A19563:809
An answerAn aunsvvere
An answer by the Reverend Father in God Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury, primate of all England and metropolitan, unto a crafty and sophistical cavillation, devised by Stephen Gardiner Doctor of Law, late Bishop of Winchester against the true and godly doctrine of the most holy sacrament, of the body and blood of our saviour Jesus Christ Wherein is also, as occasion serveth, answered such places of the book of Doct. Richard Smith, as may seem any thing worthy the answering. Here is also the true copy of the book written, and in open court delivered, by D. Stephen Gardiner ...An aunsvvere by the Reuerend Father in God Thomas Archbyshop of Canterbury, primate of all England and metropolitane, vnto a craftie and sophisticall cauillation, deuised by Stephen Gardiner Doctour of Law, late Byshop of Winchester agaynst the true and godly doctrine of the most holy sacrament, of the body and bloud of our sauiour Iesu Christ Wherein is also, as occasion serueth, aunswered such places of the booke of Doct. Richard Smith, as may seeme any thyng worthy the aunsweryng. Here is also the true copy of the booke written, and in open court deliuered, by D. Stephen Gardiner ...
London: printed by John Daye, 1580London: printed by Iohn Daye, 1580
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Now followeth Saint Augustine.
Now followeth Saynt Augustine.
And yet S. Augustine showeth this matter more clearly and fully then any of the rest,1 specially in an epistle, which he wrote ad Bonifacium, where he saith, that a day or two before good Friday, we use in common speech to say thus: To morrow or this day .ij. days, Christ suffered his passion. Where in very deed he never suffered his passion but once, and that was many years passed. Likewise upon Easter day we say, This day Christ rose from death. Where in very deed it is many hundred years sithens he rose from death. Why then do not men reprove us as liars, when we speak in this sort. But because we call these days so, by a similitude of those days, wherein these things were done in deed? And so it is called that day, which is not that day in deed, but by the course of the year it is a like day. And such things be said to be done that day, for the solemn celebration of the sacrament, which things indeed were not done that day, but long before. Was Christ offered any more but once? And he offered him self, and yet in a sacrament or representation, not only every solemn feast of Easter, but every day he is offered to the people, so that he doth not lye, that saith, He is every day offered. For if sacraments had no some similitude or likeness of those things, whereof they be Sacraments, they could in no wise be sacraments. And for their similitude and likeness, commonly they have the name of the things, whereof they be sacraments. Therefore as after a certain manner of speech, the sacrament of Christs body, is Christs body: the sacrament of Christs blood, is Christs blood: so likewise the sacrament of faith, is faith. And to believe is nothing else, but to have faith, And therefore when we answer for young children in their baptism, that they believe, which have not yet the mind to believe, we answer that they have faith, because they have the sacrament of faith. And we say also that they turn unto God, because of the sacrament of conversion unto God, for that answer pertaineth to the celebration of the sacrament. And likewise speaketh the Apostle of baptism, saying: that by Baptism we be buried with him into death: he saith not that we signify burial, but he saith plainly, that we be buried. So that the sacrament of so great a thing, is not called but by the name of the thing it self.