Out of the same Psalme 109. he vrgeth this also, Sit thou on my right hand, Shewing
that the Leuitical tabernacle on earth, was but a shadow of his true Tabernacle in heauen:
without which he should not be a Priest at al: 6. Whereas he is of a better Priesthood then they,
as also he proueth by the excellencie of the new Testament aboue the old.
1. BVT the summe concerning those things which be said, is: We haue such an high Priest,
who is set on the right hand of the seat of maiestie in the heauens.
2. A
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Christ liuing & reigning in heauen continueth his priestly function stil, & is
Minister not of Moyses Sancta & tabernacle, but of his owne body & bloud, which be
the true holies, and tabernacle not formed by man, but by Gods owne hand.
Minister of the Holies, and of the true tabernacle, which our Lord pight and
not man.
3. For euery high Priest is appointed to offer guifts and hosts, wherfore it is
Necessarie that he also.
Christs Priesthood & Sacrifice is external, not spiritual only.
Euen now being in heauen, because he is a Bishop and Priest, he must needes haue somewhat
to offer, and vvherein to do sacrifice: and that not in spiritual sort onely, for that
could not make him a Priest of any certaine order. And it is most false and vvicked, to hold
vvith the Caluinistes, *that Melchisedecks Priesthod vvas vvholy spiritual. For then Christs
death vvas not a corporal, external, visible, and truely named sacrifice: neither could
Christ or Melchisedec be any otherwise a Priest, then eúery faithful man is: vvhich to
hold (as the Caluinists folowing their owne doctrine must needes do) is directly against
the Scriptures, and no lesse against Christes one oblation of his body vpon the Crosse,
then it is against the daily sacrifice of his body vpon the altar. Therfore he hath a
certaine host in external and proper maner, to make perpetual oblation thereby in the
Church: for, visible and external act of sacrificing in heauen he doth not exercise.
* Beza in schol. Test. Græcolat. in c. 7 Heb. num. 8.
necessarie that he also haue some thing that he may offer:
4.
If vpon the earth.
How Christes body is made fit to be sacrificed and eaten perpetually.
It is by his death, and resurrection to life againe, that his body is become apt and fitte
in such diuine sort to be sacrificed perpetually. For if he had liued in mortal sort still,
that vvay of mystical representation of breaking his body and separating the bloud from the
same, could not haue been agreable. and so the Church and Christian people should haue
lacked a priesthod and sacrifice, & Christ him self should not haue been a Priest of a
peculiar order, but either must haue offered in the things that Aarons Priests did, or els
haue been no Priest at all. For, to haue offered onely spiritually, as all faithful men do,
that could not be ynough for his vocation, and our redemption, and state of the new
Testament. How his flesh vvas made fit to be offered and eaten in the B. Sacrament, by his
death, see Isychius li. 1 in leuit. cap. 2.
if then he were vpon the earth, neither were he a Priest: whereas there were that
did offer guifts according to the Law,
5. that
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λατϱεύουσι.
serue the exampler and shadow of
Heauenly things.
Kingdom of heauen & heauenly things, spoken of the Church.
As the Church or state of the new Testament is commonly called Regnum cœlorum & Dei,
in the Scriptures, so these heauenly things be probably taken by learned men, for the
mysteries of the new Testament. And it seemeth that the paterne giuen to Moyses to frame
his tabernacle by, vvas the Church, rather then the heauens them selues: al S. Paules
discourse tending to shew the difference betwixt the new Testament and the old, and not to
make comparison betwene the state of heauen and the old law. Though incidently, because the
condition of the new Testament more neerely resembleth the same, then the old state doth,
he sometime may speake somewhat therof also.
heauenly things. As it was answered Moyses,
when he finished the tabernacle,
*
Exo. 25,9. 40.
See (quoth he) that thou make al things according to the exampler
which was shewed thee in the mount.
6. But now he hath obtained a better ministerie, by so much as he is Mediatour of a
better Testament, which is established in better promises.
7. For
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The promises and effects of the Law were temporal, but the promises & effects of
Christes Sacraments in the Church be eternal.
if that former had been void of fault, there should not certes a place of a
second been sought.
8. For blaming them, he saith:
*
Hier. 31,31.
Behold the daies shal come, saith our Lord: and I
wil consummate vpon the house if Israel, and vpon the house of Iuda a new Testament:
9. not according to the Testament which I made to their Fathers in the day that I
tooke their hand to bring them out of the land of Ægypt: because they did not continue in my
Testament: and I neglected them, saith our Lord.
10. For this is the Testament which I wil dispose to the house of Israel after those
daies, saith our Lord: Giuing my lawes
Into their mind.
Grace, the effect of the new Testament.
This also and the rest folowing is fulfilled in the Church, and is the proper effect of the
new Testament, vvhich is the grace and spirit of loue, graffed in the hartes of the faithful
by the holy Ghost, vvorking in the Sacraments and sacrifice of the new law to that effecte.
into their mind, and in their hart wil I superscribe
them: and I wil be
Their God.
The new Testament or couenant between God & man.
This mutual couenant made betwixt God and the faithful, is that vvhich vvas dedicated and
established, first in the chalice of his bloud, called therfore the nevv Testament in his
bloud: and vvhich vvas straight after ratified by the death of the testator, vpon the
Crosse.
Luc. 22.
their God, and they shal be my people:
11. and euery one
Shal not teach.
Scriptures abused for phantastical inspirations.
So it vvas in the primitiue Church, in such specially as vvere the first founders of our
new state in Christ. And that vvhich vvas verified in the Apostles and other principal
men, the Apostle speaketh generally as though it vvere so in the vvhole. as S. Peter
applieth the like out of Ioël, and our Sauiour so speaketh, vvhen he saith that such as
beleeue in him, shal vvorke miracles of diuers sortes. Christian men then must not abuse
this place to make chalenge of new inspirations and so great knowledge that they neede no
Scriptures or teaching in this life, as some Heretikes doe: vvith much like reason and
shew of Scriptures as the Protestants haue to refuse external sacrifice. And it is no
lesse phantastical madnesse to deny external sacrifice, sacraments, or Priesthod, then it
is to abolish teaching and preaching.
Act. 2. Io. 14. v. 12.
shal not teach his neighbour, and euery one his brother, saying,
Know our Lord: because al shal know me from the lesser to the greater of them:
12. because I wil be merciful to their iniquities, & their sinnes I wil not now
remember.
13. And in saying a new, the former he hath made old. And that which groweth ancient
and waxed old is nigh to vtter decay.