Bellarmine · De Controversiis · On the Sacrament of the Eucharist · Book III: On the Truth of the Body of the Lord, from Reason
Chapter 13: The Error of Durandus Is Refuted
Our translation, from the Latin of the Opera Omnia (Paris: Vivès, 1870–74), vol. IV, De Sacramento Eucharistiae, Book III: On the Truth of the Body of the Lord in the Eucharist (from Reason). The Latin source text is public domain; this English rendering is released with the site. Scripture quotations follow Bellarmine's Vulgate citations, rendered in Douay-Rheims wording where he quotes exactly. Click “Show the Latin” for the original (raw OCR of the scan; scanning errors remain — the scan itself is the authority).
The third error, of those who will have only the matter of the bread to remain, fights first expressly with the Council of Trent, session 13, chapter 4 and canon 2, where we read that a change is made of the whole substance of the bread into the body of the Lord: and with the Council of Constance, session 8, where the second error of Wyclif is reproved, which was that accidents do not remain without a subject. For according to the opinion of Durandus, if the matter of the bread remains, all the accidents also remain in their subject: for the subject of the accidents is the matter, according to the opinion of the better philosophers. Nay, this opinion of Durandus seems to fight even with the Lateran Council. For that Council would not have said that the bread is transubstantiated into flesh, unless it had wished to signify that the whole substance of the bread is changed: but that change which Durandus introduces can be called not transubstantiation, but transformation. And so the opinion of Durandus is heretical, although he himself is not to be called a heretic, since he was prepared to acquiesce in the judgment of the Church.
Secondly, this opinion is refuted. For either the matter of the bread would be informed by the soul of Christ alone, or by the whole humanity of Christ. But each is most openly false. For in no way can it be said that that matter is informed by the whole humanity of Christ: nor can it be imagined how matter should be informed by matter; for matter has a potency to form, not to matter. But neither does Durandus say this, who will have the conversion of the bread to be like nutrition. And neither can it be said that the matter of the bread is informed by the soul of Christ alone: for that composite of the matter of bread and the soul of Christ would not be flesh, or certainly would not be that flesh which was taken from the Virgin and hanged on the cross. But Scripture in express words affirms that the Eucharist is that flesh which was crucified, John 6: The bread which I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. And Matthew 26: This is my body, which shall be delivered for you.
Someone will say for Durandus: By concomitance there will be in the Sacrament also that flesh which was taken from the Virgin. But this does not suffice for the truth of the Scriptures: for Scripture testifies that that which is in the Eucharist by force of the Sacrament is that body which was delivered to death for us: therefore that flesh of the Lord which was taken from the Virgin ought to be in the Eucharist not by concomitance, but by force of the Sacrament.
Thirdly, either the matter of the bread accedes to the rest of the body of Christ and remains in it; or it accedes, but does not remain; or it does not accede. If it accedes and remains, then the body of the Lord is daily augmented and grows, and has already grown into an immense mass: if it accedes and afterward recedes, then it daily grows and decreases, which indeed who would bear? if it does not accede, then there are three bodies of Christ really distinct; one taken from the Virgin, another compounded of the matter of bread and the soul of Christ, a third of the matter of wine and the form of the Lord's blood. Behold what figments, contrary to all the Fathers, the rashness of Durandus is compelled to admit.
Fourthly, if the matter remains and is informed by the soul of Christ, then the dimensions of the bread will be the dimensions of Christ; then the body of Christ will be in place extendedly and corporeally; then it will be able truly and properly to be divided, heated, corrupted. You will say: It will not, because it is glorious and incorruptible. But this very thing the argument proves, that that body is not glorious and incorruptible, or certainly that a glorious and incorruptible body can be harmed and corrupted: for we experience that the consecrated bread, which according to Durandus is the matter of the bread informed by the soul of Christ, is divided, altered, corrupted.
But let us see what Durandus brings forward for himself. He proves aptly enough for persuading. First, that the contrary opinion is impossible. Secondly, that his own is possible. Thirdly, that his own is really true.
The first he proves in this way: “Conversion cannot come about except with the matter, or subject, remaining in both terms of the conversion. For this is the difference between creation, annihilation, and conversion, that in creation there comes to be what was not; in annihilation there ceases to be what was; in conversion something passes from one being to another: it is necessary, therefore, that what passes should remain.”
I answer that this argument would be tolerable if it were made by a heathen philosopher. For truly, naturally, a conversion cannot come about except with the matter remaining: for natural agents cannot produce the matter itself. But Christians, who by sure faith hold that God made matter out of nothing and can reduce it to nothing, it is truly a wonder if they do not believe that by the same omnipotent God matter, and anything into anything, can be changed — namely out of created things: for into God nothing can be turned, nor He into another, since all passive potency is repugnant to pure act. To the argument, then, I say that a conversion can be made of the whole into the whole; but that it is distinguished from annihilation and creation, because by conversion, by one and the same action, out of one thing another comes to be, whereas by creation out of nothing something comes to be, by annihilation out of something nothing.
The second Durandus proves in this way: “Christ after the resurrection truly ate, Luke last, and therefore was truly nourished; therefore bread can be turned into His glorious body by way of nutrition.”
I answer that Christ after the resurrection truly ate, because with a true palate and true teeth and tongue He took true food and passed it to the stomach. But He could be not thereby nourished, but convert that food into air; which Bede seems to indicate in his commentary on the last chapter of Luke, where he sets down this comparison between our eating, who eat from need, and that of Christ, which was done from power: “Just as,” he says, “the thirsty earth absorbs water in one way, the burning ray of the sun in another: so also we eat in one way, He ate in another.” Now the earth truly adjoins to itself the water, and is helped by it and grows fat: but the ray of the sun does not adjoin to itself the water which it absorbs, but dissolves it into air and vapors. It could also be said, with John of Louvain in his book on the body of the Lord, that Christ was truly nourished by that food after the resurrection, but without any accession or change of Himself: for He could turn the whole of that food into His pre-existing flesh, so that neither the matter nor the form of the bread remained. But the former solution is easier.
The third Durandus proves from Damascene, Book 4 on the faith, chapter 14, to whom we can add Gregory of Nyssa in his Catechetical Oration, chapter 37, and Theophylact on chapter 6 of John, who say that the bread is now changed into the flesh of Christ by consecration in the same way in which it was once changed, while He lived on earth, by nutrition.
But those Fathers use the likeness of nutrition in order to show a true and real change, not in order to will that consecration and nutrition be alike in all things; nor do examples and likenesses ever require that they agree in absolutely all things.
Show the Latin (Vives edition, OCR)
CAPUT XIII. Refellitur error Durandi . Tertius error eorum, qui volunt solam materiam panis remanere, pugnat in primis expresse cum Tridentino Concilio sess. xm. cap. 4. et canon. 2. ubi legimus, mutatio¬ nem fieri totius substanti® panis in corpus Domini : et cum Concilio Constantiensi sess. 8. ubi reprobatur secundus 'error Wiclefi, qui erat, accidentia non manere sine subje¬ cto. Nam ex sententia Durandi, si materia panis manet, manent etiam accidentia om¬ nia in suo subjecto : subjectum enim acci¬ dentium materia est, ex sententia meliorum philosophorum. Imo etiam cum Concilio Lateranensi pugnare videtur h®c Durandi sententia. Neque enim Concilium illud tran- substantiari dixisset panem in carnem, nisi totam panis substantiam mutari, significare voluisset : illa autem mutatio, quam Duran¬ dus inducit, non transubstantiatio, sed trans¬ formatio dici potest. Itaque sententia Du¬ randi h®reticaest, licet ipse non sit dicen¬ dus h®reticug, cum paratus fuerit Ecclesi® judicio acquiescere. Secundo, refellitur h®c sententia. Nam vel informaretur materia panis sola Christi anima, vel tota Christi humanitate. Utrum¬ que autem est apertissime falsum. Non enim ullo pacto dici potest informari materiam illam tota Christi humanitate : nec enim fin¬ gi potest, quomodo materia informetur a materia ; materia enim potentiam habet ad formam, non ad materiam. Sed neque hoc Durandus dicit, qui vult conversionem pa¬ nis similem esse nutritioni. Ac nec potest dici, materiam panis a sola Christi anima infor¬ mari : nam illud compositum ex materia panis, et anima Christi, non esset caro, at certe non esset illa caro, qu® de Virgine sumpta est, et in cruce suspensa. Scriptura vero disertis verbis affirmat, Eucharistiam esse carnem illam, qu® crucifixa est, Joan- nis vi : Panis quem ego dabo, caro mea est , quam ego dabo pro mundi vita. EtMatth. xxvi: Iloc est corpus meum, quod pro vobis tra¬ detur (1). Dicet aliquis pro Durando : Per concomi- tantiam erit in Sacramento etiam caro illa, qu® de Virgine sumpta est, Sed hoc non 168 LIBER III. sufficit ad Scripturas veritatem : Scriptura enim testatur id, quod ex vi Sacramenti est in Eucharistia, esse corpus illud, quod pro nobis ad mortem traditum est : debet igitur non per concomitantium, sed ex vi Sacra¬ menti esse in Eucharistia caro illa Domini, quae de Virgine sumpta est. Tertio, vel materia panis accedit reliquo corpori Christi, et in eo manet; vel accedit, sed non manet ; vel non accedit. Si accedit, et manet, ergo quotidie augetur, et crescit corpus Domini, et jam in immensam molem excrevit : si accedit, et postea recedit, ergo quotidie crescit, et decrescit, quod sane quis ferat ? si non accedit, ergo tria sunt Christi corpora re ipsa distincta ; unum de Virgine sumptum , alterum conflatum ex materia panis, et Christi anima ; tertium ex materia vini, et forma sanguinis Domini. Ecce qualia figmenta Patribus omnibus con¬ traria Durandi temeritas admittere cogi¬ tor. Quarto, si materia manet, et Christi ani¬ ma informatur : ergo dimensiones panis, dimensiones Christi erunt; ergo extense, et corporaliter corpus Christi in loco erit; ergo vere, et proprie dividi, calefieri, corrumpi poterit. Dices : Non poterit, quia gloriosum est, et incorruptibile. At hoc ipsum probat argumentum, corpus illud non esse glorio¬ sum, et incorruptibile, aut certe corpus glo¬ riosum et incorruptibile leedi, et corrumpi posse : experimur enim consecratum panem, qui per Durandum est materia panis, Chri¬ sti anima informata, dividi, alterari, cor¬ rumpi. Sed videamus, quid pro se Durandus af¬ ferat. Ille satis apposite ad persuadendum probat. Primo, sententiam contrariam esse impossibilem. Secundo, suam esse possibi¬ lem. Tertio, suam reipsa esse veram. Primum hoc pacto probat : « Conversio fieri nequit, nisi manente materia, seu sub¬ jecto in utroque termino conversionis. Hoc enim interest inter creationem, annihilatio- nem, et conversionem, quod in creatione fit, quod non erat ; in annihilatione desinit esse id, quod erat: in conversione transit aliquid de uno esse ad aliud : oportet igitur ut remaneat id, quod transit. » Respondeo, hoc argumentum tolerabile esset, si ab ethnico philosopho fieret. Vero enim naturaliter fieri nequit conversio, nisi manente materia : nec enim possunt agentia naturalia materiam ipsam producere. At Christiani, qui certa fide tenent Deum ex ni¬ hilo fecisse materiam, et eam in nihilum posse redigere : mirum profecto est, si non credant ab eodem omnipotente Deo posse mutari materiam, et quodlibet in quodlibet, ex creatis rebus videlicet : nam in Deum ni¬ hil verti potest, nec ipse in aliud, siquidem repugnat actui puro omnis potentia passiva. Ad argumentum ergo dico, conversionem posse fieri totius in totum ; distingui autem eam ab annihilatione, et creatione, quia per conversionem una, et eadem actione ex uno fit aliud, cum per creationem ex nihilo fiat aliquid, per annihilationem ex aliquo ni¬ hil. Secundum probat Durandus hoc modo : « Christus post resurrectionem vere mandu¬ cavit, Luc. ult. et proinde vere nutritus est; ergo potest verti in corpus ejus gloriosum panis per modum nutritionis. » Respondeo, Christum post resurrectionem vere comedisse, quia vero palato, verisque dentibus, et lingua verum cibum sumpsit, et ad stomachum trajecit. Sed potuit non inde nutriri, sed eum cibum in aerem con¬ vertere ; id quod indicare videtur Beda in comment. cap. ultimi Lucae, ubi ponit hanc similitudinem intermanducationem nostram, qui ex indigentia manducamus, et illam Christi, quae ex potestate facta est : « Sicut, inquit, aliter aquam terra sitiens absorbet, aliter solis radius candens : sic etiam aliter nos manducamus, aliter ille manducavit. » Porro terra vere sibi adjungit aquam, et ea juvatur, et pinguescit : solis autem radius non sibi adjungit aquam , quam absorbet, sed eam in auram, et vapores dissolvit. Pos¬ set etiam dici cum Joanne a Lovanio, in lib. de corpore Domini, Christum vere nutritum eo cibo post resurrectionem , sed sine ulla accessione, vel mutatione sua : potuit enim totum eum cibum vertere in carnem suam praeexistentem , ita ut nec materia, nec for¬ ma panis remaneret. Sed prior solutio faci¬ lior est. Tertium probat Durandus ex Damasceno lib. iv. de fide, cap. 14. cui possumus addere Gregorium Nyssenum in orat. Catech. cap. 37. et Thcophylactum in cap. vi. Joannis, qui dicunt eo modo mutari nunc panem in carnem Christi per consecrationem, quo rnu- (1) Joan. VI, 52; Matth. XXVI, 2o. CAPUT XY. 169 tabatur olim, dum ipse in terris viveret, per nutritionem. At Patres illi similitudine nutritionis utun¬ tur, ut veram, et realem mutationem osten¬ dant, "non autem, ut in omnibus similia esse velint consecrationem, et nutritionem ; neque exempla, et similitudines id unquam exigunt, ut in omnibus omnino conveniant.