But if instead of the bread which we perceive, it is the substance of the body that we must believe,' our senses will have deceived us, you will say, and their testimony, on which reposes the certainty of the facts in the Gospel, will then be shaken. No, Sir, our senses do not deceive us here, for they do not pronounce sentence, they simply report; and their report is true in the Eucharist. They tell us that they there find the taste, the colour, the appearance of bread, all which is there in effect. It is the mind which, from the report of the senses, judges and pronounces: at the sight of the species it would naturally and with reason conclude, that the substance of bread is also there, if on this particular occasion, it had not been admonished to check its natural propensity and to reform its judgment. After the instructions of Jesus Christ, the apostles must have judged, and all of us after them, not from what they saw, but from what they had heard. This is the exception, it is the only one. Except in this instance, and whenever there is no reason from distance or malady for mistrusting our senses, we ought confidently to rely upon them, remembering that our Saviour has himself appealed to them in testimony of his resurrection. "See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; "handle me and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see me to have.""

It is high time to bring this long discussion to a conclusion. In concluding it, I entreat the adversaries of the real presence and of the change of the substance, candidly and conscientiously to say, whether it be the text of scripture that induces them to deny

'Luke XXIV. v. 39.

either of these dogmas; whether, on the contrary, putting aside every other consideration, the text does not of itself naturally conduct them to it: whether they do not stand in need of exertion or violence to turn it from the proper to the figurative sense: whether they have not, with a view to sanction their supposed metaphor, been obliged to bring all the Bible into requisition, for the purpose of extracting a few examples, which, after all, do not agree with the case in question, and can neither warrant them to take the figurative sense nor save them from the natural energy of the words. They must allow, I am intimately persuaded, they must acknowledge that their repugnance to receive the text in its simplicity proceeds solely from the philosophical consequences it brings after it, which frighten reason: a body existing in many places at the same time! the body which suffered, which is in heaven, reduced to so small a space in the Eucharist! bread and wine, according to all appearance, and no such thing in reality! who can persuade himself of this? who can believe it? This is the ground of their infidelity, this is the scandal that determines them against each of these mysteries; it is better they think, to resist the Scriptures, better to turn aside the sense of the words of Jesus Christ, than to admit the sense, which they present with all its consequences.

For my part, to act with the candour and good faith I wish to see in them, I frankly admit these consequences. I allow that they are impenetrable, and not less alarming to human comprehension: they are so, it is true. But is it less true that Jesus Christ promised that he would give us his flesh to eat, the same flesh that he would deliver for the life of the world, and that this flesh would be meat indeed?

Is it less true that in executing his promise, and presenting the object he held in his hand, he said: Take, eat, this is my body? Is it less true that he had the power to operate what he asserted, and much beyond what we can understand? Is it less true that he could not wish to mislead us by fallacious expressions, being essentially truth itself; that with a word he could have made us understand the figure, if he had not wished us to understand the reality ; that his goodness and his justice obliged him to do it, since he knew the disputes, the animosites, and the horrible schism, which, the cause of this reality would one day occasion in the Church? Is it less true that it is much more sure and reasonable to mistrust ourselves than him: to believe in simplicity what he has said to us in so simple a manner, than to heap up difficulties, for which, after all, we are no ways responsible? Is it not wiser to turn away our eyes from them and to fix them upon him who has spoken? We are guilty if we do not hear and believe him, but we cannot be guilty if we do not understand the whole extent of his discourse; for he is as infinite in his intelligence as we are circumscribed in ours.' He has made known to us his intention and his will

They must leave off all their quibbling and disputing, and take "whatever they find plainly revealed in the Gospel; remembering, "that though infinite wisdom and goodness can never possibly "oblige them to believe any thing that is really absurd and contra"dictory, or do any thing which is unreasonable; yet they may "be obliged to believe and practise many things, which uncor"quered prejudice may tell them are absurd and unreasonable, "and which they may think to be so, by using themselves to judge "of the ways of God too much by human rules and measures." Humphrey Ditton, Discourse on the Resurrection. Part 1. sect. 4. p. 15. second edit. London: 1714.

by all, that language possesses the most simple, most consistent, and intelligible, so that we cannot be mistaken as to the natural and proper sense which the words present; all the parts agree together, it is within the reach of all men to judge of them. What is not within their reach, and what never can be so here below, is the following up of the consequences that result from it, explaining the manner in which this reality of the presence is effected, and comprehending by what invisible cause and secret this change of substance is operated. But where has it been learned that we have a right to reject what is easily conceived, because in its train follow obscurities which we cannot penetrate? Wherefore do we obstinately resist what surpasses our comprehension, and close our eyes to what strikes us? Why do we wish to give an account to ourselves of that which we know to be impenetrable to our ideas? Let us not foolishly seek to overleap the boundaries by which we are circumscribed. Let us hold fast to our Saviour: let us rest firmly on his word; and be assured that the appearances of contradiction and impossibilities which confound us now that we see through the veil and the cloud, will vanish from our eyes, the instant we shall contemplate the objects by the light of celestial splendour. Let us wait: we shall, each of us, soon be there: the longest life is very short.

LETTER VIII.

Examination of tradition upon the Eucharist.

I have engaged myself, Sir, to justify the the decrees of the Church upon the Eucharist, to shew you their conformity with the doctrine revealed by Jesus Christ and transmitted to us in the two-fold deposit of the scriptures and tradition. The first of these you have just been examining, and in it you must have discovered the principal dogmas, which the Church obliges us to believe. The second is now about to be laid open before your eyes, and in it you will see these same dogmas taught at all times, and indubitably deriving their origin from the preaching of the apostles. It is an immense field to pass over; but be not alarmed; the ages, with which above all it will be our business to become well aequainted, are the most ancient. We will confine ourselves to the six first: and by proceeding methodically, we shall avoid the confusion into which we should otherwise be thrown by the quantity of monuments, facts, and passages, which will successWe will begin by ively present themselves to us. arranging them into two classes, into general and particular proofs. The former will bring us acquainted with the belief of all the Churches of the world at once; the latter will shew us the testimonies separately given by particular teachers in its favour.