And where you grant, that “accidents to be without substance is against the common course of natural things, but it is done by a spiritual miracle,” this is but a cloud to darken the light. For accidents to be without substances is not only against tbe common course of natural things, but also against the very nature of accidents, which. have none other being but in substances (as they be defined, accidentis esse est inesse,) and is also against all philosophy, reason, and working of God sithens the world - began. For God never created nor made, with miracle nor without miracle, sub- 3 stances without accidents, nor accidents without substances, as some vainly phantasy de materia prima. lt is against also the doctrine of the old catholic authors; for never none wrote that accidents were without substances, until the bishop of Rome. with his monks and friars defined the contrary. But note well here, good reader, the end of wit, when it is not stayed by Gods word, but shooteth at rovers, or runneth at large, as it were a young colt without a bridle. “That nothing is broken but the accidents, this is denied. Then would I fain learn of this great wise man, that so well can dissever substances from accidents, wha ) substance it is that is broken? Not the body of Christ, saith he, for that is whole in every part; nor the bread is not broken, saith he, for our faith teacheth us contrary: then must it be either Christ’s divinity or soul that is broken, or else is some other substance there which never man heard of before. i
ΐ Note also, good reader, how well this author agreeth with himself, which within 4 little compass denieth so many things, and affirmeth the same again. For first he Saith, that to separate substances from the accidents is to bring it to nothing; and yet he separateth from their accidents as well the substances of bread and wine, as of the body of Christ. Before he said, that nothing was broken but the accidents; now he denieth it. Before he saith, the body of Christ is not broken, and shortly after he saith that which is broken is no bread, but the body of Christ. And here it appeareth, how falsehood neither agreeth with truth nor with itself.
And where you allege, that “in the book of common prayer it is set forth, how in each part of that is broken of the consecrated bread is the whole body of our Saviour Christ,” what could you have alleged more against yourself? For if the consecrated bread be broken in parts, how can you “answer truly by faith, as a believing man,” which answer you make straightways after, that that which is broken is no bread?” And if you would answer, as you be wont to do, that the accidents of bread be called bread, yet that collusion will not serve you in this place. For seeing that this place speaketh of consecrated bread, answer me to this, whether the substanee or accidents be consecrated? And if you say the accidents, then forasmuch as consecration, by your doctrine, is conversion, it must follow that the accidents of bread be converted, and not the substance; and so should you call it transaccidentation, and not transubstantiation: and if you say, that the substance of bread is consecrated, then forasmuch as that which is consecrated is divided into parts, and in every part is the whole body of Christ, you must confess that the substance of bread remaineth with the parts thereof, wherein is received the body of Christ.
But yet will you say, peradventure, that although this make against transubstantiation, yet it proveth the real presence of Christ’s body, seeing that it “is whole in every part of the bread.” It is whole indeed in every part of the bread divided, as it is in the whole bread undivided; which is sacramentally, not really, corporally, carnally, and naturally, as you feign and imagine, and would constrain other to believe. And faith denieth not the bread, but teacheth it to remain as a sacrament. And calling of it Christs body is not making of it to be really so, no more than the calling of the blessed virgin John’s mother made not her to be naturally so indeed, nor him to be her son. For although Christ’s words effectually spoken be an effectual making, yet his words sacramentally and figuratively spoken declare not the figure or sacrament to be in deed the thing that is signified.
And if the rude and simple people understand not substance from accidents, as you here affirm, then this thing they may at the leastwise understand, how little they be beholden to you papists, that would bind them to believe, under peril of damnation, such things as they be not able to understand, making articles of their faith to snare them rather than to save them. But what skilleth that to the papists, how many men perish, which seek nothing else but the advancement of their pope, whom they say no man can find fault withal’? For though he “neither care for his own soul’s health, nor of his christian brother, but draw innumerable people captive with him into hell, yet,” say the papists, no man may reprehend him,” nor ask the question why he so doth.