because this is spiritual and heavenly, and that is corporeal and visible: yet because it does not only figure the thing which it is holily appointed to represent, as a naked and empty token, but does also truly deliver it indeed: why may not the name of the thing rightly accord with it? If signs devised by men, which are rather images of things absent, than marks of things present, which very absent things, they do oftentimes deceitfully shadow, are yet sometime garnished with the titles of the things: then those things that are ordained of God, do by much greater reason borrow the names of those things, of which they always both bear a sure and not deceitful signification, and have the truth adjoined with them. There is therefore so great likeness and nearness of the one to the other, that it is easy to draw their names to and fro. Therefore let our adversaries cease to heap unsavory scoffings against us, in calling us Tropists: because we expound the sacramental manner of speaking after the common use of the Scripture. For whereas the sacraments agree together in many things: in this transferring of names, they have all a certain community together. As therefore the Apostle teaches, that the stone out of which spiritual drink did spring to the Israelites, was Christ, because it was a visible sign, under which that spiritual drink was truly indeed but not discernibly to the eye perceived: so bread is at this day called the body of Christ, forasmuch as it is a sign whereby the Lord offers to us the true eating of his body. Neither did Augustine otherwise think or speak, lest any man should despise this as a new invention. If (says he) the sacraments had not a certain likeness of those things of which they are sacraments, they should not be sacraments at all. And of this likeness oftentimes they take the names of the things themselves. As therefore after a certain manner the sacrament of the body of Christ, is the body of Christ: the sacrament of the blood of Christ, is the blood of Christ: so the sacrament of faith is faith. There are in him many like places, which it were superfluous to heap together, since that same one suffices: saving that the readers must be warned that the holy man teaches the same thing in the Epistle to Enodius. But it is a trifling shift to say, that where Augustine teaches, that when transferring is often and commonly used in mysteries, he makes no mention of the Supper: because if this shift were received, we might not reason from the generality to the speciality, neither were this a good argument: Every feeling creature has power of moving, therefore an ox and a horse have power of moving. However, long disputation hereof is in another place ended by the words of the same holy man, where he says, that Christ did not stick to call it his body, when he gave the sign of his body. Against Adimantus, the Manichean, in Chapter 12. And in another place, upon the third Psalm, Marvelous (says he) is the patience of Christ, that he received Judas to the banquet, wherein he committed and delivered to his disciples the figure of his body and blood.

But if some precise man, being blind at all the rest, does stand only upon this word (this is) as though it severed this mystery from all other, the solution is easy. They say that the vehemence of the substantive verb (is) is so great that it admits no figure. Which if we grant to them: even in the words of Paul is read the substantive verb, where he calls bread the communicating of the body of Christ. But the communicating is another thing than the body itself. Indeed commonly where sacraments are treated of, we find the same word used. As: this shall be to you a covenant with me. This Lamb shall be to you a Passover. To rehearse no more: when Paul says that the rock was Christ, why do they take the substantive verb in that place to be of less vehemence than in the speech of Christ? Let them also answer, where John says, the Holy Ghost was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified, of what force the substantive verb is in that place. For if they abide fastened to their rule, the eternal essence of the Holy Ghost shall be destroyed, as though it took beginning at the Ascension of Christ. Finally let them answer, what means that saying of Paul, that Baptism is the washing of regeneration and renewing, which it is evident to be unprofitable to many. But nothing is stronger to confute them, than that saying of Paul, that the Church is Christ. For, bringing a similitude of the body of man, he adds, So is Christ: in which place he understands the only begotten Son of God, not in himself, but in his members. Hereby I think I have obtained that to sound-witted and uncorrupted men the slanders of our enemies are loathsome, when they spread abroad that we withdraw credit from the words of Christ: which we do no less obediently embrace than they, and do weigh them with more godly reverence. Indeed their negligent carelessness shows that they do not greatly care what Christ meant, so that it give them a buckler to defend their obstinacy: like as our earnest searching ought to be a witness how much we esteem the authority of Christ. They odiously spread abroad that natural sense of man withholds us from believing that which Christ has uttered with his own holy mouth: but how maliciously they burden us with this slander, I have a great part already made plain, and hereafter it shall more clearly appear. Therefore nothing withholds us from believing Christ when he speaks, nor from obeying so soon as he does but with beck will this or that. Only this is the question, whether it be unlawful to inquire of the natural meaning.

These good masters, that they may seem well lettered, do forbid men to depart, be it never so little from the letter. But I on the other side, when the Scripture names God a warlike man, because I see that without figurative interpretation it is too rough a manner of speaking, do not doubt that it is a comparison taken from men. And truly upon none other pretense in the old time did the Anthropomorphites trouble the true teaching Fathers, but that catching fast hold of these sayings — The eyes of God do see, It went up to his ears, His hand stretched out, The earth his footstool — they cried out that God had his body taken from him, which the Scripture assigns to him. If this law be received, outrageous barbarousness shall overwhelm the whole light of faith. For, what monsters of absurdities may not frantic men pick out, if it be granted them to allege every small tittle to establish their opinions? That which they object, that it is not likely, that when Christ prepared for his Apostles a singular comfort in adversities, he did then speak in a riddle or darkly, makes for our side. For if it had not come into the minds of the Apostles, that bread was figuratively called the body, because it was the sign of the body, they had without doubt been troubled with so monstrous a thing. Almost at the same moment John reports that they did stick in perplexity at every one of the least difficulties. They who strive among themselves, how Christ will go to the Father: and do move a question, how he will go out of the world: they who understand nothing of those things that are spoken concerning the heavenly Father, till they see him: how would they have been so easy to believe that which all reason refuses, that Christ sits at the board in their sight, and is enclosed invisible under bread? Whereas therefore they in eating the bread without doubting, testified their consent, hereby appears that they took Christ's words in the same sense that we do, because they remembered that which ought not to seem strange in mysteries, that the name of the thing signified is transferred to the sign. Therefore it was to the disciples, as it is to us, a certain and clear comfort, entangled with no riddle. Neither is there any other cause why some should depart from our exposition, but because the enchantment of the devil has blinded them, namely that they should feign darkness to themselves, where the exposition of an apt figure offers itself. Moreover if we precisely stand upon the words, Christ should wrongfully have spoken in one place separately another thing concerning the bread than he speaks of the cup. He calls the bread his body, he calls the wine his blood: either it shall be a confused vain repetition, or it shall be such a partition as shall divide the body from the blood. Indeed it shall as truly be said of the cup, This is my body, as of the bread itself, and it may likewise interchangeably be said, that the bread is the blood. If they answer that we must consider to what end or use the signs were ordained: I grant it indeed: but in the mean time they shall not unwind themselves, but that their error must draw this absurdity with it, that the bread is the blood, and the wine is the body. Now I do not know what this means, when they grant the bread and the body to be different things, yet affirm that the one is spoken of the other properly and without any figure: as if a man should say that a garment is indeed a thing differing from a man, and yet that it is properly called a man. In the mean while as though their victory consisted in obstinacy and railing, they say that Christ is accused of lying, if an exposition be sought of the words. Now it shall be easy for us to show to the readers how unjust a wrong these catchers of syllables do to us, when they fill the simple with this opinion, that we withdraw credit from the words of Christ, which we have proved to be furiously perverted and confounded by them, but to be faithfully and rightly expounded by us.

But the slander of this lie cannot be utterly purged, till another crime be wiped away. For they spread abroad, that we are so addicted to natural reason, that we give no more to the power of God, than the order of nature suffers, and common sense teaches. From such malicious slanders I appeal to the very doctrine itself which I have declared: which does clearly enough show, that I do not measure this mystery by the proportion of man's reason, nor do make it subject to the laws of nature. I beseech you, have we learned out of natural philosophy, that Christ does so from heaven feed our souls and bodies with his flesh, as our bodies are nourished with bread and wine? From where comes this power to flesh, that it may give life? All men will say that it is not done naturally. It will no more please man's reason, that the flesh of Christ reaches to us, that it may be food to us. Finally, whoever has tasted of our doctrine, shall be ravished into admiration of the secret power of God. But these good men that are so zealous of it, forge to themselves a miracle, which being taken away, God himself vanishes with his power. I desire to have the readers once again warned, that they diligently weigh what our doctrine brings, whether it hangs upon common sense, or with the wings of faith, surmounting the world, climbs up beyond it into the heavens. We say that Christ as well with the outward sign as with his Spirit, descends to us that he may truly quicken our souls with the substance of his flesh and of his blood. In these few words he that perceives not to be contained many miracles, is more than senseless: forasmuch as there is nothing more besides nature, than that souls should borrow spiritual and heavenly life, of the flesh which took her beginning of the earth, and which was subject to death. Nothing is more incredible, than that things distant and asunder by the whole space of heaven and earth, should in so great distance of places not only be conjoined, but also united, that souls may receive food of the flesh of Christ. Therefore let wayward men cease to procure hatred to us by a filthy slander, as though we did enviously restrain anything of the immeasurable power of God. For they do either too foolishly err or too maliciously lie. For it is not here in question what God could, but what he would. We affirm that to be done which pleased him. But it pleased him, that Christ should be made like to his brethren in all things, except sin. What manner of thing is our flesh? Is it not such as consists of a certain measure of it, as is contained in place, as is touched, as is seen? And why (say they) may not God make, that one self-same flesh may occupy many and diverse places, may be contained in no place, may be without measure and form? You madman, why do you require of the power of God, to make flesh at one self-same time to be and not to be flesh? Just as if you should instantly require him to make at one self-same time the light to be both light and darkness. But he wills light to be light, darkness to be darkness, flesh to be flesh. He shall indeed when it pleases him, turn darkness into light, and light into darkness: but when you require that light and darkness may not differ, what do you else but pervert the order of the wisdom of God? Therefore flesh must be flesh: and Spirit, Spirit: every thing in such law and condition as God has created it. But such is the condition of flesh, that it must be in one — indeed a certain — place, and consist of its measure and other form. With this condition Christ took flesh upon him, to which (as Augustine witnesses) he has given indeed incorruption and glory, but he has not taken from it nature and truth.

They answer, that they have the word, whereby the will of God is made plain: namely if it be granted them to banish out of the Church the gift of exposition, which may bring light to the word. I grant that they have the word: but such as in old time the Anthropomorphites had, when they made God having a body: such as Marcion and the Manichees had, when they feigned the body of Christ to be either heavenly or fantastical. For they alleged for testimonies, The first Adam was of the earth, earthly: the second Adam is of heaven, heavenly. Again, Christ abased himself, taking upon him the form of a servant, and was found in likeness as a man. But the gross eaters think that there is no power of God, unless with the monster forged in their brains the whole order of nature be overthrown: which is rather to limit God, when we covet with our feigned inventions to prove what he can do. For out of what word have they taken, that the body of Christ is visible in heaven, but lurks invisible in earth under innumerable little pieces of bread? They will say that necessity requires this, that the body of Christ should be given in the Supper. Indeed because it pleased them to gather a fleshly eating out of the words of Christ: they being carried away with their own [reconstructed: prejudgment], were driven to necessity to coin this subtlety, which the whole Scripture cries out against. But that anything is by us diminished of the power of God, is so false, that by our doctrine the praise of it is very honorably set out. But forasmuch as they always accuse us, that we defraud God of his honor, when we refuse that which according to common sense is hard to be believed, although it has been promised by the mouth of Christ: I make again the same answer that I made even now, that in the mysteries of faith we do not ask counsel of common sense, but with quiet willingness to learn, and with the Spirit of meekness which James commends, we receive the doctrine come from heaven. But in that when they perniciously err. I deny not that we follow a profitable moderation. They hearing the words of Christ, This is my body, imagine a miracle most far from his mind. But when out of this feigned invention arise foul absurdities, because they have already with headlong haste put snares upon themselves, they plunge themselves into the bottomless depth of the almightiness of God, that by this means they may quench the light of truth. From this comes that proud preciseness: We will not know how Christ lies hidden under the bread, holding ourselves contented with this saying of his, This is my body. But we, as we do in the whole Scripture, do with no less obedience than care, study to obtain a sound understanding of this place: neither do we with preposterous haste rashly and without choice catch hold of that which first thrusts itself into our minds: but using diligent musing upon it, we embrace the meaning which the Spirit of God ministers: and standing on it we do from aloft despise whatever earthly wisdom is set against it. Indeed we hold our minds captive, that they may not be bold so much as with one little word to carp against it: and do humble them, that they may not dare to rise up against it. From this sprang up the exposition of the words of Christ, which to be by the continual usage of the Scripture common to all sacraments, all they that have been though but moderately exercised therein, do know. Neither do we, after the example of the holy virgin, think it lawful for us, in a hard matter to inquire how it may be done.

But because nothing shall more avail to confirm the Faith of the godly, than when they have learned that the doctrine which we have taught is taken out of the word of God, and stands upon the authority thereof: I will make this also evident with as great brevity as I can. The body of Christ, since the time that it rose again, not Aristotle but the Holy Ghost teaches to be limited, and that it is comprehended in heaven until the last day. Neither am I ignorant that they boldly mock out those places that are alleged for this purpose. So often as Christ says that he will depart, leaving the world, they answer that that departing is nothing else but a changing of mortal state. But after this manner, Christ should not set the Holy Ghost in his place to supply (as they call it) the want of his absence: forasmuch as he does not succeed into his place, nor does Christ himself descend again out of the heavenly glory to take upon him the state of mortal life. Truly the coming of the Holy Ghost, and the ascending of Christ are things set as contrary: therefore it cannot be that Christ should according to the flesh dwell with us after the same manner that he sends his Spirit. Moreover he in plain words expresses, that he will not be always with his disciples in the world. This saying also they think that they do finely wipe away, as though Christ said that he will not always be poor and miserable or subject to the necessities of this frail life. But the circumstance of the place cries plainly to the contrary, because there is not treated of poverty and need or of the miserable state of earthly life, but of worship and honor. The anointing pleased not the disciples, because they thought it to be a superfluous and unprofitable cost, and near to riotous excess, therefore they had rather that the price thereof which they thought to be ill wasted, had been bestowed upon the poor. Christ answers that he shall not always be present, that he may be worshipped with such honor. And none otherwise did Augustine expound it, whose words be these which are nothing doubtful. When Christ said, You shall not always have me, he spoke of the presence of his body. For according to his majesty, according to his providence, according to his unspeakable and invisible grace, this was fulfilled which he said, Behold, I am with you even to the ending of the world. But according to the flesh which the word took to him, according to this that he was born of the Virgin, according to this that he was taken of the Jews, that he was fastened to the tree, that he was taken down from the cross, that he was wrapped in linen clothes, that he was laid in the grave, that he was manifestly showed in the resurrection, this was fulfilled, You shall not always have me with you. Why so? Because he was conversant according to the presence of his body forty days with his disciples, and while they accompanied him in seeing not in following, he ascended. He is not here: for he sits there at the right hand of the Father. And yet he is here: because he is not gone away in presence of majesty. Otherwise according to the presence of majesty we have Christ always: and according to the presence of the flesh it is rightly said, But me you shall not always have. For according to the presence of the flesh, the Church had him a few days: now she holds him by Faith, but sees him not with eyes. Where (that I may note this also briefly) he makes him present to us three ways, by majesty, providence, and unspeakable grace, under which I comprehend this marvelous communion of his body and blood: if so that we understand it to be done by the power of the Holy Ghost, not by that feigned enclosing of his body under the element. For our Lord has testified, that he has flesh and bones which may be felt and seen. And to go away and ascend do not signify to make a show of one ascending and going away, but to do in deed that which the words sound. Shall we then (will some man say) assign to Christ some certain coast of heaven? But I answer with Augustine, that this is a most curious and superfluous question, if so that yet we believe that he is in heaven.

But what does the name of ascending so often repeated: does it not signify a removing from one place to another? They deny it: because after their opinion, by height is only signified majesty of Empire. But what means the very manner of ascending — was he not, in sight of his disciples looking on, lifted up on high? Do not the Evangelists plainly declare, that he was taken up into the heavens? These witty Sophisters do answer, that with a cloud set between him and them, he was conveyed out of their sight, that the faithful might learn that from that point forward he should not be visible in the world. As though, to make credit of his invisible presence, he ought not rather to vanish away in a moment: or as though the cloud ought not rather to encompass him before that he stirred his foot. But when he is carried up on high into the air, and with a cloud cast underneath him, teaches that he is no more to be sought in earth: we safely gather, that now he has his dwelling place in the heavens: as Paul also affirms, and from there bids us to look for him. After this manner the Angels warned the disciples, that they in vain gazed up into heaven: because Jesus which is taken up into heaven, shall so come as they have seen him go up. Here also the adversaries of sound doctrine start away with a pleasant shift as they think, saying that he shall then come visible, which never went out of the earth but that he abides invisible with them that be his. As though the Angels did there signify a double presence, and do not simply make the disciples witnesses of his going up seeing it with their eyes, that no doubting might remain: even as if they had said: he in your sights beholding it, being taken up into heaven, has claimed to himself the heavenly Empire: it remains that you patiently abide in expectation, till he come again the judge of the world: because he is now entered into heaven, not that he may alone possess it, but that he may gather together with him you and all the godly.

But forasmuch as the defenders of this bastard doctrine are not ashamed to adorn it with the consenting voices of the old writers, and especially of Augustine, I will in few words declare how perversely they go about it. For whereas their testimonies have been gathered together by learned and godly men, I will not do a thing already done: let him that will, seek them out of their works. I will not heap together, neither out of Augustine himself, all that might make to the purpose: but will be content to show by a few that he is without controversy wholly on our side. As for what our adversaries, to wrest him from us, allege — that it is commonly read in his books that the flesh and blood of Christ is distributed in the Supper, namely the sacrifice once offered on the cross — it is but trifling, since he also calls it either thanksgiving, or the sacrament of the body. But in what sense he uses the words of flesh and blood, we need not seek with long compassing about, forasmuch as he declares himself, saying that sacraments take their names from the likeness of the things which they signify, and that therefore after a certain manner the sacrament of the body is the body. With which accords another place which is well enough known: the Lord did not hesitate to say, "This is my body," when he gave the sign of it. Again they object that Augustine writes expressly that the body of Christ falls to the ground and enters into the mouth — in the same sense that he affirms it to be consumed, because he joins them both together. Neither does that make to the contrary, which he says: that when the mystery is ended the bread is consumed — because he had a little before said, since these things are known to men, forasmuch as they are done by men, they may have honor as things, but as marvelous things, they may not. And to no other end tends that which our adversaries do so unadvisedly draw to themselves: that Christ did (after a certain manner) bear himself in his own hands, when he reached the mystical bread to the disciples. For by interlacing this adverb of likeness (after a certain manner) he sufficiently declares that he was not truly nor really enclosed under the bread. And no marvel: since in another place he plainly affirms that bodies, if spaces of places be taken from them, shall be nowhere, and because they shall be nowhere, they shall not be at all. It is a hungry cavilation to say that in that place there is no treatment of the Supper, in which God utters special power — because the question was moved concerning the flesh of Christ, and the holy man of set purpose answering says: Christ gave immortality to his flesh, but took not nature from it. After this form it is not to be thought that he is everywhere spread abroad: for we must beware that we do not so affirm the godhead of the man, that we take away the truth of the body. And it follows not, that that which is in God must be everywhere as God is. There is a reason added by and by: for one person is God and man, and both are one Christ — everywhere, by this that he is God; in heaven, by this that he is man. What negligence had it been, not to except the mystery of the Supper, being a thing so earnest and weighty, if there had been in it anything against the doctrine which he treated of. And yet if a man does heedfully read that which follows within a little after, he shall find that under that general doctrine the Supper is also comprehended — that Christ the only begotten Son of God, and the same the Son of man, is everywhere whole present as God; that he is in the temple of God (that is, in the Church) as God dwelling there, and in some certain place of heaven by reason of the measure of his true body. We see how, for the uniting of Christ with the Church, he does not draw his body out of heaven — which surely he would have done, if the body of Christ were not truly meat to us unless it were enclosed under bread. In another place defining how the faithful do now possess Christ, he says: "You have him by the sign of the cross, by the sacrament of baptism, by the meat and drink of the altar." How rightly he reckons a superstitious usage among the signs of the presence of Christ, I do not now dispute: but he that compares the presence of the flesh to the sign of the cross sufficiently shows that he feigns not a two-bodied Christ, that the same he may lurk hidden under the bread, which sits visible in heaven. If this needs plainer declaration, it is added by and by after in the same place: that according to the presence of majesty, we always have Christ; that according to the presence of the flesh, it is rightly said, "Me you shall not always have." They answer that this is also added — that according to an unspeakable and invisible grace, it is fulfilled which is said of him, "I am with you, even to the ending of the world." But that is nothing to their advantage, because this is at length restrained to his majesty, which is ever in comparison set against the body, and his flesh by express name is made different from his grace and power. As in another place the same comparison of contraries is read in him — that Christ by bodily presence left the disciples, that by spiritual presence he may be still with them — where it is plain that the substance of the flesh is distinguished from the power of the Spirit, which unites us with Christ, though we be otherwise far severed by distance of places. The same manner of speaking he often uses, as when he says: he is to come again to the living and the dead with bodily presence, according to the rule of faith and sound doctrine. For with spiritual presence he was also to come to them, and to abide with the whole Church in the world until the ending of the world. Therefore this speech is directed to the believers, whom he had already begun to save with bodily presence, and whom he was to leave with bodily absence, that he might with his Father save them with spiritual presence. To take bodily for visible is but trifling, since he sets also the body in comparison against the divine power, and adding (to save with the Father) he clearly expresses that he does pour abroad his grace from heaven to us by his Spirit.

And since they put so much confidence in this lurking hole of invisible presence, go to, let us see how well they hide themselves in it. First they shall not bring forth one syllable out of the Scriptures, by which they may prove that Christ is invisible: but they take that for confessed which no man that has his sound wit will grant them, that the body of Christ can not otherwise be given in the Supper but being covered with the visor of bread. And this is the very point about which they strive with us, so far is it from having the place of a principle. And when they so babble, they are compelled to make a double body of Christ: because after their opinion, it is in itself visible in heaven, but invisible in the Supper after a special manner of dispensation. But how trimly this agrees, it is easy to judge both by other places of Scripture, and by the witness of Peter. Peter says that Christ must be held or contained in heaven, till he come again (Acts 3:21). These men teach that he is everywhere, but without form. They take exception and say that it is unjust dealing, to make the nature of a glorified body subject to the laws of common nature. But this answer draws with it that doting error of Servetus, (which is worthily to be abhorred of all the godly) that the body was swallowed up of the Godhead. I do not say that they think so. But if this be reckoned among the qualities of a glorified body, to fill all things after an invisible manner, it is evident that the bodily substance is destroyed, and that there is left no difference of the Godhead and the nature of man. Again if the body of Christ be so of many fashions and diverse, that it is seen in one place, and is invisible in another: where is the very nature of a body which consists of its measured proportions? And where is the unity? Much more rightly does Tertullian say, who affirms that the body of Christ was a true and natural body, because in the mystery of the Supper the figure of it is set before us for a pledge and assurance of the spiritual life. And verily Christ said of his glorified body, see and feel, for a Spirit has not flesh and bones (Luke 24:39). Lo, by Christ's own mouth the truth of his flesh is proved, because it can be felt and seen. Take away these things, then it shall cease to be flesh. They still flee to their den of dispensation which they have framed to themselves. But it is our part so to embrace that which Christ absolutely pronounces, that that which he means to affirm may be of force with us without exception. He proves himself to be no ghost, because he is visible in his flesh (Philippians 3:21). Let that be taken away which he claims as proper to the nature of his body: must they not then be fain to coin a new definition of a body? Now wherever they turn themselves about, their feigned dispensation has no place in that place of Paul where he says, that we look for a Savior from heaven, which shall fashion our base body like to his glorious body. For we may not hope for a like fashioning in those qualities which they ascribe to Christ, that every one should have an invisible and unmeasurable body. Neither shall there be found any man so dull witted whom they may make to believe so great an absurdity. Let them not therefore ascribe this gift to Christ's glorified body, to be at once in many places, and to be contained in no space. Finally let them either openly deny the resurrection of the flesh, or let them grant that Christ being clothed with heavenly glory, did not put off his flesh, who shall make us in our flesh fellows and partners of the same glory, when we shall have the resurrection common with him. For, what does the Scripture teach more plainly, than that as Christ did put on our true flesh when he was born of the Virgin, and suffered in our true flesh when he satisfied for us: so he received again also the same true flesh in rising again, and carried it up to heaven (John 20:27). For this is to us the hope of our resurrection and ascending into heaven, that Christ is risen again and ascended: and (as Tertullian says) he carried the earnest of our resurrection into the heavens with him. Now how weak and frail should that hope be, unless this our own flesh had been raised up with Christ and entered into the kingdom of heaven? But this is the proper truth of a body, to be contained in space, to consist of its measured proportions, to have its form. Therefore away with this foolish devise, which does fasten both the minds of men and Christ to the bread. For to what purpose serves the secret presence under bread, but that they which covet to have Christ joined with them, may rest in that sign? But the Lord himself willed us to withdraw not only our eyes but all our senses from the earth, forbidding himself to be touched of the women until he had gone up to his Father (Acts 7:56). When he sees Mary with godly zeal of reverence to make haste to kiss his feet, there is no cause why he should disallow and forbid this touching till he have been taken up into heaven, but because he will be sought nowhere else. Whereas they object that he was afterward seen of Stephen, the solution is easy. For neither was it therefore necessary that Christ should change place, which could give to the eyes of his servant such sharpness of sight as might pierce through the heavens (Acts 9:4). The same also is to be said of Paul. Whereas they object that Christ came out of the Sepulcher being shut: and entered in among the disciples, the doors being shut: that makes never a whit more for maintenance of their error. For as the water like a fast pavement made a way to Christ walking upon the lake: so it is no marvel, if at his coming the hardness of the stone yielded itself (Matthew 28:6; John 20:19; Matthew 14:25). However it is more probable, that by his commandment the stone was removed, and by and by after passage given him returned into its place. And to enter, the doors being shut, is not as much in effect as to pierce through the whole substance, but by divine power to open an entry for himself, that he suddenly stood among the disciples, verily after a marvelous manner, when the doors were fast locked. That which they allege out of Luke, that Christ suddenly vanished away from the eyes of the disciples with whom he went to Emmaus, profits them nothing, and makes for us (Luke 24:31). For, that he might take away the sight of himself from them, he was not made invisible, but only went out of sight. As when he went in journey together with them (as the same Luke witnesses) he did not put on a new face, that he might not be known, but held their eyes (Luke 24:16). But these fellows do not only transform Christ, that he may be conversant in earth, but in diverse places they make him diverse and unlike himself. Finally in so trifling they do, not by one word indeed, but by a circumstance, make of the flesh of Christ a Spirit: and not contented therewith, they put upon it altogether contrary qualities. Whereupon of necessity follows that it is double.

Now although we grant them that which they prate of the invisible presence, the unmeasurableness shall not be yet proved, without which they shall in vain attempt to enclose Christ under bread. Unless the body of Christ may be everywhere at once, without any compass of place, it shall not be likely that he lies hidden under bread in the Supper. By which necessity they brought in the monstrous being everywhere. But it is showed by strong and plain witnesses of Scripture, that it was limited about by the measure of the body of a man: and then that by his ascending he has made it plain that he is not in all places, but that when he passes into one place, he leaves the other that he was in before. Neither is the promise which they allege, to be drawn to the body. "I am with you even to the ending of the world." First the continual conjoining cannot stand, unless Christ dwell in us bodily without the use of the Supper. Therefore there is no just cause why they should so sharply brawl about the words of Christ, that they may in the Supper enclose Christ under bread. Again the text itself proves, that Christ speaks nothing less than of his flesh, but promises to his disciples invisible help, whereby he may defend and sustain them against all the assaults of Satan and the world. For when he enjoined them a hard charge: lest they should doubt to take it in hand, or should fearfully execute it, he strengthens them with assurance of his presence: as if he had said, that his succor shall not fail them, which shall be impossible to be overcome. Unless they chose to confound all things, ought they not to have made distinction of the manner of presence. And truly some had rather with great shame to utter their ignorance, than to yield never so little of their error. I speak not of the Papists: whose doctrine is more tolerable, or at the least more modest. But contentiousness so carries some away, that they say that by reason of the natures united in Christ, wherever the Godhead of Christ is, there is also his flesh, which cannot be severed from his Godhead. As though that same uniting have compounded of those two natures I know not what mean thing which was neither God nor man. So indeed did Eutyches, and after him Servetus. But it is plainly gathered out of the Scripture, that the only one person of Christ does so consist of two natures, that either of them has still her own property remaining safe. And that Eutyches was rightly condemned, they will be ashamed to deny: it is a marvel that they mark not the cause of his condemning, that taking away the difference between the natures, enforcing the unity of person, he made of God man, and of man God. What madness therefore is it, rather to mingle heaven and earth together, than not to draw the body of Christ out of the heavenly Sanctuary? For whereas they bring for themselves these testimonies, "None is gone up to heaven but he that is come down the Son of man which is in heaven," again, "The Son which is in the bosom of the Father, he shall declare them:" it is a point of like senseless dullness, to despise the communicating of properties which was in old time not without cause invented of the holy Fathers. Truly, when the Lord of glory is said to be crucified, Paul does not mean that he suffered anything in his Godhead: but because the same Christ which being abject and despised in the flesh did suffer, was both God and Lord of glory. After this manner also the Son of man was in heaven: because the very same Christ, which according to the flesh did dwell the Son of man in earth, was God in heaven. In which sort he is said to have descended from the said place according to his Godhead: not that the Godhead did forsake heaven, to hide itself in the prison of the body: but because, although it filled all things, yet in the very manhood of Christ it dwelled bodily, that is to say naturally and after a certain unspeakable manner. It is a common distinction in schools, which I am not ashamed to rehearse: that although whole Christ be everywhere, yet not the whole that is in him is everywhere. And I would to God the Schoolmen themselves had well weighed the substance of this saying: for so should the unsavory invention of the fleshly presence of Christ have been met withal. Therefore our mediator, since he is whole everywhere, is always at hand with his own, and in the Supper after a special manner gives himself present: but yet so, that whole he is present, not the whole that he is: because, as it is said, in his flesh he is contained in heaven till he appears to judgment.

But they are far deceived, who conceive no presence of the flesh of Christ in the Supper, unless it be made present in bread. For so they leave nothing to the secret working of the Spirit, which unites Christ himself to us. They think not Christ present, unless he come down to us. As though if he did lift us up to him, we should not as well enjoy his presence. Therefore the question is only of the manner: because they place Christ in the bread, but we think it not lawful for us to pluck him out of heaven. Let the readers judge which is the righter. Only let this cavil be driven away, that Christ is taken away from his Supper, unless he be hidden under the cover of bread. For since this mystery is heavenly, it is no need to draw Christ into the earth, that he may be joined to us.

Now if any man does ask me of the manner, I will not be ashamed to confess, that it is a higher secret than that it can be either comprehended with my wit, or uttered with my words: and, to speak it more plainly, I rather feel it, than I can understand it. Therefore I do herein without controversy embrace the truth of God, in which I may safely rest. He pronounces that his flesh is the meat of my soul, and his blood is the drink. With such food I offer my soul to him to be fed. In his holy Supper he commands me under the signs of bread and wine to take, eat, and drink his body and blood. I nothing doubt that both he does truly deliver them, and I do receive them. Only I refuse the absurdities, which appear to be either unworthy of the heavenly majesty of Christ, or disagreeing from the truth of his nature of manhood: forasmuch as they must also fight with the word of God, which also teaches that Christ was so taken up into the glory of the heavenly kingdom that it lifts him up above all estate of the world, and no less diligently sets forth in his nature of man, those things that are properly belonging to his true manhood. Neither ought this to seem incredible, or not consonant to reason: because as the whole kingdom of Christ is spiritual, so whatever he does with his Church, ought not to be reduced to the reason of this world. Or, that I may use the words of Augustine, this mystery, as others are, is done by men, but from God: in earth, but from heaven. Such (I say) is the presence of the body, as the nature of the Sacrament requires: which we say here to excel with so great force, and so great effectiveness, that it not only brings to our minds undoubted trust of eternal life, but also assures us of the immortality of our flesh. For it is now quickened of his immortal flesh, and after a certain manner communicates of his immortality. They who are carried above this with their excessive speeches, do nothing but with such entanglements darken the simple and plain truth. If any be not yet satisfied, I would have him here a while to consider with me, that we now speak of a Sacrament, all the parts whereof ought to be referred to Faith. But we do no less daintily and plentifully feed Faith with this partaking of the body which we have declared, than they that pluck Christ himself out of heaven. In the mean time I plainly confess, that I refuse that mixture of the flesh of Christ with our soul, or the pouring out of it such as they teach: because it suffices us, that Christ does out of the substance of his flesh breathe life into our souls, yes does pour into us his own life, although the very flesh of Christ does not enter into us. Moreover it is no doubt that the proportion of Faith, whereby Paul wills us to examine all exposition of Scripture, does in this behalf very well agree with me. As for them that speak against so evident a truth, let them look after what rule of faith they fashion themselves. He that does not confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is not of God. These men, although they cloak it, or mark it not, do spoil him of his flesh.

Of communicating is to be likewise thought, which they acknowledge none, unless they devour the flesh of Christ under bread. But there is no small wrong done to the Holy Spirit, unless we believe that it is brought to pass by his incomprehensible power, that we communicate with the flesh and blood of Christ. Indeed if the force of the mystery, such as it is taught by us, and as it was known to the old Church from four hundred years ago, were weighed according to the worthiness of it, there was enough and more whereupon we might be satisfied: the gate had been shut against many foul errors, out of which have been kindled many horrible dissensions wherewith both in old times and in our age the Church has been miserably vexed, while curious men enforce an excessive manner of presence, which the Scripture never shows. And they turmoil about a thing fondly and rashly conceived, as if the enclosing of Christ under bread were (as the proverb is) the prow and poop of godliness. It principally behoved to know how the body of Christ, as it was once delivered for us, is made ours: how we are made partakers of his blood that was shed: because this is to possess whole Christ crucified, that we may enjoy all his good things. Now these things, in which was so great importance, being omitted, indeed neglected and in a manner buried, this only crabbed question pleases them, how the body of Christ lies hidden under bread or under the form of bread. They falsely spread abroad that whatever we teach concerning spiritual eating is contrary to the true eating, as they call it: because we have respect to nothing but the manner, which among them is carnal, while they enclose Christ in bread: but to us it is spiritual, because the secret power of the Spirit is the bond of our joining with Christ. No truer is that other objection, that we touch only the fruit or effect which the faithful take of the eating of the flesh of Christ. For we have said before, that Christ himself is the substance of the Supper: and that thereupon follows the effect, that by the sacrifice of his death we are cleansed from sins, by his blood we are washed, by his resurrection we are raised up into hope of the heavenly life. But the foolish imagination, whereof Lombard was the author, has perverted their minds, while they think that the eating of the flesh of Christ is the Sacrament. For thus says he: The Sacrament and not the thing are the forms of bread and wine: the sacrament and the thing, are the flesh and blood of Christ: the thing and not the sacrament, is his mystical flesh. Again within a little after: The thing signified and contained, is the proper flesh of Christ: the thing signified and not contained is his mystical body. Whereas he makes difference between the flesh of Christ, and the effectual power of nourishing, wherewith it is endued, I agree: but whereas he feigns it to be a sacrament, indeed and contained under bread, it is an error not to be suffered. Hereupon has grown the false exposition of sacramental eating, because they have thought that wicked men also and evildoers do eat the flesh of Christ, however much they be strangers from him. But the flesh of Christ itself in the mystery of the Supper is no less a spiritual thing than eternal salvation. Whereupon we gather, that whoever be void of the Spirit of Christ, can no more eat the flesh of Christ than they can drink wine wherewith is joined no taste. Truly Christ is too heinously torn asunder, when that dead body which has no living strength, is given forth in common to unbelievers: and his express words are directly against it, Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood, abides in me, and I in him (John 6:56). They answer that in that place is not treated of the sacramental eating: which I grant, so that they will not now and then stumble against the same stone, in saying that the flesh itself is eaten without fruit. But I would know of them, how long they hold it when they have eaten it. Here, in my judgment, they shall have no way to get out. But they object, that nothing can be withdrawn or fail of the promises of God by the unthankfulness of men. I grant indeed, and I say that the force of the mystery remains whole, however wicked men do, as much as in them lies, endeavor to make it void. Yet it is one thing to be offered, and another thing to be received. Christ reaches this spiritual meat and offers this spiritual drink to all men: some do greedily eat of it, some do lothingly refuse it: shall these men's refusing make the meat and the drink to lose their nature? They will say that their opinion is helped by this similitude, namely that the flesh of Christ, though it be unsavory, is nevertheless his flesh. But I deny that it can be eaten without the taste of faith: or (if we would rather speak as Augustine does) I say that men bear away no more of this sacrament than they gather with the vessel of faith. So nothing is abated from the Sacrament, indeed the truth and effectiveness thereof remains undiminished, although the wicked depart empty from the outward partaking of it. If they again object that this word, this is my body, is diminished, if the wicked receive corruptible bread and nothing else: we have a solution ready, that God will not be acknowledged true in the receiving itself, but in the steadfastness of his own goodness, when he is ready to give, indeed liberally offers to the unworthy that which they refuse. And this is the fullness of the Sacrament, which the whole world cannot break, that the flesh and blood of Christ is no less given to the unworthy than to the chosen faithful ones of God: but therewith it is true, that as water lighting upon a hard stone, falls away, because there is no entry open into the stone: so the wicked do with their hardness drive back the grace of God that it cannot pierce into them. Moreover, that Christ should be received without faith, is no more agreeable with reason, than seed to bud in the fire. Whereas they ask, how Christ is come to damnation to some, unless they receive him unworthily, it is a very cold question: forasmuch as we nowhere read, that men do procure death to themselves by unworthily receiving Christ, but rather by refusing him. Neither does Christ's parable help them, where he says that seed grows up among thorns, and afterward, being choked is spoiled (Matthew 13:7): because he there treats of what value the faith is which endures but for a time, which they do not think to be necessary to the eating of Christ's flesh and drinking of his blood, that in this behalf do make Judas equally fellow with Peter. But rather by the same parable their error is confuted, where Christ says that some seed falls on the highway, other some upon stones, and neither of them takes root. Whereupon follows that to the unbelievers their own hardness is a hindrance that Christ attains not to them. Whoever desires to have our salvation helped by this mystery, shall find nothing fitter, than that the faithful being led to the very fountain, should draw life out of the Son of God. But the dignity of it is honorably enough set out, when we keep in mind that it is a help whereby we be grafted into the body of Christ, or being grafted do more and more grow together, till he does fully make himself one with us in the heavenly life. They object that Paul ought not to have made them guilty of the body and blood of Christ (1 Corinthians 11:29), unless they were partakers of them. But I answer that they are not therefore condemned, because they have eaten them, but only because they have profaned the mystery, in treading under foot the pledge of the holy joining with God, which they ought reverently to receive.

Now because Augustine among the old writers chiefly has affirmed that article of doctrine, that nothing is abated from the Sacraments, nor the grace which they figure is made void by the infidelity or worthlessness of men: it shall be profitable to prove clearly by his own words, how unfittly and perversely they do draw that to this present cause, which cast the body of Christ to dogs to eat. The sacramental eating, after their opinion, is whereby the wicked receive the body and blood of Christ without the power of the Spirit, or any effect of grace. Augustine, contrariwise, weighing wisely those words, "He that eats my flesh, and drinks my blood, shall not die for ever," says: "Namely the power of the sacrament, not only the visible sacrament: and verily within, not without: he that eats it with heart, not he that presses it with tooth." Therefore at length he concludes that the sacrament of this thing, that is to say, of the unity of the body and blood of Christ, is set before men in the Supper of the Lord, to some to life, to some to destruction: but the thing itself of which it is a sacrament, to all men to life, to none to destruction, whoever be partaker of it. That none should here cavil, that the thing is called not the body, but the grace of the Spirit which may be severed from the body, the contrary comparison between these two words of addition, Visible and Invisible, drives away all these mists: for under the first of them cannot be comprehended the body of Christ. Therefore it follows that the unbelievers do communicate only of the visible sign. And that all doubting may be better taken away, after that he had said that this bread requires the hunger of the inward man, he adds: "Moses and Aaron and Phinehas, and many other that did eat Manna, pleased God. Why so? Because the spiritual food they spiritually understood, spiritually hungered, spiritually tasted, that they might be spiritually filled. For we also at this day have received spiritual food: but the Sacrament is one thing, and the power of the sacrament is another." A little after: "And by this he that abides not in Christ, and in whom Christ abides not, without doubt neither eats spiritually his flesh, nor drinks his blood, though carnally and visibly he presses with teeth the sign of the body and blood." We hear again that the visible sign is set in comparison as contrary to spiritual eating. By which the error is confuted, that the body of Christ invisible is indeed eaten sacramentally, though not spiritually. We hear also that nothing is granted to profane and unclean men besides the visible receiving of the sign. From this comes his famous saying, that the other disciples did eat the bread the Lord, but Judas did eat the bread of the Lord: in which he plainly excludes the unbelievers from the partaking of the body and blood. Neither does it tend to any other end which he says in another place: "What do you marvel, if to Judas was given the bread of Christ, by which he might be made bound to the devil: when you see on the contrary side that to Paul was given the angel of the devil, by whom he might be made perfect in Christ?" He says verily in another place, that the bread of the Supper was the body of Christ to them to whom Paul said, "He that eats unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself": and that they have not therefore nothing, because they have received unworthily. But in what sense, he declares more fully in another place. For (taking in hand purposely to define how the wicked and evil doers, which profess the christian faith with mouth but with deeds do deny it, do eat the body of Christ, and that against the opinion of some which thought that they did not eat in sacrament only but in very deed.) But neither (says he) ought it to be said that they eat the body of Christ, because they are not to be reckoned among the members of Christ. For (to speak nothing of the rest) they cannot together be the members of Christ, and the members of a harlot. Finally where he himself says, "He that eats my flesh, and drinks my blood, abides in me, and I in him," he shows what it is not sacramentally but in very deed to eat the body of Christ. For this is to abide in Christ, that Christ may abide in him. For he so said this, as though he had said, "he that abides not in me, and in whom I abide not, let him not say or think that he does eat my body, or drink my blood." Let the readers weigh the things set as contraries in the comparison to eat: Sacramentally, and in Very deed: and there shall remain no doubt. He confirms the same, no less plainly in these words: "Prepare not your jaws, but your heart: From this is this Supper commended. Lo, we believe in Christ, when we receive by faith: in receiving we know what to think. We receive a little and are satisfied in heart. Therefore not that which is seen, but that which is believed, does feed." Here also that which the wicked receive, he restrains to the visible sign: and teaches that Christ is received in no other way than by faith. So also in another place, pronouncing expressly that the good and the evil do communicate together in the signs, he excludes the evil from the true eating of the flesh of Christ. For if they received the thing itself, he would not utterly have left that unspoken which was more fit for his matter. Also in another place, treating of the eating and the fruit thereof, he concludes thus: "Then shall the body and blood of Christ be life to every man, if that which in the Sacrament is visibly received, be in the truth itself spiritually eaten, spiritually drunk." Therefore whoever make unbelievers partakers of the flesh and blood of Christ, that they may agree with Augustine, let them show us the visible body of Christ: forasmuch as, by his judgment, the whole truth is spiritual. And it is certainly gathered out of his words, that the Sacramental eating, when unbelief closes up the entry to truth, is as much in effect as visible or outward eating. If the body of Christ might be eaten truly and yet not spiritually, what should that mean which he says in another place? "You shall not eat this body which you see, and drink the blood which they shall shed that shall crucify me. I have commended a certain sacrament to you, being spiritually understood it shall quicken you." Verily he would not deny but that the same body which Christ offered for sacrifice, is delivered in the Supper: but he did set out the manner of eating: namely that being received into heavenly glory, by the secret power of the Spirit it breathes life into us. I grant indeed that there is oftentimes found in him this manner of speaking, that the body of Christ is eaten of the unbelievers: but he expounds himself, adding, "In Sacrament." And in another place he describes spiritual eating, in which outward performances consume not grace. And lest my adversaries should say, that I fight with them with a heap of places, I would know of them how they can unwind themselves from one saying of his, where he says that Sacraments do work in the only elect that which they figure. Truly they dare not deny but that the bread in the Supper figures the body of Christ. Therefore it follows that the reprobate are debarred from the partaking of it. That Cyril also thought no otherwise, these words do declare: "As if a man upon molten wax do pour other wax, he wholly tempers the one wax with the other: so is it necessary, if any man receive the flesh and blood of the Lord, that he be joined with him, that Christ may be found in him and he in Christ." By these words I think it is evident, that they are bereft of the true and real eating, that do but sacramentally eat the body of Christ, which cannot be severed from his power: and that therefore the faith of the promises of God fails not, which ceases not to rain from heaven, although the stones and rocks receive not the liquor of the rain.

This knowledge shall also easily draw us away from the carnal worshipping, which some have with perverse rashness erected in the Sacrament: because they made account with themselves in this manner: If it be the body, then both the soul and the godhead are together with the body, which now cannot be severed: therefore Christ is there to be worshipped. First if their accompanying which they pretend be denied them, what will they do? For however much they cry out upon an absurdity, if the body be severed from the soul and the godhead: yet what sound-witted and sober man can persuade himself that the body of Christ is Christ? They think themselves indeed gaily to prove it with their logical arguments. But since Christ speaks distinctly of his body and blood, but describes not the manner of presence: how will they of a doubtful thing gather certainly that which they would? What then? If their consciences chance to be exercised with any more grievous feeling, shall they not by and by with their logical arguments be dissolved and melted? Namely when they shall see themselves destitute of the certain word of God, on which alone our souls stand fast, when they are called to account, and without which they faint at every first moment: when they shall call to mind that the doctrine and examples of the Apostles are against them, and that themselves alone are to themselves the authors of it. To such motions shall be added other not small prickings. What? Shall it be a matter of no importance, to worship God in this form, where nothing was prescribed to us? When it concerned the true worship of God, ought they with so great lightness to have attempted that of which there is nowhere read any one word? But if they had, with such humbleness as they ought, held all their thoughts under the word of God, they would truly have hearkened to that which he said, Take, eat, drink, and would have obeyed this commandment, wherein he bids the Sacrament to be received, not to be worshipped. But they which, as it is commanded of God, do receive it without worshipping, are assured that they do not swerve from God's commandment: than which assuredness there is nothing better when we take any work in hand. They have the example of the Apostles, whom we read not to have fallen down flat and worshipped it, but even as they were sitting, to have received it and eaten it. They have the use of the Apostolic Church, wherein Luke reports that the faithful did communicate not in worshipping but in breaking of bread. They have the Apostles' doctrine, with which Paul instructed the Church of the Corinthians, professing that he had received of the Lord that which he delivered.

And these things truly tend to this end, that the godly readers should weigh how perilous it is in such high matters to wander from the simple word of God to the dreams of our own brain. But those things that are above said, ought to deliver us from all doubt in this behalf. For, that godly souls may rightly take hold of Christ, they must needs be lifted up to heaven. If this be the office of a sacrament, to help the mind of man which otherwise is weak, that it may rise upward to reach the height of spiritual mysteries: then they which are held down in the outward sign do stray from the right way of seeking Christ. What then? Shall we deny that it is a superstitious worshipping, when men do throw themselves down before bread, to worship Christ therein? Doubtless the Nicene Synod meant to meet with this mischief, when it forbade us to be humbly attentive to the signs set before us. And for no other cause was it in old time ordained, that before the consecration the people should with a loud voice be put in mind to have their hearts lifted upward. The Scripture itself also, besides that it diligently declares to us the ascension of Christ, whereby he conveyed away the presence of his body from our sight and conversation: to shake away from us all carnal thinking of him, so often as it makes mention of him, commands us to be in minds raised upward, and to seek him in heaven sitting at the right hand of the Father. According to this rule he was rather to be spiritually worshipped in heavenly glory, than this so perilous a kind of worshipping to be devised, full of carnal and gross opinion of God. Therefore they that have invented the worshipping of the sacrament, have not only dreamed it of themselves beside the Scripture, in which no mention of it can be shown (which yet should not have been overpassed if it had been acceptable to God.) But also all the Scripture crying out against it, they have framed to themselves a God after the will of their own lust, leaving the living God. For what is idolatry, if this be not, to worship the gifts instead of the giver himself? Wherein they have doubly offended: For both the honor taken from God was conveyed to a creature: and he himself also dishonored in the defiling and profaning of his benefit, when of his holy sacrament is made a cursed idol. But let us contrariwise, lest we fall into the same pit, thoroughly settle our ears, eyes, hearts, minds, and tongues in the holy doctrine of God. For that is the school of the Holy Spirit, the best schoolmaster, in which such profit is attained that nothing need more to be gotten from anywhere else, but we willingly ought to be ignorant of whatever is not taught in it.

But now (as superstition, when it has once passed the right bounds, makes no end of sinning) they fell a great way further. For they have devised ceremonies altogether strange from the institution of the Supper, to this end only that they might give divine honors to the sign. We yield (say they) this worship to Christ. First, if this were done in the Supper, I would say that that worshipping only is lawful, which rests not in the sign, but is directed to Christ sitting in heaven. But now by what pretense do they boast that they worship Christ in that bread, when they have no promise thereof? They consecrate a host, as they call it, which they may carry about in pomp, which they may show forth in a common gazing to be looked upon, worshipped, and called upon. I ask by what power they think it to be rightly consecrated. Indeed they will bring forth those words: This is my body. But I will object to the contrary, that it was therewith also said, Take and eat. Neither will I do that for nothing. For when a promise is joined to a commandment, I say that the promise is so contained under the commandment, that being severed it is made no promise at all. This shall be made plainer by a like example. God gave a commandment, when he said, Call upon me (Psalm 50:15): he added a promise, I will hear you. If any man calling upon Peter and Paul, does glory upon this promise, will not all men cry out that he does wrongfully? And what other thing, I pray you, do they which, leaving the commandment concerning eating, do catch hold of an incomplete promise — this is my body — to abuse it to strange ceremonies from the institution of Christ? Let us therefore remember that this promise is given to them which keep the commandment joined with it: but that they be destitute of all the word which remove the Sacrament to any other way. We have previously treated how the mystery of the holy supper serves our faith before God. But forasmuch as the Lord does here not only bring into our remembrance so great largesse of his bounty, as we have before shown, but does as it were from hand to hand bring it forth, and stirs us to acknowledge it: he does therewith warn us that we be not ungrateful to so plentiful liberality: but rather that we should publish it with such praises as is fitting, and advance it with thanksgiving. Therefore when he delivered the institution of the Sacrament itself to the Apostles, he taught them that they should do it in remembrance of him. Which Paul expounds, to declare the Lord's death (Luke 22:19; 1 Corinthians 11:26). That is, publicly and altogether with one mouth openly to confess, that all our confidence of life and salvation is placed in the death of the Lord: that we may glorify him with our confession, and may by our example exhort others to give glory to him. Here again it appears to what end the mark of this Sacrament is directed, namely to exercise us in the remembrance of the death of Christ. For, this that we are commanded to declare the Lord's death till he come to judge, is nothing else but that we should publish that with confession of mouth, which our faith has acknowledged in the Sacrament, that is, that the death of Christ is our life. This is the second use of the Sacrament, which pertains to outward confession.

Thirdly the Lord also willed it to be to us in place of an exhortation, than which none other can more vehemently encourage and inflame us both to purity and holiness of life, and also to charity, peace, and agreement. For the Lord does therein so communicate his body to us, that he is made thoroughly one with us, and we with him. Now since he has but one body, of which he makes us all partakers, it is necessary that all we also be by such partaking made one body. Which unity the bread which is delivered in the Sacrament represents: which as it is made of many grains in such sort mingled together that one can not be discerned from another: after the same manner we also ought to be conjoined and knit together with so great agreement of minds, that no disagreement or division come between us. This I had rather be expressed with Paul's words. The cup of blessing (says he) which we bless, is the sharing of the blood of Christ: and the bread of blessing which we break, is the partaking of the body of Christ (1 Corinthians 10:16). Therefore we all are one body, that partake of one bread. We shall have very well profited in the Sacrament, if this thought shall be imprinted and engraved in our minds, that none of the brethren can be hurt, despised, refused, abused, or in any wise be offended by us, but that therewith we do in so doing hurt, despise and abuse Christ with our injurious dealings: that we can not disagree with our brethren, but that we must therewith also disagree with Christ: that Christ can not be loved by us, but that he must be loved in our brethren: that what care we have of our own body, such also we ought to have of our brethren which are members of our body: as no part of our body is touched with any feeling of grief, which is not spread throughout all the other parts, so we must not suffer our brother to be grieved with any evil of which we should not also be touched with compassion. Therefore Augustine not without cause so often calls this Sacrament the bond of charity. For what sharper spur could be put to us, to stir up mutual charity among us, than when Christ giving himself to us, does not only allure us with his own example that we should mutually dedicate and deliver ourselves one to another: but in so much as he makes himself common to all, he makes all us also one in himself?

But hereby is that very well confirmed which I have said in another place, that the true administration of the Sacrament stands not without the word. For whatever profit comes to us of the Supper, requires the word: whether we be to be confirmed in faith, or to be exercised in confession, or to be stirred up to duty, prayer is needful. Therefore nothing can be more disorderly done in the Supper, than if it be turned to a dumb action: as has been done under the tyranny of the Pope. For they would have the whole force of consecration to hang upon the intent of the Priest, as though this nothing pertained to the people, to whom it most of all behoved that the mystery should be declared. But thereupon has grown this error, that they marked not that those promises wherewith the consecration is made, are directed not to the elements themselves, but to them that receive them. But Christ speaks not to the bread, that it may be made his body, but commands his disciples to eat, and promises to them the communicating of his body and blood. And none other order does Paul teach, than that together with the bread and the cup, the promises should be offered to the faithful. Thus it is truly. We ought not here to imagine any magical enchantment, that it be sufficient to have mumbled up the words, as though the elements did hear them: but let us understand that those words are a lively preaching, which may edify the hearers, which may inwardly pierce into their minds, which may be imprinted and settled in their hearts, which may show forth effectualness in the fulfilling of that which it promises. By these reasons it clearly appears, that the laying up of the Sacrament, which many do earnestly require, that it may be extraordinarily distributed to the sick, is unprofitable. For either they shall receive it without rehearsing of the institution of Christ, or the minister shall together with the sign join the true declaration of the mystery. In silence is abuse and fault. If the promises be rehearsed, and the mystery declared, that they which shall receive it may receive it with fruit, there is no cause why we should doubt that this is the true consecration. To what end then will that other consecration come, the force whereof comes not so far as to the sick men? But they that do so, have the example of the old Church. I grant: but in so great a matter, and in which we err not without great danger, nothing is safer than to follow the truth itself.

Now as we see that this holy bread of the Supper of the Lord is spiritual meat, no less sweet and delicate than healthful to the godly worshippers of God, by the taste whereof they feel that Christ is their life, whom it raises up to thanksgiving, to whom it is an exhortation to mutual charity among themselves: so on the other side it is turned into a most noxious poison to all them whose faith it does not nourish and confirm, and whom it does not stir up to confession of praise and to charity. For as bodily meat, when it finds a stomach possessed with evil humors, being itself also thereby made evil and corrupted does rather hurt than nourish: so this spiritual meat, if it lights upon a soul defiled with malice and wickedness, throws it down headlong with greater fall: verily not by the fault of the meat itself, but because to defiled and unbelieving men nothing is clean, though otherwise it be never so much sanctified by the blessing of the Lord. For (as Paul says) they that eat and drink unworthily, are guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, and do eat and drink judgment to themselves, not discerning the body of the Lord. For, such kind of men as without any spark of faith, without any zeal of charity, do thrust themselves forth like swine to take the Supper of the Lord, do not discern the body of the Lord. For inasmuch as they do not believe that that body is their life, they do as much as in them lies dishonor it, spoiling it of all the dignity thereof, and finally in so receiving it they profane and defile it. But in so much as being estranged and disagreeing from their brethren, they dare mingle the holy sign of the body of Christ with their disagreements, it is no thanks to them that the body of Christ is not rent asunder, and limb from limb torn in pieces. And so not unworthily they are guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, which they do with ungodliness full of sacrilege so foully defile. Therefore by this unworthy eating, they take to themselves damnation. For whereas they have no faith reposed in Christ, yet receiving the Sacrament they profess that there is salvation for them nowhere else than in him, and do forswear all other trust. Therefore they themselves are accusers to themselves, they themselves pronounce witness against themselves, and they themselves seal their own damnation. Again when they being with hatred and ill will divided and drawn asunder from their brethren, that is, from the members of Christ, have no part in Christ: yet they do testify that this is the only salvation to communicate with Christ, and to be made one with him. For this cause Paul commands, that a man prove himself, before that he eat of this bread or drink of this cup. Whereby (as I expound it) he meant that every man should descend into himself, and weigh with himself, whether he does with inward trust of heart rest upon the salvation which Christ has purchased: whether he acknowledges it with confession of mouth: then whether he does with desirous endeavor of innocence and holiness aspire to the following of Christ: whether after his example he be ready to give himself to his brethren, and to communicate himself to them with whom he has Christ common to him: whether, as he himself is accounted of Christ, he does likewise on his behalf take all his brethren for members of his own body: whether, he desires to cherish, defend, and help them as his own members. Not for that these duties both of faith and charity can now be perfect in us: but because we ought to endeavor this, and with all our desires to long toward it, that we may daily more and more increase our faith begun.

Commonly when they go about to prepare men to such worthiness of eating, they have in cruel wise tormented and vexed poor consciences: and yet they brought never a bit of all those things that might serve to the purpose. They said that those did eat worthily which were in state of grace. To be in state of grace they expounded to be pure and cleansed from all sin. By which doctrine all the men that ever have at any time been or now be in earth, were debarred from the use of this Sacrament. For if we go about this, to fetch our worthiness from ourselves, we are utterly undone: only despair and damnable ruin awaits us. Though we endeavor with our whole strengths, we shall nothing more prevail, but that then at last we shall be most unworthy, when we have most of all travailed about seeking of worthiness. To salve this sore, they have devised a way to attain worthiness: that, as much as in us lies, making examination, and requiring of ourselves account of all our doings, we should with contrition, confession, and satisfaction cleanse our unworthiness: which way of cleansing, what manner of thing it is, we have already showed there where was more convenient place to speak of it. So much as serves for our present purpose, I say that these be too hungry and vanishing comforts to dismayed and discouraged consciences and such as are stricken with horror of their sin. For if the Lord by special forbidding, admits none to the partaking of his Supper but the righteous and innocent: there needs no small heed that may make a man assured of his own righteousness which he hears to be required of God. But whereby is this assuredness confirmed to us, that they are discharged before God, which have done so much as in them lay? But although it were so, yet when shall it be that a man may be bold to assure himself that he has done as much as in him lay? So when there is made no certain assurance of our worthiness, the entry shall always remain shut by that horrible forbidding, whereby is pronounced that they eat and drink judgment to themselves, which eat and drink unworthily.

Now it is easy to judge what manner of doctrine this is which reigns in the Papacy, and from what author it has proceeded, which with the outrageous rigor thereof bereaves and spoils, miserable sinners and such as be tormented with fear and sorrow, of the comfort of this Sacrament, in which yet all the sweet delicacies of the Gospel were set before them. Surely the devil could by no readier way destroy men, than by so making them senseless, that they could not perceive the taste and savor of such food, with which it was the will of the most good heavenly Father to feed them. Lest therefore we run into such headlong downfall, let us remember that this holy banquet is medicine to the sick, comfort to sinners, liberal gift to the poor: which bring no profit to the healthy, righteous, and rich, if any such could be found. For whereas in it Christ is given us for meat: we understand that without him we pine, starve, and faint, like as famine destroys the lively strength of the body. Again whereas he is given us for life: we understand that without him we are in ourselves utterly dead. Therefore this is the worthiness both the only and best that we can bring to God, if we offer to him our own vileness and (as I may so call it) unworthiness, that of his mercy he may make us worthy of him: if we despair in ourselves, that we may be comforted in him: if we humble ourselves, that we may be raised up by him: if we accuse ourselves, that we may be justified by him: moreover if we aspire to that unity which he commends to us in his Supper: and as he makes us all, one in himself, so if we wish to us all altogether one soul, one heart, one [reconstructed: tongue]. If we have these things thoroughly well weighed and considered, such thoughts although they shake us, yet shall never overthrow us. As, how should we being needy and naked of all good things, we defiled with filthiness of sins, we half dead, eat the body of the Lord worthily? We will rather think that we being poor come to the liberal giver, we sick to the Physician, we sinners to the author of righteousness, finally we dead men to him that gives life: that that worthiness which is commanded of God, consists chiefly of Faith, which reposes all things in Christ and nothing in us: and next of charity, and the self same charity which it is enough to offer imperfect to God, that he may increase it to better, forasmuch as it cannot be given perfect. Some other agreeing with us in this, that the worthiness itself consists in Faith and charity: yet in this measure of worthiness have gone far out of the way, requiring a perfection of Faith, to which nothing may be added, and a charity equal with that which Christ has showed toward us. But hereby they do none otherwise than those other before, drive all men away from coming to this holy Supper. For if their sentence should take place, no man should receive but unworthily, forasmuch as all without exception should be held guilty and convicted of their imperfection. And truly it were a point of too much amazed dullness, I will not say foolishness, to require such perfection in the sacrament, as may make the sacrament void and superfluous: which was not ordained for the perfect, but for the weak and feeble to awake, to stir up, to prick forward, and exercise the affection of Faith and charity, and to correct the deficiency of either of them.

But so much as concerns the outward form of doing, whether the faithful receive it in their hand or not: whether they divide it, or every one eat that which is given him: whether they put again the cup in the hand of the deacon, or deliver it to the next: whether the bread be leavened, or unleavened: whether the wine be red or white: it makes no matter. These things are indifferent and left in the liberty of the Church. However, it is certain that the usage of the old Church was that every one should take it into his hand. And Christ said, "Divide it among you." The histories report that it was leavened and common bread before the time of Alexander Bishop of Rome, who first delighted in unleavened bread: but for what reason, I see not, unless it were with a new sight to draw the eyes of the common people to wondering at it, rather than to instruct their minds with good religion. I adjure all those who are touched with any though but light zeal of godliness, to tell whether they do not evidently see, both how much more brightly the glory of God shines in this, and how much more abundant sweetness of spiritual comfort comes to the faithful, than in these cold and theatrical trifles, which bring no use but to deceive the sense of the amazed people. This they call the holding of the people in religion, when being made foolish and senseless with superstition it is drawn wherever they please. If any man will defend such inventions by antiquity, I myself also am not ignorant how ancient is the use of the chrism, and blowing in Baptism: how near to the age of the Apostles the Supper of the Lord was infected with rustiness: but this verily is the waywardness of man's boldness, which cannot withhold itself but that it must always play and be wanton in the mysteries of God. But let us remember that God does so highly esteem the obedience of his word, that he wills us by it to judge both his Angels and the whole world. Now, bidding farewell to so great a heap of ceremonies: it might thus have been most comely administered, if it were often and at least every week set before the Church, but that first they should begin with public prayers: then a sermon should be made: then the minister, having bread and wine set upon the table, should rehearse the institution of the Supper: and then should declare the promises that are in it left to us: and therewith should excommunicate all those who by the Lord's forbidding are debarred from it, afterward they should pray that with what liberality the Lord has given us this holy food, he would instruct and frame us also with the same Faith and thankfulness of mind to receive it, and that inasmuch as we are not of ourselves, he would of his mercy make us worthy of such a banquet: that then either Psalms should be sung, or somewhat read, and the faithful should in seemly order partake of the holy banquet, the ministers breaking the bread and giving it to the people: that when the Supper is ended, exhortation should be made to pure Faith and confession of Faith, to charity, and to manners meet for Christians: last of all that giving of thanks should be rehearsed, and praises be sung to God: which being ended the congregation should be let go in peace.

These things that we have until now spoken of this Sacrament do largely show, that it was not therefore ordained, that it should be received yearly once, and that slightly for manners' sake (as now commonly the custom is) but that it should be in often use to all Christians, that with often remembrance they should repeat the passion of Christ: by which remembrance they might sustain and strengthen their Faith, and exhort themselves to sing confession of praise to God, and to publish his goodness: finally by which they might nourish mutual charity, and testify it among themselves, of which they saw the knot in the unity of the body of Christ. For as often as we partake of the sign of the body of the Lord, we do as by a token given and received, interchangeably bind ourselves one to another to all duties of love, that none of us do anything by which he may offend his brother, nor leave anything undone by which he may help him, when need requires and ability suffices. That such was the use of the Apostolic Church, Luke rehearses in the Acts, when he says that the faithful were continuing in the doctrine of the Apostles, in communicating, in breaking of bread, and in prayers (Acts 2:42). So was it altogether meet to be done, that there should be no assembly of the Church without the word, prayers, partaking of the Supper, and alms. That this order was also instituted among the Corinthians we may sufficiently gather from Paul: and it is certain that in many ages afterward it was in use: for thereupon came those old Canons, which they father upon Anacletus and Calixtus, that when the consecration is done, all should partake, that will not be without the doors of the Church. And it is read in those old Canons, which they call the Canons of the Apostles: that those who continue not to the end, and do not receive the holy communion, must be corrected as men that cause unrest in the Church. Also in the Council at Antioch, it was decreed that those who enter into the Church, and hear the Scriptures, and do abstain from the communion, should be removed from the Church, until they have amended this fault. Which, although in the first Council at Toledo it was either somewhat qualified or at least set forth in milder words, yet it is there also decreed, that those who when they have heard the sermon are found never to partake, should be warned: if after warning they abstain, they should be debarred from it.

Truly by these ordinances the holy men meant to retain and maintain the frequent use of the Communion, which frequent use they had received from the Apostles themselves, which they saw to be most wholesome for the faithful, and by little and little by the negligence of the common people to grow out of use. Augustine testifies of his own time: The Sacrament (says he) of this thing, of the unity of the Lord's body, is somewhere daily, somewhere by certain distances of days, prepared upon the Lord's table, and is there received at the table, to some to life, to other some to destruction. And in the first Epistle to Januarius: some do daily communicate of the body and blood of the Lord: some receive it at certain days: in some places there is no day let pass in which it is not offered, in some other place only upon the Saturday and the Sunday, and in some other places never but on the Sunday. But forasmuch as the common people was (as we have said) somewhat slack, the holy men did call earnestly upon them with sharp rebukes, lest they should seem to wink at such slothfulness. Such an example is in Chrysostom upon the Epistle to the Ephesians. It is not said to him that dishonored the banquet: why did you sit down? but, why did you come in? Whoever is not partaker of the mysteries, he is wicked and shameless for that he stands here present. I beseech you, if any be called to a banquet, washes his hands, sits down, seems to prepare himself to eat, and then does taste of nothing: shall he not shame both the banquet, and the maker of the banquet? So you, standing among them that with prayer do prepare themselves to receive the holy food, have even in this that you have not gone away confessed that you are one of the number of them, at the last you do not partake: had it not been better that you had not been present. You will say, I am unworthy. Therefore neither were you worthy of the Communion of prayer, which is a preparing to the receiving of the holy mystery.

And truly this custom which commands to communicate yearly once, is a most certain invention of the devil, by whoever's ministry it was brought in. They say that Zepherinus was author of that decree, which it is not likely to have been such as we now have it. For he by his ordinance did perhaps not after the worst manner provide for the Church, as the times then were. For it is no doubt but that then the holy Supper was set before the faithful so often as they came together in assembly: neither is it any doubt but that a good part of them did communicate. But when it scarcely at any time happened that all did communicate together, and whereas it was necessary that they which were mingled with profane men and idolaters, should by some outward sign testify their faith: the holy man for order and policy's sake, appointed that day, in which the whole people of Christians should by partaking of the Lord's Supper utter a confession of their faith. The ordinance of Zepherinus being otherwise good, has been ill wrested by them that came after, when a certain law was made of one communicating yearly: whereby it has come to pass, that almost all men when they have once communicated, as though they had fully discharged themselves for all the rest of the year, sleep soundly on both ears. It ought to have been far otherwise done. Every week at the least, the Lord's table should be set before the assembly of the Christians: the promises should be declared, which might feed us spiritually at it: none should indeed be compelled by necessity, but all should be exhorted and urged forward: the sluggishness also of the slothful should be rebuked. All should by heaps, as hungry men, come together to such dainties. Not without rightful cause therefore at the beginning I complained, that by the craft of the devil this custom was thrust in, which when it appoints one certain day of the year, makes men slothful for all the rest of the year. We see indeed that this perverse abuse was crept in even in the time of Chrysostom: but we may also therewith see how much it displeased him. For he complains with grievous words in the same place which I even now alleged, that there is so great inequality of this matter, that often in sometimes of the year they came not even when they were clean, but at Easter they came even when they were unclean. Then he cries out: O custom. O presumption. Then in vain is the daily offering used: in vain we stand at the altar: there is none that partakes together with us. So far is it that he allowed it by his authority adjoined to it.

Out of the same shop proceeded also another ordinance, which has stolen away or violently taken away half of the Supper from the greater number of the people of God: namely the sign of the blood, which being denied to lay and profane men (for with such titles, indeed, they set out God's inheritance) became a peculiar possession to shaven and anointed men. It is the commandment of the eternal God, that all should drink: which commandment man dare discontinue and repeal with a new and contrary law, commanding that not all should drink. And that these lawmakers should not seem to fight without reason against their God, they pretend perils that might happen if this holy cup were commonly given to all: as though those dangers had not been foreseen and marked of the eternal wisdom of God. And then subtly, indeed, they reason, that the one is enough for both. For if (say they) it be the body, it is whole Christ, which cannot now be severed from his body. Therefore by accompanying the body contains the blood. Lo, how our wit agrees with God, when it has never so little begun with loose reins to be wanton and wild. The Lord showing bread, says that it is his body: when he shows the cup, he calls it his blood. The boldness of man's reason, cries out contrariwise that the bread is the blood, and the wine is the body: as though the Lord had for no cause severed his body from his blood both in words and in signs: or as though it had ever been heard spoken that the body or blood of Christ is called God and man. Verily if he had meant to signify whole himself, he might have said, it is I: as he is wont to speak in the Scriptures, and not, this is my body, this is my blood. But he willing to help our weakness, did set the cup severally from the bread, to teach that he suffices no less for drink than for meat. Now let one part be taken away, then we shall find but the one half of the nourishments in him. Therefore although it be true which they pretend, that the blood is in the bread by way of accompanying, and again the body in the cup: yet they defraud godly souls of the confirmation of Faith which Christ delivers as necessary. Therefore bidding their subtleties farewell, we must hold fast the profit which is by the ordinance of Christ in the two earnests.

I know indeed that the ministers of Satan do here cavil as it is, an ordinary thing with them to make mockery of the Scriptures. First they allege that of one bare doing ought not to be gathered a rule whereby the Church should be bound to perpetual observing. But they lie when they say that it was but a bare doing: for Christ did not only deliver the cup, but also did institute that his Apostles should in time to come do the same. For they are the words of a commander, drink you all of this cup. And Paul so recounts that it was a deed, that he also commends it for a certain rule. Another starting hole is, that the Apostles alone were received of Christ to the partaking of this Supper, whom he had already chosen and taken into the order of the sacrificing priests. But I would have them answer me to five questions, from which they shall not be able to escape, but that they shall be easily convinced with their lies. First, by what oracle have they this solution revealed, being so strange from the word of God? The Scripture reckons 12 that sat with Jesus: but it does not so obscure the dignity of Christ, that it calls them sacrificing priests: of which name we will speak hereafter in place fit for it. Though he gave it then to the 12, yet he commanded that they should do the same, namely that they should so distribute it among them. Secondly, why in that better age, from the Apostles almost a thousand years, were all without exception made partakers of both the signs? Was the old Church ignorant what guests Christ had received to his Supper? It were a point of most desperate shamelessness, here to stick and dally in granting it to be true. There remain the ecclesiastical histories, there remain the books of the old writers, which minister evident testimonies of this matter. The flesh (says Tertullian) is fed with the body and blood of Christ, that the soul may be fattened with feeding upon God. How (said Ambrose to Theodosius) will you receive with such hands the holy body of the Lord? With what boldness will you with your mouth partake of the cup of the precious blood? And Jerome says: The priests which make the Thanksgiving, and do distribute the blood of the Lord to the people. Chrysostom: Not as in the old law the priest did eat part, and the people part: but one body is set before all, and one cup. Those things that pertain to the Thanksgiving, are all common between the priest and the people. The selfsame thing does Augustine testify in many places.

But why dispute I about a thing most known? Let all the Greek and Latin writers be read over: such testimonies shall everywhere offer themselves. Neither was this custom grown out of use, while there remained one drop of pureness in the Church. Gregory, whom you may rightly say to have been the last bishop of Rome, teaches that it was kept in his time. What is the blood of the Lamb, you have now learned, not by hearing but by drinking. His blood is poured into the mouths of the faithful. Indeed it yet endured four hundred years after his death, when all things were grown out of kind. For neither was that taken only for a usage, but also for an inviolable law. For then was in force the reverence of God's institution, and they doubted not that it was sacrilege, to sever those things which the Lord had conjoined. For thus says Gelasius. We have found, that some receiving only the portion of the holy body, do abstain from the cup. Let them without doubt, because they seem to be bound with I know not what superstition, either receive the Sacraments whole, or be debarred from them whole. For the dividing of this mystery is not committed without great sacrilege. Those reasons of Cyprian were heard, which truly ought to move a Christian mind. How (says he) do we teach or provoke them to shed their blood in the confessing of Christ, if we deny his blood to them that shall fight? Or how do we make them fit for the cup of Martyrdom, if we do not first in the Church by right of communion admit them to drink the cup of the Lord? Whereas the Canonists do restrain that decree of Gelasius to the priests, that is so childish a cavil that it need not to be confuted.

Thirdly, why did he simply say of the bread, that they should eat: but of the cup, that they should all drink? Even as if he had meant of set purpose to meet with the craft of Satan. Fourthly, if (as they would have it) the Lord vouchsafed to admit to his Supper only sacrificing Priests, what man ever dared call to the partaking of it strangers whom the Lord had excluded? Indeed, and to the partaking of that gift, the power whereof was not in their hands, without any commandment of him which only could give it? Indeed upon confidence of what warrant do they use it at this day to distribute to the common people the sign of the body of Christ, if they have neither commandment nor example of the Lord? Fifthly, did Paul lie, when he said to the Corinthians, that he had received of the Lord that which he had delivered to them? For afterward he declares the thing that he delivered, that all without difference should communicate of both the signs. If Paul received of the Lord, that all should be admitted without difference: let them look of whom they have received, which do drive away almost all the people of God: because they cannot now pretend God to be the author of it with whom there is not yes and no. And yet still for cloaking of such abominations they dare pretend the name of the Church, and with such pretense defend it. As though either these Antichrists were the Church, which so easily tread underfoot, scatter abroad, and destroy the doctrine and institution of Christ: or the Apostolic Church were not the Church, in which the whole force of religion flourished.

After God has once received us into His family — not merely as servants, but as children — He takes upon Himself the role of a most good and caring Father, nourishing us throughout the whole course of our lives. And not content with this alone, it pleased Him to confirm this continual generosity through a pledge. For this purpose He has given His church another sacrament through the hand of His only-begotten Son: a spiritual banquet, in which Christ testifies that He is the living bread by which our souls are fed unto true and blessed immortality. Since the knowledge of so great a mystery is vitally necessary — and since Satan, to rob the church of this inestimable treasure, has long spread confusion and darkness to obscure its light, and has stirred up conflicts to drive simple minds away from tasting this holy food, and has done the same in our own time — I will briefly summarize the matter for those who are newer to it, and then untangle the knots with which Satan has worked to ensnare the world. Bread and wine are signs that represent to us the invisible nourishment we receive from the flesh and blood of Christ. As in baptism God regenerates us and grafts us into the fellowship of His church, adopting us as His own — so in the Lord's Supper He fulfills the role of the careful head of a household, continually providing us food, sustaining and preserving us in the life into which He has begotten us through His word. The only food of our soul is Christ, and therefore the heavenly Father calls us to Him — so that, being refreshed through sharing together in Him, we may continually draw living strength until we attain to heavenly immortality. Since this mystery of Christ's hidden union with the godly is by nature beyond human comprehension, God gives us its figure and image in visible signs suited to our limited capacity. He makes it as certain to us as something seen with our own eyes — confirming it through pledges and tokens — because this familiar analogy penetrates even the slowest minds: souls are fed by Christ just as bread and wine sustain bodily life. So we understand the purpose of this mystical blessing: to assure us that the body of the Lord was once offered for us, so that now we eat it, and in eating it, we feel in ourselves the effective power of that one sacrifice. His blood was once shed for us, and it remains our continual drink. This is what the words of promise attached to the sacrament declare: 'Take, this is my body, which is given for you.' We are commanded to take and eat the body that was once offered for our salvation — so that when we see ourselves as partakers of it, we may confidently know that the life-giving power of His death is at work in us. He also calls the cup 'the covenant in His blood' — for in a certain sense it renews, or rather continues, the covenant He once established with His blood, as often as He holds out to us that holy blood to be received, confirming our faith by it.

Godly souls may gather great fruit of assurance and sweetness from this sacrament — for it testifies that we are knit together into one body with Christ, so that whatever is His we may call our own. From this it follows that we may boldly claim that eternal life is ours, of which He is the heir — and that the kingdom of heaven, which He has now entered, can no more be taken from us than from Him. It follows as well that we can no longer be condemned for our sins, from the guilt of which He has acquitted us by willing them to be charged to Himself as if they were His own. This is the wonderful exchange that in His immeasurable generosity He has made with us: becoming with us the Son of Man, He has made us with Him the sons of God. By coming down to earth, He has opened for us the way to heaven. By taking on our mortality, He has given us His immortality. By taking on our weakness, He has strengthened us with His power. By taking our poverty to Himself, He has conveyed His riches to us. By taking the weight of our unrighteousness — under which we were crushed — He has clothed us with His righteousness.

We have such complete testimony of all these things in this sacrament that we must hold with certainty that Christ is truly given to us — as surely as if He were placed before our eyes and held in our hands. For His word cannot lie to us or deceive us: 'Take, eat, drink. This is my body which is given for you. This is my blood, which is shed for the forgiveness of sins.' When He commands us to take, He signifies that it is ours. When He commands us to eat, He signifies that it is made one substance with us. When He says of the body that it was given for us, and of the blood that it was shed for us, He teaches that both belong not so much to Him as to us — for He took and laid down both not for His own benefit, but for our salvation. It is especially important to note that the chief substance of the sacrament — and in a sense the whole of it — rests on these words: 'which is given for you,' 'which is shed for you.' For it would not greatly benefit us that the body and blood of the Lord are now distributed if they had not once been given up for our redemption and salvation. They are therefore represented under bread and wine so that we may understand they are not only ours, but also appointed for the nourishment of our spiritual life. This is what we said earlier: from the bodily things shown in the sacrament, we are guided by a kind of correspondence to spiritual realities. So when bread is given to us as a sign of Christ's body, we should immediately grasp the parallel: just as bread nourishes, sustains, and maintains the life of our body, so Christ's body is the only food that revives and gives life to our soul. When we see wine set forth as a sign of His blood, we should call to mind what wine does for the body — that these same benefits come to us spiritually through Christ's blood: to cherish, refresh, strengthen, and gladden. For if we properly consider what the giving of His holy body and the shedding of His holy blood have accomplished for us, we will plainly see that what is said about bread and wine, through this correspondence, fits very well with what Christ is to us when He is communicated to us.

Therefore, the chief purpose of the sacrament is not simply to hand Christ's body to us as a physical delivery, but rather this: to seal and confirm the promise by which He declares that His flesh is truly food and His blood is truly drink — by which we are fed unto eternal life — and by which He affirms that He is the bread of life, of which whoever eats will live forever. And in confirming this promise, to direct us to the cross of Christ, where that promise was truly fulfilled in every respect. For we do not eat Christ rightly and with profit except as the crucified Christ — when with a living sense we grasp the effectiveness of His death. When He called Himself the bread of life, He did not borrow that name from the sacrament, as some wrongly interpret it. He was the bread of life because the Father gave Him to us as such, and He fulfilled this in reality: by sharing our human mortality, He made us partakers of His divine immortality; by offering Himself as a sacrifice, He took our curse upon Himself so that He might fill us with blessing; by His death, He destroyed and swallowed up death; by His resurrection, He raised up to glory and incorruption the corruptible flesh He had taken on.

What remains is that all of this be applied to us personally. This happens through the Gospel — and more clearly through the holy Supper — where Christ offers Himself to us with all His blessings, and we receive Him by faith. The sacrament does not cause Christ to begin being the bread of life for the first time. Rather, by calling to remembrance that He was made the bread of life — which we continually eat — and by giving us a taste and experience of that bread, it causes us to feel the power of it. For it promises us that whatever Christ did and suffered was done to give life to us. And that this gift of life is eternal — so that we may be nourished, sustained, and preserved in life without end. For just as Christ would not have been the bread of life had He not been born and died and risen again for us — so He would not remain the bread of life now if the effectiveness and fruit of His birth, death, and resurrection were not an everlasting and immortal thing. Christ has expressed all this very clearly: 'The bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.' By these words He signifies without question that His body should be for us as bread for the spiritual life of the soul — because it was given over to death for our salvation. And it is given to us to eat when He makes us partakers of it through faith. Once He gave it to become bread, when He gave Himself to be crucified for the redemption of the world. He gives it daily when through the word of the Gospel He offers it to us to receive — as the crucified one — and where He seals that offering with the holy mystery of the Supper. And He inwardly fulfills what He outwardly signifies. In all of this we must beware of two errors: on one hand, so undervaluing the signs that we seem to tear them away from the mysteries to which they are in a sense joined; on the other hand, so exalting the signs that we end up obscuring the mysteries themselves. That Christ is the bread of life by which the faithful are nourished unto eternal salvation — no one who has any religion will deny this. But what is not agreed upon by everyone is the manner of partaking in Him. There are those who define eating Christ's flesh and drinking His blood as simply believing in Christ. But I think Christ intended something more definite and deeper in that remarkable discourse where He commends to us the eating of His flesh — namely, that we are truly made alive through genuine participation in Him. He expressed this through the language of eating and drinking so that no one would think the life we receive from Him comes through bare intellectual knowledge alone. For just as it is not the sight but the eating of bread that nourishes the body — so it is necessary for the soul to be truly and fully made a partaker of Christ, so that by His power it may be given life into a spiritual life. At the same time, we confess that there is no other eating but eating by faith, nor can any other be imagined. But here is the difference between my position and theirs: for them, to eat is simply to believe. I say that Christ's flesh is eaten in the act of believing — because by faith He is made ours — and I say that eating is the fruit and effect of faith. Or, to put it more plainly: for them, eating is faith itself. I think eating rather follows from faith. In words the difference may seem small, but in substance it is not small. For though the apostle teaches that Christ dwells in our hearts through faith, no one interprets this dwelling as being faith itself. Everyone understands that something is being expressed here — a remarkable effect of faith, by which the faithful come to have Christ dwelling in them. In the same way, when the Lord called Himself the bread of life, He meant not only to teach that salvation is stored up for us in faith in His death and resurrection — but also that through genuine participation in Him, His life passes into us and becomes ours, just as bread, when taken as food, imparts vitality to the body.

Nor did Augustine — whom they cite as their ally — mean anything different when he wrote that we eat by believing, than to show that this eating is by faith, not by the mouth. This I do not deny — but I add that by faith we embrace Christ not as someone standing at a distance, but as one who makes Himself one with us, so that He may be our head and we His members. I do not entirely reject that way of speaking. I only say it is not a complete account, if the intention is to define what it means to eat Christ's flesh. Augustine himself frequently used this kind of language — as when he says in book three of On Christian Doctrine: 'Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man' — this is a figure teaching that we must participate in the Lord's passion and must sweetly and profitably keep in remembrance that His flesh was crucified and wounded for us. Again, when he says that the three thousand converted at Peter's sermon drank Christ's blood by believing — blood that they had shed by their own cruel actions. But in many other places Augustine honorably sets out this benefit of faith: that through it our souls are refreshed by communion with Christ's flesh no less than our bodies are nourished by the bread we eat. Chrysostom likewise writes in one place that Christ makes us His body not only through faith but also in reality. He does not mean that we obtain this benefit from any source other than faith — only that when faith is named, no one should conceive a bare abstraction. As for those who hold that the Supper is nothing more than a token of outward profession — I pass over them here, since I believe I refuted their error sufficiently when treating the sacraments generally. Let readers simply note this: when the cup is called 'the covenant in His blood,' a promise is expressed that has power to confirm faith. From this it follows that unless we look to God and embrace what He offers, we are not rightly using the holy Supper.

I am also not satisfied with those who — while acknowledging that we have some communion with Christ — when they try to describe it, make us partakers only of the Spirit, with no mention of flesh and blood. As if all those statements meant nothing: that His flesh is truly food, that His blood is truly drink, that no one has life except the one who eats that flesh and drinks that blood — and all the other statements that point in the same direction. Since it is certain that the full communion with Christ extends beyond what they describe — their account being too narrowly confined — I will now try to summarize its full scope before addressing the opposite error of excess. I will have a more extended discussion with those who go to excess — who, according to their own crude understanding, fashion an absurd and carnal manner of eating and drinking, and in doing so strip Christ of His flesh and transform Him into a phantom. Yet I see that I cannot sufficiently grasp so great a mystery even with my own mind — and I freely confess this, so that no one will measure its greatness by the small capacity of my limited understanding. Rather, I urge readers not to confine their minds within these narrow limits, but to strive to rise far higher than I am able to lead them. Even I, whenever I speak of this, feel after saying everything I can that I have said very little compared to the dignity of the subject. And though the mind can grasp more than the tongue can express, even the mind is overcome and overwhelmed by the greatness of the thing. In the end, nothing remains but to break forth in wonder at a mystery that neither the mind can adequately think nor the tongue declare. Nevertheless, in whatever way I am able, I will set forth the substance of my meaning — which I have no doubt is true, and which I trust godly hearts will not reject.

Scripture teaches us first that Christ was from the beginning the life-giving Word of the Father — the fountain and origin of life, from whom all things ever received their existence and life. John therefore calls Him at times the Word of life, and at other times writes that life was in Him — meaning that even then, flowing into all creation, He poured into it the power of breath and life. Yet the same John adds that this life was not openly revealed until the Son of God took on our flesh, giving Himself to be seen with eyes and touched with hands. For though He spread His power through creation even before, man had been estranged from God through sin and had lost the communion of life. Death loomed on every side. For man to recover hope of immortality, it was necessary that he be received into communion with that Word. For what confidence can you draw from hearing that the Word of God — from whom you are completely separated — holds within itself the fullness of life, when in yourself and all around you nothing presents itself but death? But since that fountain of life began to dwell in our flesh, it is no longer hidden far from us — it now delivers itself to us to be partaken of. Indeed, it makes the very flesh in which it dwells capable of bringing life to us, so that through partaking of it we are nourished unto immortality. 'I am the bread of life, who came down from heaven. And the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.' In these words He teaches not only that He is life as the eternal Word of God who came down to us from heaven — but also that in coming down, He poured that same power of life into the flesh He put on, so that from there the communication of life might flow out to us. From this follows what comes next: that His flesh is truly food and His blood is truly drink, on which the faithful are sustained unto eternal life. In this lies a singular comfort for the godly: they now find life within their own flesh. They need not travel far to reach it — it lays itself open before them and offers itself to them. They need only open the embrace of their heart to receive it as it draws near, and they will have it.

Now, though Christ's flesh does not in itself have such great power — for in its original state it was subject to mortality, and even now, endowed with immortality, it does not live by its own power — it is rightly called life-giving, because it is filled with the fullness of life and pours that life into us. This is the sense in which I interpret, with Cyril, Christ's statement: 'As the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son also to have life in Himself.' There Christ is speaking not of what He possessed with the Father from the beginning, but of the gifts with which He was endowed in the very flesh in which He appeared. He is therefore declaring that the fullness of life dwells also in His humanity — so that whoever partakes of His flesh and blood thereby also partakes of life. We can illustrate this with a familiar comparison. Just as water from a spring is sometimes drunk directly, sometimes drawn, sometimes channeled through ditches to water fields — yet the water does not overflow by its own natural abundance into all these uses, but is continually supplied by the spring itself, which yields a never-ending store — so Christ's flesh is like a rich and inexhaustible fountain, pouring into us the life that springs from the Godhead itself into that flesh. Who then does not see that communion with the flesh and blood of Christ is necessary for all who aspire to heavenly life? This is the point of the apostle's statement that the church is the body of Christ and His fullness, and that He is the head from whom the whole body, joined and held together by its joints, grows — and that our bodies are members of Christ. All of this, we understand, cannot come to pass unless He wholly cleaves to us in Spirit and body. But He has described that closest fellowship in which we are joined to His flesh with an even more glorious description, when He said that we are members of His body and of His bone and of His flesh. And to make clear that this surpasses all words, He concludes with an exclamation: 'This is a great mystery.' It would therefore be the height of madness to deny any communion of the faithful with the flesh and blood of the Lord — a communion which the apostle declares to be so great that he preferred to wonder at it than to attempt to express it.

To summarize: our souls are fed by the flesh and blood of Christ just as bread and wine sustain and maintain bodily life. Otherwise the correspondence of the sign would mean nothing — unless souls truly find their nourishment in Christ. And this cannot happen unless Christ truly grows into one with us, refreshing us through the eating of His flesh and drinking of His blood. Even if it seems incredible that Christ's flesh, at such a great distance of place, should reach us to be our food — let us remember how far the secret power of the Spirit surpasses all our senses, and how foolish it is to try to measure His immeasurability by our own measure. Therefore, what our minds cannot comprehend, let faith grasp: that the Spirit truly unites what is spatially separated. Now this same holy communion of His body and blood — by which Christ pours His life into us as if driving it into our very bones and marrow — He also testifies and seals in the Supper. Not by setting before us an empty or useless sign, but by bringing there the effective working of His Spirit, through which He fulfills what He promises. Indeed, He offers and delivers the thing signified to all who sit at that spiritual banquet — though it is received with fruit only by those who welcome such great generosity with true faith and gratitude. In this sense the apostle said that the bread we break is the communion of the body of Christ, and that the cup we consecrate through the word and prayers is the communion of His blood. No one should object that this is a figure of speech in which the name of the thing signified is transferred to the sign. I grant that the breaking of bread is a sign, not the thing itself. But with that admitted, we rightly conclude from the delivery of the sign that the thing itself is delivered. For unless a person is willing to call God a deceiver, he cannot possibly say that God sets before us an empty sign. Therefore, if through the breaking of bread the Lord truly represents partaking of His body, it must be beyond doubt that He truly performs and delivers it. This is a rule the godly should always hold: as often as they see the signs ordained by the Lord, they should fully believe that the reality of the thing signified is present. For why else would the Lord place the sign of His body in your hand, except to assure you of true participation in it? If it is true that a visible sign is given to seal the gift of an invisible reality — then when we receive the sign of the body, let us believe with no less certainty that the body itself is also given to us.

I therefore affirm — and this has always been the teaching of the church, and is what all who think rightly teach today — that the holy mystery of the Supper consists of two things: the bodily signs, which are set before our eyes to represent invisible realities according to the capacity of our weakness; and the spiritual truth, which is both figured and delivered through those signs. When I want to explain this clearly, I typically distinguish three things: the signification, the substance that is attached to the signification, and the power or effect that follows from both. The signification consists in the promises, which are in a sense wrapped together with the sign. The substance or matter I call Christ with His death and resurrection. By effect I mean redemption, righteousness, sanctification, and eternal life — and whatever other benefits Christ brings us. Now, though all of these have to do with faith, I leave no room for the objection that when I say Christ is received by faith, I mean He is merely conceived in the understanding or imagination. The promises offer Him not so that we might remain in mere sight and bare knowledge, but so that we might enjoy true communion with Him. Indeed, I do not see how anyone can have confidence that he has redemption and righteousness in Christ's cross, and life in His death, unless it rests primarily on true communion with Christ Himself. For these good things would not come to us unless Christ first made Himself ours. I therefore affirm that in the mystery of the Supper, through the signs of bread and wine, Christ is truly delivered to us — indeed His body and blood, in which He accomplished all obedience to obtain righteousness for us — so that first we may grow into one body with Him, and then, being made partakers of His substance, we may also feel His power in the sharing of all His blessings.

Now I turn to the excessive distortions that superstition has introduced. Here Satan has played with remarkable cleverness — drawing men's minds away from heaven to fill them with a perverse error, as though Christ were fastened to the element of bread. First, we must not imagine the kind of presence of Christ in the sacrament that the craftsmen of Rome's papal court have invented — as though the body of Christ were made locally present to be handled with hands, crushed with teeth, and swallowed with the mouth. This is the very form of recantation that Pope Nicolas composed for Berengarius as a public demonstration of his repentance — written in terms so monstrous that even the author of the gloss cried out that readers are in danger of sucking a heresy worse than Berengarius's own if they do not read carefully. This appears in the second distinction, in the chapter beginning 'Ego Berengarius.' Peter Lombard, though he labors to excuse the absurdity, ultimately leans toward the same position. We have no doubt that Christ's body, in accordance with the permanent nature of a human body, has its limits — it is held in heaven, into which it was once received, until He returns in judgment. Therefore to drag it back under these corruptible elements, or to imagine it present everywhere, we count as entirely unlawful. Nor is any such thing necessary for us to enjoy communion with Him. The Lord grants us this benefit through His Spirit — that we are made one with Him in body, Spirit, and soul. The bond of this union is the Spirit of Christ. Through that bond we are joined together, and through it — as through a kind of channel — whatever Christ is and has is conveyed to us. For if we see the sun shining on the earth and, by its rays, in a certain sense extending its substance to engender, nourish, and quicken the fruits of the earth — why should the extending of the beams of Christ's Spirit be insufficient to convey to us the communion of His flesh and blood? Scripture therefore, when it speaks of our participation with Christ, refers the whole power of it to the Spirit. One passage will suffice in place of many: Paul in Romans 8 says that Christ dwells in us through His Spirit. Yet by this he does not take away the communion of Christ's flesh and blood that we are now speaking of — but teaches that the Spirit alone works so that we possess the whole Christ and have Him dwelling in us.

The scholastic theologians thought more modestly — restrained by horror at such crude impiety. Yet even they did nothing but deceive with more refined tricks. They grant that Christ is not contained in the sacrament by local confinement or in a bodily manner — but then they invent a mode of presence that they themselves do not understand and cannot explain to others. It amounts to this: Christ must be sought in what they call the form of bread. For consider what this actually means. When they say the substance of bread is turned into Christ, do they not bind Him to the whiteness they leave behind? They say He is so contained in the sacrament that He remains in heaven — and that they designate no presence other than one of relationship. But whatever words they use to disguise this with a semblance of reason, the conclusion is always the same: through consecration, what was bread becomes Christ, and from that point forward, Christ lies hidden under the appearance of bread. They are not ashamed to say this in plain words. Lombard's own words are: the body of Christ, which is itself visible, when the consecration is complete lies hidden and is covered under the form of bread. So the form of bread is nothing more than a mask that hides Christ's flesh from the eyes. We need not look far to understand what trap they intended to set with these words — the thing itself makes it plain. For we can see what vast superstition has held captive — not only common people but even the greatest leaders — in the papal churches for certain past ages and still today. Having little concern for true faith — through which alone we both enter fellowship with Christ and cling to Him — as long as they have the carnal presence they have devised apart from the word, they think they have Christ present enough. In sum, we see that through this clever subtlety the result has been that bread is taken for God.

From this source came the invented doctrine of transubstantiation — which today they defend more fiercely than any other article of their faith. The original advocates of local presence could not resolve how the body of Christ might be united with the substance of bread without running into numerous absurdities. They were therefore driven by necessity to invent the idea that bread is converted into the body — not that the body is literally made from bread, but that Christ, in order to conceal Himself under the outward form, reduces the substance of bread to nothing. It is astounding that they fell into such ignorance — indeed, such senseless dullness — that they put forward this monstrosity despite both Scripture and the unanimous witness of the ancient church working against them. I grant that some of the ancient writers occasionally used the word 'conversion' — but not to mean that the substance of the outward signs is destroyed. They used it to indicate that bread dedicated to the mystery differs greatly from ordinary bread and has become something different in purpose and significance. But everywhere and without exception they plainly declare that the holy Supper consists of two parts — an earthly part and a heavenly part — and the earthly part they consistently explain to be bread and wine. Whatever these defenders claim, it is plain that they have no support from the ancient writers for this doctrine — support they are so accustomed to invoke against the clear word of God. The doctrine of transubstantiation is not ancient. It was unknown not only in those better ages when purer religious doctrine flourished, but even in times when that purity had already been considerably corrupted. None of the ancient writers fails to confess in plain terms that the holy signs in the Supper are bread and wine — though, as we said, they sometimes use elevated language to honor the dignity of the mystery. When they say a secret conversion takes place in the consecration — so that what is present is now other than ordinary bread and wine — I have already explained that they do not mean the things themselves are reduced to nothing, but only that they are now to be regarded differently from common food appointed merely to fill the stomach, since through them the spiritual food and drink of the soul is given to us. This we do not deny. But if there is a conversion, our opponents say, then one thing must be made into another. If they mean that something is made which was not there before, I agree. But if they want to apply this to their own invented scheme, let them answer me: what change do they think takes place in baptism? The fathers there also speak of a remarkable conversion — saying that from a corruptible element is made a spiritual washing of the soul — yet none of them denies that water remains. 'But,' they say, 'there is nothing in baptism like the words in the Supper: this is my body.' As if the question were about those words — which have a clear enough meaning — and not rather about the word 'conversion,' which should carry no more meaning in the Supper than in baptism. So farewell to these hair-splitting word games, which do nothing except expose the emptiness of those who use them. The correspondence between sign and reality would not hold unless the truth represented there had a living image in the outward sign. Christ's will was to testify through the outward sign that His flesh is food. If He set before us only an imaginary phantom of bread — not real bread — where would the parallel be that leads us from the visible to the invisible? For if everything must fit together, the signification can extend no further than feeding us on the appearance of Christ's flesh. Just as in baptism — if the form of water were deceiving our eyes rather than being real water — it would not be a reliable pledge of our washing. Instead, we would be given an occasion for doubt by that deceptive illusion. The nature of the sacrament is therefore overthrown unless, in the manner of signifying, the earthly sign corresponds to the heavenly reality. And so we lose the truth of this mystery unless real bread represents to us the real body of Christ. To say it once more: since the Supper is nothing other than a visible testimony of the promise in John 6 — that Christ is the bread of life who came down from heaven — visible bread must be used as the means by which that spiritual bread is represented. Otherwise we lose all the benefit that God in His tenderness grants through this to sustain our weakness. And by what reasoning would Paul conclude that all of us who partake together of one bread are one body and one bread — if there remained only an imaginary form and not the natural reality of bread? (1 Corinthians 10:17)

They could never have been so thoroughly deceived by Satan's tricks had they not already been captured by this error — that the body of Christ, enclosed under the bread, is sent down into the stomach through the physical mouth. The cause of such a crude imagination was that consecration meant to them something like a magical incantation. They were ignorant of this principle: that bread is a sacrament only for those to whom the word is directed. Just as the water of baptism is not changed in itself — but as soon as the promise is attached to it, it begins to be for us what it was not before — so it is with bread. A parallel sacrament makes this clearer. The water that sprang from the rock in the desert was for the fathers a token and sign of the same thing that wine represents to us in the Supper — for Paul teaches they drank the same spiritual drink. But it was also ordinary drinking water for the people's animals and livestock. From this it is easily concluded that in earthly elements when applied to a spiritual use, no other change takes place than in relation to people — insofar as the elements become seals of the promises for them. Moreover, since God's purpose is — as I often say — to lift us up to Himself by means suited to our nature, those who call us to Christ lurking invisibly under bread wickedly frustrate that purpose. For it is impossible for a mind, unable to escape the limitations of place, to reach Christ who is above the heavens. What nature denied them, they tried to compensate for with a remedy more harmful still: remaining on earth, we would have no need of Christ's heavenly nearness. That is the necessity that drove them to transform Christ's body in their theology. In Bernard's time, though a harsher way of speaking had come into use, transubstantiation was not yet known. And in all earlier ages this comparison was universally on every man's lips: that in this mystery a spiritual reality is joined together with the bread and wine. As for their answer about the words — they think it clever, but it is entirely beside the point. Moses's rod turned into a serpent, they say — yet though it received the name of a serpent, it still retained the old name and is called a rod. So in their view it is equally reasonable that though the bread passes into a new substance, it may still — loosely but not unfittingly — be called what it appears to the eyes. But what resemblance do they find between a clear miracle and their invented illusion, of which no eye on earth is witness? The magicians had deceived the Egyptians with their tricks, persuading them they had divine power to alter the order of nature. Moses came forward, drove away all their deceptions, and showed that the invincible power of God was on his side — for his own rod swallowed all the rest. But since that transformation was visible to the eyes, as we have said, it has nothing to do with the present question. And shortly afterward, the rod visibly returned to its original form. Furthermore, it is not even clear whether that sudden transformation was one of substance or not. Also, the connection to the magicians' rods must be considered: the prophet would not call them serpents, precisely to avoid suggesting a real transformation had occurred — since those deceivers had done nothing but cast an illusion before the eyes of the observers. What resemblance does any of this have to these statements: 'The bread which we break,' 'As often as you eat this bread,' 'They devoted themselves to the breaking of bread,' and similar expressions? It is certain that in the case of the magicians, only their eyes were deceived by enchantment. As for Moses, the matter is less clear — for it was no harder for God through Moses to make a serpent from a rod and a rod from a serpent than to clothe angels with bodily forms and unclothe them again shortly after. If the nature of this sacramental mystery were the same or similar, their solution might have some color of credibility. Let it remain certain: the promise that Christ's flesh is truly our food in the Supper cannot be truly or properly fulfilled unless the real substance of the outward sign corresponds to it. And as one error breeds another, the passage from Jeremiah is so foolishly twisted to prove transubstantiation that I am reluctant even to rehearse it. The prophet complained that wood was put in his bread — meaning that through his enemies' cruelty, his food was made bitter. David uses a similar figure when he mourns that his food was corrupted with gall and his drink with vinegar. These men would have it that Christ's body was allegorically fastened to the cross. Some of the ancient fathers thought so. As though we ought not rather to overlook their ignorance and spare their embarrassment, than to add shamelessness by forcing them still to fight as though they were opponents of the natural meaning of the prophet.

Others, seeing that the correspondence between the sign and the thing signified cannot be overthrown without the truth of the mystery collapsing, concede that the bread of the Supper is truly a substance of an earthly and corruptible element, unchanged in itself — but claim that it has the body of Christ enclosed beneath it. If they meant by this that when bread is delivered in the mystery the delivery of the body is joined to it — because the reality is inseparable from the sign — I would not have much quarrel with them. But since they place the body in the bread and invent for it a kind of everywhere-presence contrary to its nature — and in saying 'under the bread' they mean it lies there hidden — it is necessary to briefly draw these subtleties out of their hiding places. My full intention is not yet to address this whole point, but only to lay the foundations for the discussion that will follow shortly in its proper place. They insist the body of Christ must be invisible and immeasurable so that it can lie hidden under the bread — for they think they cannot share in Him unless He descends into the bread. But they fail to grasp the manner of His descending — which is how He lifts us upward to Himself. They dress the idea up in every available argument, but when all is said, it is plain that they rest on a local presence of Christ. Where does this come from? Simply from the fact that they cannot conceive of any sharing in His flesh and blood except one that consists of physical proximity, local contact, or some form of gross enclosure.

And to stubbornly defend an error rashly adopted, some of them do not hesitate to say that Christ's flesh never had any measurements other than the full breadth of heaven and earth. When He was born as a child from the womb, when He grew, when He was stretched out on the cross, when He was enclosed in the tomb — all this was done by a kind of special arrangement so that He could be born, die, and fulfill the other duties of human existence. When after His resurrection He was seen in His familiar bodily form, when He was taken up to heaven, when after His ascension He appeared to Stephen and Paul — this too was done by the same arrangement, so that it might be visible to human eyes that He was established as king in heaven. What is this but to resurrect Marcion from hell? For no one can doubt that Christ's body was a phantom or a phantasm if He was in such a condition. Some slip away more subtly by saying that the body given in the sacrament is glorified and immortal, and therefore it is no absurdity if it is contained in many places, or in no place, or in no fixed form, under the sacrament. But I ask: what kind of body did Christ give to the disciples on the night before He suffered? Do not the words indicate that He gave the same mortal body, which was about to be handed over to death shortly after? 'But He had already shown His glory to three disciples before this,' they say. True — but His intention was to give them a brief taste of His immortal glory for that moment. Even then they saw not two different bodies but the one body Christ bore, adorned with new glory. But when He distributed His body at the first Supper, the moment was already approaching when He, stricken by God and humbled, would lie in disgrace like a leper — far from displaying the glory of His resurrection. And what a wide door this opens to Marcion — if Christ's body was mortal and lowly in one place, yet immortal and glorious in another? Moreover, if their view holds, this same thing happens every day — for they are forced to admit that the body of Christ, which is visible in itself, lies hidden invisibly under the sign of bread. And yet those who vomit out such absurdities are so unashamed that they ferociously attack us without provocation, merely because we refuse to agree with them.

If they insist on fastening the body and blood of the Lord to bread and wine, one must necessarily be separated from the other. For since the bread is delivered separately from the cup, the body united to the bread must of necessity be divided from the blood enclosed in the cup. When they affirm that the body is in the bread and the blood is in the cup, and the bread and wine are spatially separated from each other, they cannot escape the conclusion that the body is separated from the blood. Their usual dodge — claiming that by what they call 'accompaniment,' the blood is present with the body and the body with the blood — is far too weak, since the signs in which they are enclosed are clearly separated. But if with our eyes and minds we are lifted up to heaven — seeking Christ there in the glory of His kingdom, as the signs draw us to Him whole — then under the sign of bread we shall be fed with His body, and under the sign of wine we shall separately drink His blood, so that at last we may enjoy Him whole. For although He has taken His flesh away from us and in His body has ascended into heaven, He nonetheless sits at the right hand of the Father — that is, He reigns in the power, majesty, and glory of the Father. This kingdom is bounded by no limits of place, enclosed by no measurements — so that Christ may display His power wherever He pleases, in heaven and on earth; so that He may show Himself present in power and strength; so that He may always be at hand with those who are His, breathing His life into them, living in them, strengthening them, giving them life, keeping them safe — as surely as if He were present in body. And finally, so that He may feed them with His own body, whose communion He pours into them by the power of His Spirit. In this manner the body and blood of Christ is delivered to us in the sacrament.

We must affirm a presence of Christ in the Supper that does not fasten Him to the element of bread, does not enclose Him in the bread, does not in any way confine or circumscribe Him — for all these things plainly diminish His heavenly glory. It must be a presence that does not take away His proper dimensions, does not simultaneously stretch Him into many places at once, and does not ascribe to Him an unlimited immensity spread throughout heaven and earth — for these things plainly contradict the truth of His human nature. Let us never allow these two principles to be taken from us. The first: nothing must be taken away from Christ's glory — which happens whenever He is brought under the corruptible elements of this world or bound to any earthly creature. The second: nothing must be falsely attributed to His body that does not fit the nature of a true man — which happens whenever it is said to be infinite, or is placed in many locations at once. With these absurdities set aside, I gladly receive whatever may help to express the true and substantial communication of the body and blood of the Lord — the communication that is delivered to the faithful under the holy signs of the Supper — provided it is understood that the faithful do not receive it merely in imagination or by mental conception, but truly enjoy it as the food of eternal life. There is no reason whatever that this teaching should be so hated by the world and so unfairly stripped of its defense by unjust verdicts — none except that the devil has maddened people's minds with his horrible bewitchment. What we teach agrees in every point with Scripture. It contains no absurdity, no obscurity, no ambiguity. It is consistent with true godliness and sound edification. It has nothing offensive in it — except that in certain past ages, when the ignorance and barbarism of the scholastics dominated the church, this clear light and open truth was unjustly suppressed. Yet because Satan today is also working through contentious spirits to smear it with every slander and reproach he can — bending himself to no other task with greater effort — it is worth defending and rescuing it more carefully.

Before going further, we must examine the actual institution of Christ — since the chief objection our opponents raise is that we depart from Christ's words. To clear ourselves of the false charge of malice they lay on us, we should begin with an exposition of those words. Three evangelists and Paul recount that Christ took bread, gave thanks, broke it, gave it to His disciples, and said: 'Take, eat: this is my body, which is given' — or broken — 'for you.' Of the cup, Matthew and Mark say: 'This cup is the blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the forgiveness of sins.' Paul and Luke say: 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood.' The defenders of transubstantiation claim the pronoun 'this' refers to the form of bread — because the consecration is performed over the whole sentence and there is no visible substance that can be pointed to. But if they are so scrupulously attached to Christ's exact words — since He testified that what He placed in the disciples' hands was His body — their own invention, that what was bread is now the body, is in fact the furthest thing from the natural meaning of those words. What Christ took in His hands and gave to the apostles He calls His body. But He took bread. Who cannot see that bread is still being pointed to? There is therefore no greater absurdity than to redirect to the 'form' what is said about the bread. Others who interpret 'is' as 'to be transubstantiated' resort to a more forced and violently twisted gloss. There is therefore no reason for them to pretend they are moved by reverence for the words. It was unheard of in any language that the word 'is' should be taken to mean 'to be transformed into another thing.' As for those who leave the bread in the Supper while affirming that the body of Christ is there — they differ greatly among themselves. The more moderate among them, though they insist strictly on the letter 'This is my body,' still swerve from their own strictness and say it amounts to the same as saying that the body of Christ is 'with bread,' 'in bread,' and 'under bread.' We have already touched on the substance of what they assert, and will shortly have occasion to say more. For now I dispute only about the words — by which they claim to be constrained so they cannot admit bread to be called the body, since it is merely a sign of the body. But if they shun all figures, why do they leap from Christ's plain statement to their own expressions that differ from it entirely? For there is a great difference between 'bread is the body' and 'the body is with bread.' Since they saw it was impossible to maintain the simple proposition that bread is the body, they have tried to escape through these roundabout expressions. Some bolder advocates do not hesitate to affirm that even in the literal sense, bread is the body — and by this they truly prove themselves to be wooden literalists. If it is objected that bread is therefore Christ, and is God — they will deny this, because it is not stated in Christ's words. But their denial gains nothing — since all agree that whole Christ is offered to us in the Supper. And it is an intolerable blasphemy to say without figure that a frail and corruptible element is Christ. Now I ask them: are these two propositions equivalent? 'Christ is the Son of God' and 'bread is the body of Christ.' If they grant they are different — which we will compel them to grant, willing or not — let them explain where the difference lies. I think they will give no other answer than that the bread is called the body in a sacramental sense. From which it follows that Christ's words do not follow the common rule and should not be judged by ordinary grammar. I also ask all the rigid, inflexible defenders of the letter: when Luke and Paul call the cup 'the covenant in the blood,' do they not express the same thing as in the first part, where they call bread the body? The same reverence applies to both parts of the mystery. And because brevity is obscure, more words give a clearer meaning. So whenever they affirm in one statement that the bread is the body, I will supply from the fuller statement the fitting interpretation: that it is the covenant in the body. For why should we need any more faithful or reliable interpreter than Paul and Luke? Nor is my intent to diminish anything from the communion of Christ's body that I have already affirmed — only to refute the foolish stubbornness with which they so hatefully quarrel about words. I understand, on the authority of Paul and Luke, that the bread is the body of Christ because it is the covenant in the body. If they fight against this, they fight not with me but with the Spirit of God. However much they protest that reverence for Christ's words keeps them from treating plain statements figuratively, this is not a sufficient excuse for rejecting all the arguments we bring to the contrary. Meanwhile, as I have already noted, it is important to grasp what this is: the covenant in the body and blood of Christ. For the covenant established by the sacrifice of death would not benefit us unless it were accompanied by that secret communion whereby we grow into one with Christ.

We must therefore conclude: because of the close relationship between the things signified and their signs, the name of the thing was given to the sign — figuratively, but not without a most fitting correspondence. I will set aside allegories and parables so that no one can accuse me of grasping for loopholes and wandering from the point. What I am describing is a figure of speech called metonymy — the transfer of a name — which is commonly used in Scripture whenever mysteries are discussed. There is no other way to understand these statements: that circumcision is the covenant, that the lamb is the Passover, that the sacrifices of the law are expiations, that the rock from which water flowed in the desert was Christ — unless you take them as involving a transfer of names. Nor are names transferred only from the higher to the lower. The reverse also occurs — the name of the visible sign is given to the thing signified: as when God is said to have appeared to Moses in the bush, when the ark of the covenant is called God and the face of God, and when the dove is called the Holy Spirit. For even though the sign differs in substance from the thing signified — since the thing signified is spiritual and heavenly, while the sign is bodily and visible — why should the name of the thing not rightly belong to the sign? For the sign does not merely figure the reality it is solemnly appointed to represent, as though it were a bare and empty token — it truly delivers that reality. If signs devised by human beings — which are more like images of absent things than marks of things present, and which often deceptively shadow what is absent — are nonetheless sometimes adorned with the names of those things: then signs ordained by God, which always carry a sure and truthful signification and have the truth joined to them, have far greater reason to borrow the names of what they signify. The likeness and nearness of sign to thing is therefore so close that their names are easily interchangeable. Let our opponents therefore stop piling up their tasteless mockeries and calling us 'tropists,' as if we expound the sacramental manner of speaking in some unheard-of way. We explain it according to the common usage of Scripture. Because the sacraments share many things in common, they all share in this transfer of names. Therefore, as the apostle teaches that the rock from which spiritual drink flowed for the Israelites was Christ — because it was a visible sign under which that spiritual drink was truly present, though not discernible to the eye — so bread today is called the body of Christ, because it is a sign through which the Lord offers us the true eating of His body. Augustine thought and said the same, lest anyone dismiss this as a new invention. He writes: 'If sacraments did not have a certain likeness to the things of which they are sacraments, they would not be sacraments at all. And from this likeness they often take the names of those things. So the sacrament of the body of Christ is, in a certain manner, the body of Christ; the sacrament of the blood of Christ is the blood of Christ; the sacrament of faith is faith.' There are many similar passages in him, but this one is enough — except that readers should be informed that Augustine teaches the same in his letter to Enodius. The attempt to dismiss this by saying that when Augustine speaks of metonymy in mysteries, he makes no mention of the Supper is a feeble evasion. If that kind of evasion were valid, we could never reason from the general to the particular — it would be like arguing that because every sentient creature has the power of movement, therefore an ox and a horse have the power of movement, and treating that as invalid. In any case, the matter is settled by Augustine's own words elsewhere, where he says that Christ did not hesitate to call the sign of His body His body. This appears Against the Manichaean Adimantus, chapter 12. And in another place, commenting on Psalm 3, he writes: 'Marvelous is the patience of Christ, who received Judas to the banquet in which He committed and delivered to His disciples the figure of His body and blood.'

But if someone, ignoring all the rest, takes his stand on only these words — 'This is' — as though this mystery were governed by different rules than everything else, the solution is easy. They argue that the force of the verb 'is' is so strong that it admits no figure. But if we grant this: even in Paul's words the same verb appears — where he calls bread 'the communion of the body of Christ.' But communion is something different from the body itself. Indeed, whenever sacraments are discussed, we find the same construction used. 'This shall be to you a covenant with me.' 'This lamb shall be to you a Passover.' To mention just one more: when Paul says the rock was Christ, why do they treat the verb 'is' in that passage as less forceful than in Christ's own words? Let them also explain what force the verb carries in John's statement 'the Holy Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified.' For if they hold to their rule, the eternal essence of the Holy Spirit would be destroyed — as if He had no existence until the ascension of Christ. Finally, let them explain what Paul means when he says that baptism is 'the washing of regeneration and renewal' — which is clearly not profitable for everyone who receives it. But nothing confutes them more effectively than Paul's statement that 'the church is Christ' — for in drawing an analogy from the human body, he adds 'so is Christ,' meaning by this the only-begotten Son of God, not in Himself but in His members. I believe I have now shown, for those of sound and unbiased judgment, how repugnant our enemies' slanders are — when they spread the claim that we withhold trust from Christ's words, which we embrace no less obediently than they do, and weigh with greater reverence. Their careless negligence shows that they care little what Christ meant, so long as they have a shield to defend their stubbornness. Our earnest inquiry, by contrast, testifies to how greatly we esteem Christ's authority. They maliciously spread abroad that natural human reason keeps us from believing what Christ spoke with His own holy mouth. But I have already made clear in large part how false that slander is, and it will become even clearer going forward. Nothing keeps us from believing Christ when He speaks, nor from obeying the moment He indicates His will. The only question is whether it is unlawful to inquire into the natural meaning of His words.

These self-styled scholars, to appear well educated, forbid any departure from the literal text, however slight. But when Scripture calls God a man of war, I have no hesitation — seeing that the expression, taken literally, would be far too crude — in understanding it as a comparison drawn from human experience. It was on precisely this basis that the Anthropomorphites in ancient times troubled the orthodox fathers, seizing on statements like 'the eyes of God see,' 'it reached His ears,' 'His hand stretched out,' 'the earth is His footstool' — and crying out that the fathers were stripping God of the body Scripture assigns to Him. If that principle is accepted, outrageous barbarousness will overwhelm every light of faith. For what monstrous absurdities might fanatical minds not extract, if they are permitted to cite any small phrase to establish their opinions? Their objection — that it is unlikely Christ would have spoken in riddles when He was preparing singular comfort for His apostles in the face of adversity — actually supports our position. For if it had not occurred to the apostles that bread was figuratively called the body because it was the sign of the body, they would without doubt have been shocked and bewildered by something so monstrous. The Gospel of John records that at almost that very same time they were confused and troubled by each small difficulty. Men who were arguing among themselves about how Christ would go to the Father, raising questions about how He would leave the world, who understood nothing of what was said about the heavenly Father until they would see Him — how would they have so easily believed what all reason refuses: that Christ was sitting before them at the table and at the same time was invisibly enclosed under the bread? The fact that they ate the bread without hesitation and without confusion shows that they understood Christ's words in the same sense we do — because they remembered what ought not to seem strange in mysteries: that the name of the thing signified is transferred to the sign. So to the disciples, as to us, it was a clear and certain comfort, entangled in no riddle. The only reason some depart from our interpretation is that the devil's enchantment has blinded them — making them fabricate darkness for themselves where the plain use of a fitting figure presents itself. Moreover, if we press the words precisely, Christ would have wrongly said something separately about the bread that differs from what He says about the cup. He calls the bread His body. He calls the wine His blood. Either this is a confused and meaningless repetition, or it is a division that separates the body from the blood. By the same logic it would be just as true to say of the cup 'This is my body' as of the bread itself — and equally valid to say the bread is the blood. If they answer that we must consider the purpose for which the signs were ordained — I grant it. But they will not be able to escape the absurdity that their error entails: that the bread is the blood and the wine is the body. I do not know what to make of their claiming that bread and body are different things, yet affirming that the one is properly and literally said of the other without any figure — as if someone were to say that a garment is indeed different from a person, yet is properly called a person. Meanwhile, as if their victory depended on stubbornness and insults, they cry that Christ is accused of lying if any interpretation of the words is sought. It will be easy to show readers how unjust a wrong these word-catchers do us when they fill simple minds with the notion that we withhold trust from Christ's words — when we have shown that they violently pervert and confuse those words, while we expound them faithfully and rightly.

But this slander cannot be fully cleared away until another charge is also answered. They spread the claim that we are so bound to natural reason that we grant no more to the power of God than the order of nature permits and common sense teaches. Against such malicious slanders I appeal to the very doctrine I have set forth — which shows plainly enough that I do not measure this mystery by the proportion of human reason, nor make it subject to the laws of nature. Tell me: have we learned from natural philosophy that Christ feeds our souls from heaven with His flesh, as our bodies are nourished with bread and wine? From where does this power come to flesh, that it can give life? Everyone will say that this does not happen naturally. It will please human reason no more to be told that Christ's flesh reaches to us to become our food. In short, whoever has truly tasted our doctrine will be filled with wonder at the secret power of God. But these zealous men invent for themselves a miracle that, when taken away, leaves God himself to vanish along with His power. I urge readers once again to weigh carefully what our doctrine actually teaches — whether it rests on common sense, or whether it climbs with the wings of faith above the world and into the heavens. We say that Christ, through both the outward sign and His Spirit, descends to us so that He may truly give life to our souls with the substance of His flesh and blood. Whoever does not see that these few words contain many miracles is more than senseless — for nothing is more contrary to nature than that souls should draw spiritual and heavenly life from flesh that had its origin in the earth and was subject to death. Nothing is more incredible than that things separated by the whole expanse of heaven and earth should not only be joined together across that distance, but so united that souls receive nourishment from Christ's flesh. Let these contentious men stop cultivating hatred toward us with this filthy slander — as if we enviously limit the immeasurable power of God. They either err too foolishly or lie too maliciously. The question here is not what God could do, but what He willed to do. We affirm that what pleased Him is done. And what pleased Him was that Christ should be made like His brothers in all things, except sin. What kind of thing is our flesh? Is it not something that has a certain measure, that is contained in space, that can be touched, that can be seen? And why, they ask, might God not make the same flesh occupy many different places, be contained in no place, be without measure or form? You madman — why do you demand that the power of God make flesh simultaneously to be and not to be flesh? That is like demanding that He make light at the same moment to be both light and darkness. But He wills that light be light, darkness be darkness, and flesh be flesh. He will indeed, when it pleases Him, turn darkness into light and light into darkness. But when you require that light and darkness not differ — what are you doing but overturning the order of God's wisdom? Therefore flesh must be flesh, and spirit must be spirit — each thing in the law and condition God created it for. And such is the condition of flesh: it must exist in one — a specific — place, and consist of its proper measure and form. Christ took flesh on these terms — and, as Augustine testifies, He has given it incorruption and glory, but He has not taken from it its nature and reality.

They answer that they have the word, by which God's will is made plain — provided, that is, that the gift of interpretation that sheds light on the word is banished from the church. I grant that they have the word — but the same kind of word the Anthropomorphites had when they gave God a body, the same kind Marcion and the Manicheans had when they invented a heavenly or phantasmal body for Christ. They cited as proof: 'The first Adam was from the earth, earthy; the second Adam is from heaven, heavenly.' And again: 'Christ humbled Himself, taking the form of a servant, and was found in likeness as a man.' But the crude carnalists think there is no power of God unless all the order of nature is overturned by the monster they have fashioned in their imaginations — which is actually a more severe limitation of God, since we try to define what He can do by our own invented ideas. For from which word have they derived that the body of Christ is visible in heaven but lurks invisibly on earth under countless small pieces of bread? They will say that necessity requires this — that the body of Christ must be given in the Supper. Indeed — because they were pleased to draw a fleshly, physical eating from the words of Christ, their own preconceived judgment swept them away and drove them by necessity to coin this subtlety, which all of Scripture cries out against. As for the claim that we diminish God's power — this is false. Our doctrine in fact honors that power most admirably. But since they constantly accuse us of robbing God of His honor when we refuse what is hard to believe according to common sense — even though they claim it has been promised by Christ's own mouth — I give again the same answer as before: in the mysteries of faith we do not consult common sense. We receive doctrine from heaven with quiet willingness to learn and with the meekness James commends. But they err perniciously in this very point. I do not deny that we follow a useful moderation. They hear the words 'This is my body' and immediately imagine a miracle utterly foreign to His meaning. Then, when foul absurdities arise from their invented scheme — because they have already rushed headlong into their own snares — they plunge themselves into the bottomless depths of God's omnipotence to quench the light of truth. From this comes that proud dogmatism: 'We will not inquire how Christ lies hidden under the bread — we are content with His words, This is my body.' We, however — as we do throughout all of Scripture — study with no less obedience than care to arrive at a sound understanding of this passage. We do not rashly and indiscriminately seize the first thing that comes to mind. Instead, through diligent reflection, we embrace the meaning the Spirit of God provides — and standing on it, we look down from above on whatever earthly wisdom is set against it. Indeed, we take our own minds captive so that they dare not so much as quibble with a single word against it. We humble them so they do not dare rise up against it. From this came our interpretation of Christ's words — an interpretation shown to be common to all sacraments throughout Scripture, as everyone who has been even moderately trained in Scripture knows. Nor do we think it lawful for us — following the example of the holy virgin — to inquire how a difficult thing can be done.

Since nothing will more confirm the faith of the godly than knowing that the doctrine we have taught is drawn from God's word and stands on its authority, I will demonstrate this as briefly as I can. Since His resurrection, it is not Aristotle but the Holy Spirit who teaches that Christ's body is limited in location and is held in heaven until the last day. I am well aware that they boldly mock the passages cited for this purpose. Whenever Christ says He will depart and leave the world, they answer that this departure means nothing more than a change from His mortal condition. But if that were so, Christ would not have needed to send the Holy Spirit to supply — as they call it — what would otherwise be lacking from His absence. For the Spirit does not take Christ's place in the sense of descending to earth, nor does Christ Himself come down again from heavenly glory to resume a mortal life. The coming of the Holy Spirit and the ascension of Christ are set against each other as opposites — and so it cannot be that Christ dwells with us bodily in the same manner as He sends His Spirit. Moreover, He plainly says that He will not always be present with His disciples in the world. This too they think they cleverly explain away, as if Christ meant only that He would not always be poor and miserable or subject to the necessities of this frail life. But the context of the passage cries out plainly against this — for the subject there is not poverty or misery or the hardships of earthly life, but worship and honor. The anointing displeased the disciples because they thought it a wasteful and unnecessary expense, bordering on excess, and they wished the money — which they thought poorly spent — had been given to the poor. Christ answers that He will not always be present to be honored with such an act. Augustine interpreted it the same way, and his words are perfectly clear: 'When Christ said, You will not always have Me, He spoke of the presence of His body. For according to His majesty, according to His providence, according to His unspeakable and invisible grace, what He said was fulfilled: Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age. But according to the flesh that the Word took to Himself — according to His birth from the virgin, His seizure by the Jews, His nailing to the cross, His taking down, His wrapping in linen, His laying in the tomb, His visible appearance in the resurrection — this was fulfilled: You will not always have Me with you.' Why not? 'Because according to the presence of His body He spent forty days with His disciples, and while they looked on — not following, but watching — He ascended. He is not here: for He sits at the right hand of the Father. And yet He is here: because He has not departed in the presence of His majesty. Therefore, according to the presence of His majesty, we always have Christ; but according to the presence of His flesh, it is rightly said: You will not always have Me. For in the presence of His flesh, the church had Him for a few days; now she holds Him by faith, but does not see Him with her eyes.' I will note briefly here: Augustine identifies three ways Christ is present with us — by majesty, by providence, and by unspeakable grace — and under this last I include this marvelous communion of His body and blood. But it must be understood as accomplished by the power of the Holy Spirit, not by the invented enclosure of His body under the element. For our Lord testified that He has flesh and bones that can be felt and seen. And 'to go away' and 'to ascend' do not signify making a show of ascending while not actually doing so — but doing in fact what the words plainly say. Someone may ask: shall we then assign to Christ some fixed corner of heaven? I answer with Augustine: that is an overly curious and unnecessary question — as long as we believe that He is in heaven.

But what does the word 'ascending,' so often repeated, mean — does it not signify movement from one place to another? They deny it — claiming that 'height' signifies only the majesty of His dominion. But what of the very manner of His ascending? Was He not, in the sight of His watching disciples, lifted up on high? Do not the evangelists plainly declare that He was taken up into the heavens? These clever sophists answer that He was carried out of their sight by an intervening cloud, so that the faithful might learn He would no longer be visibly present in the world. As if, to establish His invisible presence, it would not have been more fitting for Him simply to vanish in an instant — or for the cloud to have surrounded Him before He lifted a foot. But when He was carried upward into the air and a cloud was placed beneath Him — teaching thereby that He is no longer to be sought on earth — we rightly conclude that He now dwells in the heavens, as Paul also affirms, and from there He bids us to look for Him. In the same way, the angels told the disciples it was useless to keep gazing up into heaven — for 'this Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven.' Here too the opponents of sound doctrine slip away with what they think is a clever move — saying that He will come visibly then, but that He never left the earth and has remained invisibly present with His own all along. As if the angels were there pointing to a double presence, rather than simply making the disciples eyewitnesses of His departure — so that no doubt would remain. It is as if the angels said: 'He has been taken up into heaven before your very eyes. He has claimed the heavenly kingdom for Himself. What remains is for you to wait patiently for His return as judge of the world — for He has now entered heaven, not to possess it alone, but to gather you and all the godly together with Him.'

Since the defenders of this counterfeit doctrine are not ashamed to decorate it with the endorsement of the ancient writers — especially Augustine — I will show in brief how perversely they go about this. Because learned and godly men have already gathered together the relevant testimonies, I will not repeat work already done. Whoever wishes may find them in their writings. I will not even compile everything from Augustine that could serve the purpose — I will only show by a few examples that he is, without any real dispute, entirely on our side. As for what our opponents cite — that it is commonly read in his books that the flesh and blood of Christ is distributed in the Supper, namely the sacrifice once offered on the cross — this amounts to nothing, since he also calls it thanksgiving or the sacrament of the body. And in what sense he uses the words 'flesh and blood,' we need not search far — for he explains himself by saying that sacraments take their names from the likeness of the things they signify, and that therefore in a certain sense the sacrament of the body is the body. With this agrees his well-known statement: 'The Lord did not hesitate to say, This is my body, when He gave the sign of it.' They also object that Augustine explicitly writes that the body of Christ falls to the ground and enters the mouth — in the same sense that he affirms it to be consumed, because he links both statements together. But the counter-statement he makes is not a difficulty: that when the mystery is ended the bread is consumed — because just before he had said, 'since these things are known to people, because they are performed by people, they may have honor as familiar things, but not as marvelous things.' And to no other end points what our opponents so rashly apply to themselves — that Christ 'in a certain manner' carried Himself in His own hands when He offered the mystical bread to the disciples. By inserting this qualifying phrase 'in a certain manner,' Augustine makes sufficiently clear that Christ was not truly and literally enclosed under the bread. This is no surprise, since in another place he plainly affirms that bodies, if spaces and locations are taken from them, will be nowhere — and because they will be nowhere, they will not exist at all. It is a desperate dodge to say that passage does not concern the Supper, in which God exercises special power — because the question being addressed was precisely about Christ's flesh, and the holy man deliberately answers: 'Christ gave immortality to His flesh, but took not nature from it.' 'After this manner it must not be thought that He is everywhere spread abroad — for we must be careful not to so affirm the deity of the man that we take away the truth of the body. And it does not follow that what is in God must be everywhere as God is.' He adds the reason immediately: 'For one person is God and man, and Christ is both — everywhere by reason of His deity, in heaven by reason of His humanity.' What negligence it would have been not to except the mystery of the Supper — so serious and weighty a matter — if anything in it had conflicted with the doctrine he was treating. And if a person reads attentively what follows shortly after, he will find that the Supper is included under that general teaching — that Christ, the only-begotten Son of God and Son of man, is everywhere present as God; that He is in the temple of God, that is in the church, as God dwelling there; and in some definite place in heaven by reason of the measure of His true body. We see how, in order to unite Christ with the church, Augustine does not drag His body down from heaven — which he surely would have done if Christ's body could not be our true food unless it were enclosed under the bread. Elsewhere, defining how the faithful now possess Christ, he says: 'You have Him by the sign of the cross, by the sacrament of baptism, by the food and drink of the altar.' I will not now dispute how rightly he counts a somewhat superstitious practice among the signs of Christ's presence — but the one who compares the presence of the flesh with the sign of the cross shows plainly enough that he does not imagine a two-bodied Christ — one who lurks hidden under the bread while the other sits visibly in heaven. If this needs to be stated more plainly, it is added in the same passage shortly after: 'According to the presence of majesty, we always have Christ; but according to the presence of the flesh, it is rightly said, Me you shall not always have.' They answer that this is also added there — that 'according to an unspeakable and invisible grace, it is fulfilled which is said of Him, I am with you always, to the end of the age.' But that does nothing for their position — because this statement is ultimately restricted to His majesty, which is consistently set in contrast to His body, while His flesh is explicitly distinguished from His grace and power. The same contrast appears elsewhere in Augustine — that Christ departed from the disciples by bodily presence so that He might remain with them by spiritual presence — where it is plain that the substance of the flesh is distinguished from the power of the Spirit, which unites us with Christ even while we are otherwise far separated by distance of place. He uses the same manner of speaking repeatedly — as when he says: 'He is to come again to the living and the dead with bodily presence, according to the rule of faith and sound doctrine. For with spiritual presence He was also to come to them, and to abide with the whole church in the world to the end of the age.' He therefore directs this statement to the believers whom He had already begun to save through bodily presence, and whom He was to leave through bodily absence — so that by His spiritual presence with the Father He might save them. To interpret 'bodily' as merely 'visible' is a weak evasion — since Augustine also sets the body in contrast against divine power, and by adding 'to save with the Father' he clearly expresses that Christ pours out His grace from heaven to us through His Spirit.

Since they place such confidence in their hiding place of invisible presence, let us see how well they actually conceal themselves in it. First, they cannot produce a single word from Scripture to prove that Christ is invisible. They simply assume what no person of sound judgment will grant them — that the body of Christ cannot be given in the Supper unless it is covered with the mask of bread. Yet that is precisely the point under dispute, and it is far from being an established principle. Furthermore, their position forces them to make Christ's body twofold — for on their view, it is visible in heaven in its own right, but becomes invisible in the Supper through a special arrangement. How well this fits with Scripture generally, and with Peter's testimony in particular, is easy to judge. Peter says that Christ must be held or contained in heaven until He returns (Acts 3:21). But these men teach that He is everywhere, though without form. They object that it is unfair to subject the nature of a glorified body to the laws of ordinary nature. But this answer drags in Servetus's delirious error — rightly abhorred by all godly people — that the body was absorbed into the Godhead. I am not saying they intend this. But if filling all things invisibly is reckoned among the qualities of a glorified body, it is clear that the bodily substance is destroyed and that no difference remains between the Godhead and human nature. Again, if Christ's body is so multi-faceted that it is visible in one place and invisible in another — where is the actual nature of a body, which consists of definite proportions? And where is its unity? Tertullian is far more correct when he affirms that the body of Christ was a true and natural body — because it is the figure of that body that is set before us in the Supper as a pledge and assurance of spiritual life. And truly, of His glorified body, Christ Himself said: 'See and feel — for a spirit does not have flesh and bones' (Luke 24:39). There, by Christ's own mouth, the reality of His flesh is proven — because it can be felt and seen. Take these away, and it ceases to be flesh. They still flee to their invented den of special dispensation. But it is our duty to embrace what Christ absolutely affirms — so that what He intends to assert carries full force with us, without qualification. He proves He is no ghost by showing Himself visible in His flesh (Philippians 3:21). Take away what He claims as proper to the nature of His body — and must they not then be forced to coin a new definition of what a body is? No matter where they turn, their invented dispensation has no place in Paul's statement that we look for a Savior from heaven who will transform the body of our humble state to be like His glorious body. For we cannot hope for such a transformation into qualities like those they ascribe to Christ — where everyone would have an invisible and limitless body. No one of any intelligence can be made to believe such a gross absurdity. Let them therefore not ascribe to Christ's glorified body the quality of being in many places at once and contained in no space. Finally, let them either openly deny the resurrection of the flesh — or grant that Christ, clothed in heavenly glory, did not put off His flesh. He will make us in our flesh fellow partakers of that same glory when we share in the resurrection with Him. For what does Scripture teach more plainly than this: just as Christ put on our true flesh when He was born of the virgin, and suffered in our true flesh when He made satisfaction for us — so He received again that same true flesh in the resurrection and carried it up to heaven (John 20:27)? This is our hope of resurrection and ascension — that Christ has risen and ascended. And as Tertullian says, He carried the pledge of our resurrection into the heavens with Him. How weak and frail would that hope be unless our own flesh had been raised up with Christ and entered into the kingdom of heaven? But the defining property of a body is to be contained in space, to consist of its proper proportions, and to have its form. Therefore away with this foolish invention that fastens both human minds and Christ to the bread. For what purpose does His secret presence under bread serve, except that those who long to be joined with Christ may rest in the sign? But the Lord Himself willed us to lift not only our eyes but all our senses away from the earth — forbidding the women to touch Him until He had ascended to His Father (Acts 7:56). When He saw Mary hastening in godly reverence to kiss His feet, the only reason He forbade this touching until His ascension was that He wills to be sought nowhere else. As for the objection that He was afterward seen by Stephen — the answer is simple: it was not necessary for Christ to change location in order to give His servant's eyes such sharpness of sight as could pierce through the heavens (Acts 9:4). The same applies to Paul. The objection that He came out of the sealed tomb and entered through closed doors does nothing to support their error. Just as the water bore Christ walking on the lake as on solid ground, it is no wonder if the hardness of the stone yielded at His approach (Matthew 28:6; John 20:19; Matthew 14:25). Though it is more likely that the stone was moved by His command and then returned to its place after He had passed. And entering through closed doors does not mean passing through solid matter, but rather that by divine power He opened a way for Himself so that He suddenly stood among the disciples in a marvelous manner, though the doors were firmly shut. What they cite from Luke — that Christ vanished from the sight of the disciples He walked with on the road to Emmaus — neither helps them nor hurts us (Luke 24:31). He was not made invisible to remove their sight of Him — He simply went out of sight. In the same way, when He walked alongside them on the road — as Luke himself testifies — He did not put on a different face to go unrecognized; He held their eyes back (Luke 24:16). But these men do not only transform Christ so He might move about on earth — they make Him different and unlike Himself in different places. Finally, in all this foolishness, they effectively — not in one word, but by the sum of their teaching — turn the flesh of Christ into a spirit. And not content with this, they load it with completely contrary qualities. The necessary result is that it becomes twofold.

Even if we grant them what they claim about invisible presence, ubiquity is still not proved — and without ubiquity, their attempt to enclose Christ under bread fails entirely. Unless Christ's body can be everywhere at once, without any spatial limitation, it cannot plausibly be hidden under bread in the Supper. That necessity is what drove them to invent their monstrous doctrine of ubiquity. But Scripture bears clear and strong testimony that His body was bounded by the measure of a human body — and that His ascension proved He is not everywhere, for when He moves into one place, He leaves the place He was in before. The promise they cite cannot be stretched to cover His body: 'I am with you always, to the end of the age.' First, if it referred to bodily presence, continuous fellowship with Him would have to hold even apart from the Supper. There would then be no reason for their fierce quarreling about Christ's words in the Supper specifically, in order to enclose Him under the bread. Furthermore, the text itself shows that Christ is not speaking about His flesh at all — He is promising His disciples invisible help by which He will defend and sustain them against all the attacks of Satan and the world. For when He laid a heavy charge on them, He strengthened them against fear and doubt with the assurance of His presence — as if saying His support would never fail them, that it would be impossible to overcome. If they were not determined to confuse everything, they would have made a distinction in the manner of His presence. Indeed, some would rather display their ignorance with great shame than yield even the smallest point of their error. I am not speaking of the papists — whose doctrine is, at least on this point, more tolerable, or at least more modest. But contentiousness carries some so far that they say: by reason of the union of natures in Christ, wherever His Godhead is, His flesh is also, since the two cannot be separated. As if that union composed of the two natures some intermediate thing that was neither God nor man. That is precisely what Eutyches did — and after him, Servetus. But Scripture makes plain that the one person of Christ consists of two natures in such a way that each retains its own properties intact. That Eutyches was rightly condemned they will be ashamed to deny — yet remarkably, they fail to notice the reason for his condemnation: by removing the distinction between the natures while insisting on the unity of person, he made God into man and man into God. What madness it is, then, to prefer mixing heaven and earth together rather than simply not dragging Christ's body out of the heavenly sanctuary. As for the testimonies they cite — 'No one has ascended into heaven except He who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven,' and 'The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him' — it shows the same senseless dullness to ignore the communicatio idiomatum, which the holy fathers devised long ago with good reason. When the Lord of glory is said to have been crucified, Paul does not mean that His Godhead suffered anything — but because the same Christ who suffered in His lowly and despised flesh was also God and Lord of glory. In the same way, the Son of Man was in heaven — because the same Christ who as Son of Man dwelt on earth in the flesh was God in heaven. In the same sense He is said to have descended from heaven according to His Godhead — not that the Godhead abandoned heaven to hide itself in the prison of the body, but because, though it fills all things, it dwelt bodily in Christ's very humanity — that is, naturally, and in a certain inexplicable manner. There is a common distinction made in the schools that I am not ashamed to repeat: that although the whole Christ is everywhere, yet not the whole of what is in Him is everywhere. I wish the scholastics themselves had properly weighed the substance of this statement — for it would have headed off the unpleasant invention of the bodily presence of Christ in the bread. Therefore our Mediator, being whole and everywhere, is always at hand with His own — and in the Supper He makes Himself present in a special manner. Yet the whole of Him is present, not everything He is — because, as it has been said, in His flesh He is contained in heaven until He appears for judgment.

But they are badly mistaken who can conceive of no presence of Christ's flesh in the Supper unless it is made present in bread. For this view leaves nothing to the secret working of the Spirit, which unites Christ Himself to us. They think Christ is not present unless He comes down to us. As if we could not equally enjoy His presence if He lifted us up to Him. The question, therefore, is only about the manner: they place Christ in the bread, while we do not think it lawful to drag Him down from heaven. Let readers judge which is the more correct view. Only let this objection be driven away: that Christ is absent from His Supper unless He is hidden under the covering of bread. Since this mystery is heavenly, there is no need to draw Christ down to earth in order for Him to be joined with us.

Now if anyone asks me about the manner of this, I will not be ashamed to confess that it is a secret too high to be either comprehended by my mind or expressed in my words — and, to speak more plainly, I feel it more than I understand it. Therefore I hold without hesitation to the truth of God, in which I may safely rest. He declares that His flesh is the food of my soul and His blood is the drink. With such food I present my soul to Him to be nourished. In His holy Supper He commands me, under the signs of bread and wine, to take and eat and drink His body and blood. I have no doubt that He truly delivers them, and that I truly receive them. I only reject the absurdities that seem either unworthy of Christ's heavenly majesty or inconsistent with the truth of His human nature — since they must also conflict with the word of God, which teaches that Christ was so taken up into the glory of the heavenly kingdom that He is lifted above all the conditions of this world, and which with no less care sets forth in His human nature the things that properly belong to true humanity. Nor should this seem incredible or contrary to reason — because just as the whole kingdom of Christ is spiritual, whatever He does with His church should not be reduced to the reasoning of this world. Or, to use the words of Augustine: this mystery, like others, is performed by human beings but originates with God; on earth but from heaven. Such, I say, is the presence of the body as the nature of the sacrament requires — a presence we say is of such great force and effectiveness that it not only brings to our minds an undoubted confidence of eternal life, but also assures us of the immortality of our flesh. For our flesh is now made alive by His immortal flesh and in a certain manner participates in His immortality. Those who go beyond this with their excessive claims do nothing but use such tangles to obscure a simple and plain truth. If anyone is not yet satisfied, I would ask him here to pause and consider with me that we are speaking of a sacrament, all the parts of which must be related to faith. We feed faith no less richly and fully with this partaking of the body as we have described it, than they do who would drag Christ Himself down from heaven. At the same time, I plainly confess that I reject the mixing of Christ's flesh with our soul, or the pouring of it into us as they teach — because it is enough for us that Christ, from the substance of His flesh, breathes life into our souls and pours His own life into us, even though the literal flesh of Christ does not enter into us. Furthermore, it is plain that the analogy of faith — by which Paul instructs us to test all interpretation of Scripture — is entirely consistent with my position. As for those who speak against so evident a truth, let them consider what rule of faith they are following. 'Whoever does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God.' These men, whether they conceal it or fail to recognize it, are stripping Him of His flesh.

The same must be said of communion — which they recognize only when they can devour the flesh of Christ under bread. But great wrong is done to the Holy Spirit if we do not believe that it is through His incomprehensible power that we commune with the flesh and blood of Christ. Indeed, if the force of this mystery — as we teach it, and as it was known to the ancient church for four hundred years — had been properly weighed, there would have been more than enough to satisfy. The gate would have been closed against the many foul errors from which horrible controversies have been kindled, by which the church has been miserably tormented both in ancient times and in our own age — controversies stirred up by those who force an excessive mode of presence that Scripture never teaches. They make a commotion over something foolishly and rashly conceived, as if the enclosure of Christ under bread were — as the proverb says — the beginning and end of godliness. What was most important to know was this: how the body of Christ, once given for us, is made ours, and how we become partakers of His blood that was shed — for this is to possess the whole crucified Christ and so enjoy all His blessings. But these things, of such great importance, are overlooked, neglected, and practically buried — while the only question that interests them is how the body of Christ lies hidden under the bread or under the form of bread. They falsely claim that whatever we teach about spiritual eating is opposed to true eating, as they call it. The difference is only about the manner: theirs is carnal, since they enclose Christ in bread; ours is spiritual, since the secret power of the Spirit is the bond of our union with Christ. Equally false is the other objection — that we take into account only the fruit or effect that the faithful receive from eating the flesh of Christ. We have already said that Christ Himself is the substance of the Supper — and that from this the effect follows: that through the sacrifice of His death we are cleansed from sins, through His blood we are washed, and through His resurrection we are raised up to the hope of heavenly life. But the foolish notion originated by Lombard has perverted their thinking — the notion that the eating of Christ's flesh is the sacrament itself. His words are: 'The sacrament and not the thing are the forms of bread and wine; the sacrament and the thing are the flesh and blood of Christ; the thing and not the sacrament is His mystical body.' And a little later: 'The thing signified and contained is the proper flesh of Christ; the thing signified and not contained is His mystical body.' I agree that he distinguishes between the flesh of Christ and the effective nourishing power with which it is endowed — but I cannot accept the error of treating it as a sacrament contained under bread. From this error has grown the false idea of sacramental eating — the notion that wicked people and evildoers also eat Christ's flesh, even though they are total strangers to Him. But the flesh of Christ in the mystery of the Supper is no less a spiritual thing than eternal salvation itself. From this we conclude that whoever is empty of Christ's Spirit can no more eat Christ's flesh than they can drink wine that has no taste. To give out that dead body — with no living strength — to unbelievers is too heinous a division of Christ. And His own express words are directly against it: 'Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him' (John 6:56). They answer that this passage is not about sacramental eating — which I grant, provided they do not stumble on the same stone by claiming that the flesh itself can be eaten without any fruit. But I would like to know how long they think that eating lasts. Here, in my judgment, they will have no escape. They object that nothing can be taken away from God's promises by human ingratitude. I grant that — and I say that the force of the mystery remains whole, however much wicked people try to empty it of effect. Yet it is one thing to be offered, and another to be received. Christ reaches out this spiritual food and offers this spiritual drink to all people. Some receive it eagerly, some refuse it with contempt. Will these people's refusal cause the food and drink to lose their nature? They will say this supports their position — that Christ's flesh, even if unpalatable to the ungodly, is nonetheless His flesh. But I deny that it can be eaten without the taste of faith — or, to speak as Augustine does, men carry away from this sacrament only as much as they gather with the vessel of faith. So nothing is taken away from the sacrament — its truth and effectiveness remain completely intact — even though the wicked depart empty from the outward partaking of it. If they object again that the words 'This is my body' are diminished if the wicked receive nothing but corruptible bread — the answer is ready: God is not to be acknowledged as true in the act of receiving, but in the steadfastness of His own goodness — in that He is ready to give, and indeed generously offers to the unworthy what they refuse. And this is the fullness of the sacrament, which the whole world cannot break: that the flesh and blood of Christ is given no less to the unworthy than to God's faithful elect. Yet it is also true that, as water landing on hard stone runs off because there is no opening to enter, the wicked by their hardness drive back God's grace so it cannot penetrate them. Moreover, that Christ could be received without faith is no more reasonable than that seed should sprout in fire. As for their question of how Christ comes to damnation for some, unless they receive Him unworthily — this is a very weak argument. We nowhere read that people bring death upon themselves by receiving Christ unworthily — rather by rejecting Him. Nor does Christ's parable help them, where seed grows up among thorns and is later choked (Matthew 13:7) — for there He is addressing the value of a faith that lasts only for a time, which they do not even consider necessary for eating Christ's flesh and drinking His blood, since in this matter they make Judas the equal of Peter. Rather the same parable refutes their error — where some seed falls on the road and some on rocky ground, and neither takes root. This shows that the unbeliever's own hardness prevents Christ from reaching them. Whoever wants this mystery to truly help their salvation will find nothing more fitting than for the faithful to be led to the very fountain and draw life from the Son of God. The dignity of the mystery is honored sufficiently when we remember that it is a help by which we are grafted into the body of Christ, or — already being grafted — we grow more and more into one with Him, until He fully unites Himself with us in the heavenly life. They object that Paul would not have declared them guilty of the body and blood of Christ (1 Corinthians 11:29) unless they had been partakers of them. I answer that they are condemned not because they have eaten them, but because they have profaned the mystery — trampling underfoot the pledge of the holy union with God, which they ought to have received with reverence.

Now, since Augustine among the ancient writers most strongly affirmed the principle that nothing is taken away from the sacraments and the grace they represent is not voided by the unbelief or unworthiness of the recipients, it will be useful to show clearly from his own words how unfairly and falsely they apply his teaching to the present case -- those who would throw the body of Christ to dogs to eat. Sacramental eating, according to their view, is the way in which the wicked receive the body and blood of Christ without any working of the Spirit or any effect of grace. Augustine, on the contrary, carefully weighing those words -- "He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood shall not die forever" -- says: "This means the power of the sacrament, not merely the visible sacrament; and truly inwardly, not outwardly. It is he who eats with the heart, not he who crushes it with the teeth." Therefore he ultimately concludes that the sacrament of this reality -- that is, of the unity of the body and blood of Christ -- is set before people in the Lord's Supper, for some leading to life and for some to destruction. But the reality itself of which it is a sacrament brings life to all who partake of it and destruction to none. And let no one quibble here that the "reality" refers not to the body but to the grace of the Spirit, which could be separated from the body. The contrasting comparison between the two terms "visible" and "invisible" sweeps away all such confusion, for the body of Christ cannot be classified under the first of those terms. Therefore it follows that unbelievers share only in the visible sign. And to remove all doubt, after saying that this bread requires the hunger of the inner person, he adds: "Moses and Aaron and Phinehas and many others who ate the manna pleased God. Why? Because they spiritually understood the spiritual food, spiritually hungered for it, spiritually tasted it, so that they might be spiritually filled. For we also today have received spiritual food. But the sacrament is one thing, and the power of the sacrament is another." A little later: "And so the one who does not remain in Christ, and in whom Christ does not remain, without doubt neither eats His flesh spiritually nor drinks His blood, even though he physically and visibly crushes with his teeth the sign of the body and blood." We hear again that the visible sign is set in contrast to spiritual eating. This refutes the error that the invisible body of Christ is indeed eaten sacramentally, though not spiritually. We also hear that nothing is granted to the ungodly and unclean beyond receiving the visible sign. From this comes his famous statement: the other disciples ate the bread that was the Lord, but Judas ate the bread of the Lord. In saying this, he plainly excludes unbelievers from partaking of the body and blood. Nor does what he says elsewhere point in any other direction: "Why are you amazed that the bread of Christ was given to Judas, through which he was handed over to the devil, when you see that, on the other side, Paul was given a messenger of the devil through whom he might be perfected in Christ?" He certainly says elsewhere that the bread of the Supper was the body of Christ for those to whom Paul said, "He who eats unworthily eats and drinks judgment on himself," and that they therefore did not receive nothing just because they ate unworthily. But what he means, he explains more fully in another place. For, taking it upon himself to define specifically how the wicked and evildoers who profess the Christian faith with their mouths but deny it by their deeds eat the body of Christ -- and going against the opinion of some who thought they did not eat it even in the sacrament -- he says: Neither should it be said that they eat the body of Christ, because they are not to be counted among the members of Christ. For, to say nothing of the rest, they cannot be both members of Christ and members of a prostitute at the same time. Finally, where Christ Himself says, "He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood remains in Me, and I in him," He shows what it means to eat the body of Christ not merely in the sacrament but in reality. For this means remaining in Christ so that Christ remains in him. He said it as though He were saying: "Let the one who does not remain in Me and in whom I do not remain, not say or think that he eats My body or drinks My blood." Let the readers carefully weigh the contrast set up in this comparison -- eating "sacramentally" versus eating "in reality" -- and no doubt will remain. He confirms the same point no less plainly in these words: "Prepare not your jaws but your heart. This is what the Supper commends. See, we believe in Christ when we receive Him by faith. In receiving we know what to think. We receive a small amount and are satisfied in heart. Therefore it is not what is seen but what is believed that feeds us." Here again he limits what the wicked receive to the visible sign and teaches that Christ is received in no other way than by faith. Likewise in another place, expressly stating that the good and the wicked share together in the signs, he excludes the wicked from the true eating of Christ's flesh. For if they received the reality itself, he would certainly not have left that unmentioned, since it would have been more relevant to his argument. Also, in another place, discussing this eating and its fruit, he concludes: "Then shall the body and blood of Christ be life to each person if what is visibly received in the sacrament is in the truth itself spiritually eaten, spiritually drunk." Therefore, whoever would make unbelievers partakers of the flesh and blood of Christ and still claim to agree with Augustine must show us a visible body of Christ, since according to his judgment the whole truth is spiritual. And it is certainly clear from his words that sacramental eating, when unbelief bars the entrance to the truth, amounts to nothing more than visible or outward eating. If the body of Christ could truly be eaten yet not spiritually, what would he mean in that other passage? "You shall not eat this body which you see, nor drink the blood which those who crucify Me shall shed. I have committed a certain sacrament to you; being spiritually understood, it will give you life." He certainly would not deny that the same body Christ offered as a sacrifice is delivered in the Supper. But he explained the manner of eating: namely, that having been received into heavenly glory, it breathes life into us by the secret power of the Spirit. I grant that he often uses this way of speaking, that the body of Christ is eaten by unbelievers. But he explains himself by adding: "in the sacrament." And elsewhere he describes spiritual eating in which outward performance does not exhaust grace. And lest my opponents say I am burying them under a heap of quotations, I would simply ask how they can escape this one statement of his: that the sacraments accomplish in the elect alone what they represent. They certainly would not dare deny that the bread in the Supper represents the body of Christ. Therefore it follows that the reprobate are excluded from partaking of it. That Cyril also held the same view is shown by these words: "As if someone pours molten wax on other wax and thoroughly blends one with the other, so it is necessary that if anyone receives the flesh and blood of the Lord, that person be joined with Him, so that Christ is found in him and he in Christ." From these words I think it is clear that those who merely eat the body of Christ sacramentally are deprived of the true and real eating, which cannot be separated from Christ's power. And so the faithfulness of God's promises does not fail, which continues to rain from heaven even though stones and rocks do not absorb the moisture of the rain.

This understanding will also easily draw us away from the carnal worship that some have rashly erected around the sacrament. They reasoned this way: if the body is there, then the soul and the Godhead are with it — for they cannot now be separated. Therefore Christ is there to be worshipped. But first, if their claim of 'accompaniment' is denied, what will they do? For however much they protest at the absurdity of separating the body from the soul and the Godhead — yet what person of sound and sober judgment can persuade himself that the body of Christ is Christ? They think they prove their point neatly with logical arguments. But since Christ speaks separately of His body and blood without describing the manner of presence — how can they derive from something uncertain the certainty they claim? What then? If their consciences are ever tried with a more serious challenge, will not their logical arguments dissolve and melt away? When they find themselves without the certain word of God — which alone holds our souls firm when we are called to account, and without which they fail at the first test — when they recall that the teaching and example of the apostles are against them, and that they alone are the authors of this practice. To such unsettling thoughts will be added others that are not small. Is it a matter of no importance to worship God in a form He never prescribed? When true worship of God was at stake, should they have so lightly attempted something for which not a single word can be found anywhere? But if they had held all their thoughts under the word of God with proper humility, they would have heard what He said — 'Take, eat, drink' — and they would have obeyed this command, which instructs them to receive the sacrament, not to worship it. Those who receive it as God commands, without worshipping it, are assured they have not departed from God's command — and there is nothing better when undertaking any work than this assurance. They have the example of the apostles, who are not recorded as prostrating themselves to worship the bread, but as receiving and eating it while sitting. They have the practice of the apostolic church, in which Luke reports that the faithful participated not by worshipping but by breaking bread. They have the teaching of the apostles, by which Paul instructed the church at Corinth, professing that what he delivered he had received from the Lord.

All of this tends to one end: to help godly readers see how dangerous it is in such high matters to wander from the simple word of God into the dreams of our own minds. But the things already said above should deliver us from all doubt on this point. For, if godly souls are rightly to lay hold of Christ, they must be lifted up to heaven. If the purpose of a sacrament is to help the weak human mind rise up to grasp spiritual mysteries — then those who remain fastened to the outward sign have wandered from the right path of seeking Christ. What then? Shall we deny that it is superstitious worship when people prostrate themselves before bread in order to worship Christ within it? Without doubt the Council of Nicaea intended to address this danger when it forbade reverent attention directed toward the physical signs set before us. It was for no other reason that in ancient times the people were loudly called, before the consecration, to lift their hearts upward. Scripture itself — beyond its diligent declaration of Christ's ascension, by which He removed the presence of His body from our sight and company — commands us, whenever it mentions Him, to lift our minds upward and seek Him in heaven, seated at the right hand of the Father. This is meant to strip away all carnal thinking about Him. In keeping with this, He should be worshipped spiritually in heavenly glory — not by inventing this dangerous kind of worship, which is full of carnal and crude ideas about God. Those who invented the worship of the sacrament have not only dreamed it up from their own minds apart from Scripture — in which no mention of it can be found (and it surely would not have been left out if it were acceptable to God) — but with all of Scripture crying out against it, they have fashioned for themselves a god according to their own desires, abandoning the living God. For what is idolatry, if this is not — to worship the gifts instead of the Giver himself? They have offended doubly in this: the honor due to God alone was transferred to a creature, and God himself was dishonored through the defilement and profaning of His blessing, when out of His holy sacrament an accursed idol was made. But for our part, that we may not fall into the same pit, let us firmly fix our ears, eyes, hearts, minds, and tongues on the holy teaching of God. For that is the school of the Holy Spirit — the best of all teachers — in which such profit is gained that nothing more need be sought from anywhere else, and we ought to be content to remain ignorant of whatever is not taught there.

But now — since superstition, once it has passed its proper limits, knows no end to its sinning — they have gone much further. They have devised ceremonies completely foreign to the institution of the Supper, with the sole purpose of offering divine honor to the sign. 'We render this worship to Christ,' they say. First, even if this were done during the Supper itself, I would say that the only legitimate worship is that which does not rest in the sign but is directed to Christ sitting in heaven. But now — on what basis do they claim to worship Christ in that bread, when they have no promise to that effect? They consecrate what they call a host, to carry it about in solemn procession, to display it for public viewing, to be looked upon, worshipped, and called upon. I ask by what power they think it is rightly consecrated. They will produce the words: 'This is my body.' But I will point out in reply that it was also said: 'Take and eat.' And I will not do so without reason. For when a promise is joined to a command, the promise is so contained within the command that when the two are separated, the promise ceases to be a promise. This will be made clearer by a parallel example. God gave a command when He said, 'Call upon me' (Psalm 50:15), and He added a promise: 'I will hear you.' If someone calls upon Peter and Paul and claims this promise, will not everyone cry out that he is misusing it? And what else are they doing — those who set aside the command about eating and latch onto an incomplete promise, 'This is my body,' to turn it into ceremonies foreign to Christ's institution? Let us therefore remember: this promise is given to those who keep the command that accompanies it. Those who redirect the sacrament to any other use are left without any word from God at all. We have already discussed how the mystery of the holy Supper serves our faith before God. But the Lord here does not only bring to our remembrance so great an abundance of His grace — as we have shown — He as it were places it directly in our hands and stirs us to acknowledge it. At the same time He warns us not to be ungrateful for such lavish generosity, but rather to proclaim it with fitting praise and advance it with thanksgiving. Therefore, when He gave the institution of the sacrament itself to the apostles, He taught them to do it in remembrance of Him. Paul explains this as proclaiming the Lord's death (Luke 22:19; 1 Corinthians 11:26) — that is, publicly and with one voice openly confessing that all our confidence of life and salvation rests in the death of the Lord — so that we may glorify Him through our confession and by our example move others to give Him glory. Here again it is clear to what end this sacrament is directed: to exercise us in the remembrance of Christ's death. For the command to proclaim the Lord's death until He comes to judge means nothing other than publicly declaring with the confession of our mouths what our faith has acknowledged in the sacrament — that the death of Christ is our life. This is the second use of the sacrament, which pertains to outward confession.

Third, the Lord also willed it to serve us as an exhortation — one which nothing else can more powerfully stir and kindle us toward purity and holiness of life, and toward love, peace, and unity. For in the Supper the Lord so shares His body with us that He becomes thoroughly one with us, and we with Him. Since He has only one body, of which He makes us all partakers, it is necessary that we all also be made one body through that sharing. The bread given in the sacrament represents this unity: just as it is made from many grains so blended together that one cannot be told from another — so we also ought to be joined and knit together with such harmony of hearts that no disagreement or division arises among us. I prefer to express this in Paul's own words: 'The cup of blessing which we bless, is the sharing of the blood of Christ; and the bread which we break is the sharing of the body of Christ' (1 Corinthians 10:16). 'Therefore we, though many, are one body, because we all partake of one bread.' We will have gained very much from the sacrament if this thought is impressed and engraved in our minds: that none of the brothers can be harmed, despised, rejected, abused, or wronged by us without doing the same to Christ in our injurious treatment of them; that we cannot be at odds with our brothers without also being at odds with Christ; that Christ cannot be loved by us without being loved in our brothers; and that the care we have for our own body we must equally have for our brothers, who are members of that body. Just as no part of our body feels pain without that pain spreading to all the other parts — so we must not allow our brother to suffer any evil without being moved to compassion by it ourselves. Therefore Augustine calls this sacrament 'the bond of charity' — and not without reason. For what sharper spur could be applied to stir mutual charity among us, than when Christ, giving Himself to us, not only draws us by His own example to dedicate and give ourselves to one another — but also, in making Himself common to all, makes all of us one in Himself?

This also confirms what I said in another place: that the true administration of the sacrament cannot stand apart from the word. Whatever benefit comes to us from the Supper requires the word -- whether we need to be strengthened in faith, trained in confession, or stirred up to duty and prayer. Therefore, nothing could be done more improperly in the Supper than to turn it into a silent ceremony, as was done under the Pope's tyranny. They claimed the whole power of consecration depended on the priest's intention, as if this had nothing to do with the people -- who most of all needed to have the mystery explained. But this error grew from the fact that they did not realize the promises by which the consecration is made are directed not to the elements themselves but to those who receive them. Christ does not speak to the bread commanding it to become His body. He commands His disciples to eat and promises them the sharing of His body and blood. Paul teaches the same order: that along with the bread and the cup, the promises should be offered to the faithful. This is certainly how it should be. We must not imagine any magical spell, as if it were enough to mutter words over the elements as though they could hear them. Instead, let us understand that those words are a living sermon that edifies the hearers, penetrates their minds, is imprinted and settled in their hearts, and demonstrates its effectiveness in fulfilling what it promises. For these reasons, it is clearly wrong to store the sacrament -- as many urgently demand -- for extraordinary distribution to the sick. Either they will receive it without the recitation of Christ's institution, or the minister will join the true declaration of the mystery with the sign. Silence involves misuse and fault. If the promises are recited and the mystery explained so that those who receive it may benefit, there is no reason to doubt that this is the true consecration. In that case, what purpose would a separate consecration serve, whose effect does not even reach the sick? But those who do this point to the practice of the early church. I grant that. But in so important a matter, where great error leads to great danger, nothing is safer than to follow the truth itself.

As we see, this holy bread of the Lord's Supper is spiritual food -- no less sweet and delightful than healthful to the godly worshippers of God. By tasting it, they experience that Christ is their life. It stirs them to thanksgiving and encourages them to mutual love among themselves. But on the other hand, it turns into a deadly poison for all those whose faith it does not nourish and confirm, and whom it does not move to confession of praise and love. Just as physical food, when it enters a stomach filled with bad humors, is itself made bad and does more harm than good, so this spiritual food -- when it lands on a soul corrupted by malice and wickedness -- throws it headlong into a deeper fall. This is not the fault of the food itself, but because nothing is pure for the defiled and unbelieving, no matter how sanctified it may be by the Lord's blessing. As Paul says, those who eat and drink unworthily are guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, and eat and drink judgment on themselves because they do not discern the body of the Lord. People who thrust themselves forward like pigs to take the Lord's Supper -- without any spark of faith, without any love for others -- do not discern the body of the Lord. Since they do not believe that body is their life, they dishonor it as much as they can, stripping it of all its dignity. By receiving it in such a way, they profane and defile it. And since they dare to mix the holy sign of Christ's body with their quarrels, even while they are alienated and divided from their brothers and sisters, it is no thanks to them that Christ's body is not torn apart limb from limb. They are therefore rightly guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, which they defile with such sacrilegious ungodliness. By this unworthy eating, they bring condemnation on themselves. Although they have no faith in Christ, by receiving the sacrament they profess that salvation is found nowhere except in Him and renounce all other trust. So they are their own accusers, their own witnesses against themselves, and they seal their own condemnation. Again, though they are divided from their brothers and sisters -- that is, from the members of Christ -- by hatred and ill will, and have no part in Christ, they still testify that the only salvation is to share in Christ and become one with Him. For this reason, Paul commands each person to examine themselves before eating this bread or drinking this cup. By this (as I understand it) he meant that every person should look inward and ask: do they rest with sincere trust of heart in the salvation Christ has won? Do they acknowledge it by confessing with their mouth? Are they striving earnestly for innocence and holiness, aspiring to follow Christ's example? Are they willing to give themselves to their brothers and sisters, sharing themselves with those with whom they have Christ in common? Do they regard all their brothers and sisters as members of their own body, desiring to care for, defend, and help them as they would their own members? Are they eager to cherish, protect, and support them? Not that these duties of faith and love can be perfect in us now, but because we ought to aim for this and long toward it with all our desires, that we may daily grow in the faith we have begun.

When they set out to prepare people to receive the Supper worthily, they tormented and troubled poor consciences with great cruelty — yet they provided nothing that actually helped. They said that those who were in a state of grace ate worthily. They defined being in a state of grace as being pure and cleansed from all sin. By this teaching, every person who had ever lived or was then living on earth was barred from the sacrament. For if we try to find our worthiness within ourselves, we are completely undone. Only despair and damnable ruin awaits us. No matter how hard we try, our greatest effort will only make us feel more unworthy the more we strive to find worthiness. To solve this problem, they devised a way to attain worthiness: by carefully examining ourselves, calling ourselves to account for everything we have done, and then cleansing our unworthiness through contrition, confession, and satisfaction. But we have already shown elsewhere what this kind of cleansing actually amounts to. For our present purpose, I will simply say that these are far too thin and fleeting comforts for discouraged consciences crushed with horror at their sin. For if the Lord by a solemn prohibition admits only the righteous and innocent to His Supper, then a person needs very strong assurance of that righteousness which God requires. But how can someone be certain that he has done all he was able to do? And even if it were possible to do so, when could anyone ever be bold enough to feel sure he had actually done it? So when no certain assurance of worthiness can be found, the entry remains permanently shut by that dreadful prohibition — which declares that those who eat and drink unworthily eat and drink judgment to themselves.

It is now easy to see what kind of teaching reigns in the papacy and what kind of author produced it — a teaching that, through its outrageous severity, robs and strips miserable sinners tormented by fear and grief of the comfort of this sacrament, in which all the sweetness of the Gospel was set before them. Surely the devil could find no quicker way to destroy people than to make them so numb that they could not taste or savor the food with which the most gracious heavenly Father willed to feed them. So that we do not fall into this trap, let us remember that this holy banquet is medicine for the sick, comfort for sinners, and a generous gift for the poor — it brings no benefit to the healthy, righteous, and rich, if any such people could be found. For since Christ is given to us in it as food, we understand that without Him we waste away and starve, just as famine destroys the living strength of the body. And since He is given to us as life, we understand that without Him we are completely dead in ourselves. Therefore the worthiness — the only and best worthiness we can bring to God — is to offer Him our own unworthiness, so that He in His mercy may make us worthy of Him. It is to despair of ourselves so that we may be comforted in Him; to humble ourselves so that we may be lifted up by Him; to accuse ourselves so that we may be justified by Him. Beyond this, it is to aspire to that unity which He commends to us in His Supper — and since He makes us all one in Himself, to desire that we all share one soul, one heart, one voice. If we have weighed and considered these things thoroughly, such thoughts — though they may shake us — will never overthrow us. For how could we, being needy and stripped of all good things, defiled with the filth of sins, half dead, eat the body of the Lord worthily? We will rather think this: that as the poor we come to the generous Giver, as the sick we come to the Physician, as sinners we come to the Author of righteousness, and as dead people we come to Him who gives life. We will think that the worthiness God requires consists chiefly of faith — which rests everything in Christ and nothing in us — and next of love, and that same love it is enough to offer to God even in its imperfect state, so that He may increase it, since we cannot give it perfect. Some people agree with us that worthiness consists in faith and love, yet have gone badly wrong in how much they require — demanding a perfection of faith to which nothing can be added, and a love equal to that which Christ has shown toward us. But in doing this they drive everyone away from the Supper just as surely as the others did. For if their standard were accepted, no one could receive worthily, since everyone without exception would stand convicted of imperfection. And it would show remarkable dullness — I will not say foolishness — to require such perfection in the sacrament as would make the sacrament empty and unnecessary. It was not ordained for the perfect, but for the weak and frail — to awaken, stir up, spur on, and exercise the affection of faith and love, and to correct the deficiencies of both.

As for the outward form of administration — whether the faithful receive it in their hand or not, whether they divide the bread or each eat what is given them, whether they pass the cup back to the deacon or hand it to the person next to them, whether the bread is leavened or unleavened, whether the wine is red or white — none of this matters. These things are indifferent and left to the liberty of the church. It is certain, however, that the practice of the early church was for each person to take the bread in his own hand. And Christ said, 'Divide it among you.' The historical records show that the bread was leavened and common bread before the time of Alexander, Bishop of Rome, who was the first to prefer unleavened bread. I cannot see what his reason was, unless he wanted to draw the eyes of the common people to marvel at the spectacle rather than to instruct their minds in true religion. I urge all who have even the slightest genuine zeal for godliness to honestly consider whether they do not clearly see how much more brightly the glory of God shines in simplicity, and how much more abundant spiritual comfort comes to the faithful, than from these cold and theatrical ceremonies — which serve no purpose except to deceive the senses of a dazzled people. They call this 'keeping the people in religion,' when in reality the people have been made foolish and senseless by superstition and are led wherever the leaders please. If anyone defends such inventions by appealing to antiquity, I am well aware how ancient is the use of anointing and blowing in baptism, and how early the Lord's Supper was corrupted. But this is simply the waywardness of human boldness — which cannot restrain itself from playing loosely with the mysteries of God. Let us remember that God values obedience to His word so highly that He calls us to judge by it even angels and the whole world. Now, setting aside that great pile of ceremonies, here is how the Supper might most fittingly be administered — ideally celebrated often, at least every week, with the congregation present. It should begin with public prayers. Then a sermon should be preached. Then the minister, with bread and wine set on the table, should recite the institution of the Supper and declare the promises left to us in it. He should also exclude by excommunication all those whom the Lord's prohibition bars from the table. Then he should pray that the Lord, who has so generously given us this holy food, would instruct and prepare us to receive it with faith and thankfulness, and that since we are not worthy in ourselves, He would in His mercy make us worthy of such a banquet. Then either psalms should be sung or Scripture read, and the faithful should partake of the holy banquet in good order — the ministers breaking the bread and distributing it to the people. After the Supper, an exhortation should be made to sincere faith and confession of faith, to love, and to lives worthy of Christians. Finally, thanksgiving should be offered and praises sung to God. When this is finished, the congregation should be dismissed in peace.

Everything we have said about this sacrament makes it abundantly clear that it was not ordained to be received once a year and then only as a formality, as has now become the common custom. Rather, it was meant to be used frequently by all Christians, so that by repeated remembrance they might revisit Christ's suffering — and through that remembrance sustain and strengthen their faith, stir themselves to confess praise to God and declare His goodness, and nourish and demonstrate mutual love among one another as they see it bound together in the unity of the body of Christ. For as often as we partake in the sign of the Lord's body, we bind ourselves to one another in all the duties of love — pledging that none of us will do anything to offend a brother, and that none will fail to help when there is need and the ability to do so. That this was the practice of the apostolic church, Luke records in Acts when he says that the believers continued steadily in the apostles' teaching, in fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers (Acts 2:42). It was altogether fitting that no assembly of the church should take place without the word, prayers, partaking of the Supper, and giving of alms. That this order was also established among the Corinthians can be clearly gathered from Paul. It is also certain that this practice continued for many ages afterward — from which came the ancient canons attributed to Anacletus and Calixtus, requiring that after the consecration all who wish to remain inside the church must partake. And it is written in those ancient canons known as the Canons of the Apostles that those who do not stay to the end and do not receive the holy communion must be corrected as those who disturb the order of the church. At the Council of Antioch it was decreed that those who enter the church, hear the Scriptures, and then abstain from communion should be removed from the church until they amend this fault. At the first Council of Toledo this was either somewhat softened or at least expressed in milder terms — yet even there it was decreed that those who are found never to partake after hearing the sermon should be warned, and if they continue to abstain after the warning, they should be excluded.

These holy men intended by these ordinances to preserve the frequent use of communion, which they had received from the apostles themselves, which they knew to be most beneficial for the faithful, and which they saw was gradually falling away due to the negligence of ordinary people. Augustine testifies of his own time: 'The sacrament of this thing — of the unity of the Lord's body — is in some places prepared on the Lord's table daily, in other places at certain intervals. It is received at that table by some to life and by others to destruction.' And in his first letter to Januarius: 'Some receive the body and blood of the Lord daily; others receive it on certain days. In some places no day passes on which it is not offered; in others only on Saturday and Sunday; and in still others, only on Sunday.' But since the common people were, as we have said, rather sluggish, the holy men called on them urgently with sharp rebukes, so as not to appear to tolerate such laziness. Such an example is found in Chrysostom's commentary on the letter to the Ephesians. 'It is not said to the one who dishonored the banquet: Why did you sit down? but: Why did you come in?' 'Whoever is not a partaker of the mysteries acts wickedly and shamelessly by standing here present.' 'I beg you — if someone is invited to a banquet, washes his hands, sits down, appears to prepare himself to eat, and then tastes nothing — does he not shame both the banquet and the host?' 'So you, standing among those who are preparing themselves with prayer to receive the holy food, have by your very presence confessed that you are one of their number — and then you do not partake. Would it not have been better had you not come at all?' 'You will say: I am unworthy.' 'Then you were also unworthy to join in the prayer, which is the preparation for receiving the holy mystery.'

In truth, the custom commanding communion only once a year is most certainly an invention of the devil, by whatever means it was introduced. They say Zepherinus was the author of that decree, but it likely was not originally what we now have it. For his ordinance perhaps made reasonable provision for the church, given the circumstances of the time. There is no doubt that in those days the holy Supper was set before the faithful as often as they assembled together, and there is equally no doubt that a good portion of them did partake. But since it rarely happened that everyone communed together at the same time, and since those who were mixed among unbelievers and idolaters needed some outward sign to testify to their faith — this holy man, for the sake of order, appointed a particular day on which all the Christian people would make their confession of faith by partaking of the Lord's Supper. This ordinance of Zepherinus, though good in itself, was badly distorted by those who came after, when a law was made requiring communion only once a year. The result was that nearly everyone, having communed once, considered themselves fully discharged for the rest of the year and slept soundly without a further thought. It should have been done very differently. At least every week the Lord's table should be spread before the assembly of Christians. The promises should be declared, to feed them spiritually at it. No one should be compelled by force, but all should be earnestly exhorted and urged forward. The sluggishness of the lazy should be rebuked. All should come crowding together to such a feast, like hungry people. So I was not wrong at the outset to complain that this custom was pushed in by the craft of the devil — for by appointing one single day each year, it makes people negligent for all the rest of the year. We can see that this corrupt practice had already crept in even during Chrysostom's time — but we can also see how greatly it displeased him. For he complains with bitter words in the very passage I just quoted that there was such great inequality in this matter: people sometimes would not even come when they were spiritually clean, yet at Easter they came even when they were spiritually unclean. Then he cries out: 'O custom! O presumption!' 'Then the daily offering is in vain! In vain we stand at the altar! There is no one who partakes together with us!' He was clearly far from giving his approval to this practice.

From the same source came another ordinance that has stolen away — or violently seized — half the Supper from the greater part of God's people: namely, the sign of the blood. This was denied to laypeople (for that is how they demean God's own inheritance), becoming the exclusive possession of shaved and anointed men. The eternal God commands that all should drink. Yet man dares to override and repeal this commandment with a new and contrary law, commanding that not all should drink. To avoid appearing to fight against God without reason, they invent potential dangers that might arise if the holy cup were commonly given to all — as though the eternal wisdom of God had not foreseen and accounted for these dangers. Then, with clever reasoning, they argue that one element is sufficient for both. 'For if it is the body,' they say, 'it is the whole Christ, who cannot now be separated from His body. Therefore, by accompaniment, the body contains the blood.' See how human reasoning agrees with God when it has been given free rein to run wild and unrestrained. The Lord, showing bread, says it is His body. When He shows the cup, He calls it His blood. The boldness of human reason cries out the opposite: that the bread is the blood and the wine is the body — as though the Lord had separated His body from His blood in both words and signs for no reason, or as though anyone had ever heard the body or blood of Christ called God and man. Truly, if He had meant to signify His whole self, He could have said, 'It is I' — as He is accustomed to speak in Scripture — rather than, 'This is my body; this is my blood.' But willing to help our weakness, He set the cup apart from the bread, to teach that He is no less sufficient as drink than as food. Take away one element, and we find only half of that nourishment in Him. Therefore, even if it were true — as they claim — that the blood accompanies the body in the bread, and the body accompanies the blood in the cup, they still cheat godly souls of the confirmation of faith that Christ appointed as necessary. So, setting aside their clever arguments, we must hold firmly to the benefit Christ intended in ordaining both signs.

I know that Satan's servants cavil here, as they routinely do when mocking Scripture. First they claim that a rule binding the church to perpetual observance cannot be drawn from a single act. But they lie when they call it a single act — for Christ not only distributed the cup but also commanded His apostles to do the same going forward. The words 'Drink all of you from this cup' are the words of a commander. And Paul not only recounts this as something that was done but also commends it as a definite rule. Another escape they try is this: only the apostles were received by Christ to the Supper, since He had already chosen and appointed them to the order of sacrificing priests. But I would have them answer five questions from which they will not be able to escape without exposing their falsehoods. First: from what oracle did they receive this interpretation, so foreign to the word of God? Scripture says twelve sat with Jesus, but it does not so demean Christ's dignity as to call them sacrificing priests — a title we will address in its proper place. Even though He gave it to the twelve at that time, He commanded that they should do the same — distributing it among those gathered. Second: why, for nearly a thousand years after the apostles — that better age — was everyone without exception made a partaker of both signs? Was the early church ignorant of what guests Christ had received at His Supper? It would be utterly shameless to hesitate or quibble over admitting this. The church histories remain; the writings of the ancient authors remain — and they provide plain testimony on this matter. 'The flesh is fed with the body and blood of Christ,' says Tertullian, 'so that the soul may be nourished by feeding on God.' 'How,' said Ambrose to Theodosius, 'will you receive the holy body of the Lord with such hands? With what boldness will you with your mouth partake of the cup of the precious blood?' Jerome says: 'The priests who celebrate the thanksgiving and distribute the blood of the Lord to the people.' Chrysostom says: 'It is not as in the old law, where the priest ate one portion and the people another. One body is set before all, and one cup. The things pertaining to the thanksgiving are all common to both priest and people.' Augustine testifies the same in many places.

But why am I debating what is so well known? Read through all the Greek and Latin writers and such testimonies will appear everywhere. Nor did this practice fall out of use while any trace of purity remained in the church. Gregory — whom you may rightly call the last true bishop of Rome — teaches that it was still observed in his day. 'What the blood of the Lamb is, you have now learned not by hearing but by drinking. His blood is poured into the mouths of the faithful.' Indeed, the practice endured even four hundred years after his death, when all else had gone to corruption. For it was regarded not merely as a custom but as an inviolable law. In those days the reverence for God's institution was still felt, and people had no doubt that it was sacrilege to separate what the Lord had joined together. Thus Gelasius says: 'We have found that some, receiving only the portion of the holy body, abstain from the cup. Let them either receive the sacraments whole, or be excluded from them altogether — because they appear to be bound by some superstition. For to divide this mystery is not done without great sacrilege.' The words of Cyprian also deserve to be heard, for they ought to move any Christian heart. 'How do we teach or encourage them to shed their blood in confessing Christ,' he asks, 'if we deny His blood to those who must fight? Or how do we make them ready for the cup of martyrdom, if we do not first admit them in the church, by the right of communion, to drink the cup of the Lord?' As for the canonists who restrict Gelasius's decree to priests alone — that is so childish a cavil it does not even deserve a refutation.

Third: why did He say simply of the bread that they should eat, but of the cup that they should all drink — as though He deliberately intended to forestall Satan's deception? Fourth: if, as they would have it, the Lord admitted only sacrificing priests to His Supper, what man ever dared to invite others to partake of it — those whom the Lord had excluded — and to offer a gift whose power was not in their own hands, without any command from the only One who could give it? And on what authority do they distribute the sign of Christ's body to the common people even today, if they have neither a command nor an example from the Lord to do so? Fifth: was Paul lying when he told the Corinthians that he had received from the Lord what he had delivered to them? For he then declares what he delivered — that all without distinction should partake of both signs. If Paul received from the Lord that all should be admitted without distinction, then let those who drive away nearly all God's people explain from whom they received their different rule — for they can no longer claim God as its author, since with Him there is no contradiction. And yet to cover over such abominations, they still dare to invoke the name of the church and hide behind that claim. As though these Antichrists were the church — they who so readily trample, scatter, and destroy the doctrine and institution of Christ — while the apostolic church, in which the full power of true religion flourished, was not the church at all.