M. Harding.M. Hardinge.

M. Harding.

M. Hardinge.

If a man should press you with your own words,¹ and demand, what manner of Presence ye teach, affirming Christ him self presently to be given: I ween, ye would be found halting. For how say ye? If Christ be presently given unto us by Bread and Wine in the Sacrament, then is Christ present. If he be present, which ye must needs grant, tell us further, how is he present: according to the Substance of his Body, or by Grace, or according to the Majesty of his Godhead? The first, what shifts so ever ye seek, ye will not grant. And therefore is your own Apostle Martin Luther at foul defiance with your masters, Zuinglius, Occolampadius, Calvin, and you, and so be his Disciples, Joachimus Westphalus, Epinus, Pomeran, He shusius, Brentius, Illyricus, and many others, as ye know. If ye will say, he is Present by his Grace, so is he Present with all good men: ⟨p. 233⟩and that not only when the Sacrament is ministered, but also at all other times.² Again, how can ye make good, that by Faith we receive his Body, and Blood? By Faith we receive Grace, and the Merits of his Death suffered in his Body with shedding of his Blood. But the Body and Blood it self, that is, the very^* Substance of his Body and Blood: tell us, how by Faith (^* properly and truly to speak) as who should sate by Faith made Present,⁵ we receive it? Furthermore^‡ what have ye to answer to this question? If we receive the Body and Blood of Christ verily by Faith (for so ye say) we demand whether we receive the same by Faith only without the Body, or with the office of our Body. If the office of our Body be required to the receiving of Christs Body in the Sacrament, as Christ him self