Chapter 1: The Persuasion of Holy Scripture
Sentences says that here is something which is but only a sign (and that he appoints to be the visible forms): and that there is another thing that is both the substance and the sign: namely the body of Christ, which is hidden under the accidents: for that is a substance, if it is referred to the visible forms, and a sign, if you have respect to the mystical body. Another thing
(he says) there is which you may in no wise call a sign, but a substance only, to wit, the mystical body: because it is so signified, as it is no more a sign of anything. Those things which are afterward mingled in the action of these mysteries are not (he says) matters of necessity, but only thanksgiving and prayers interlaced.
If you demand of them how so great a body may be contained in that little cake, they say that this is not by the manner of quantity, or locally, or as they speak definitely, but by the manner of substance, and, as they say, sacramentally. Neither do they count it absurd that in this sacrament are contained two bodies in one and the same place, because they are constrained thus to say: for between the accidents of bread there is a quantity and that doubtless a corporal quantity. Also, they do not dislike that one and the same body is truly in many places, and that a man of a just largeness and stature, as Christ was upon the cross, and as he shall come to judgment, is truly, but invisibly, contained not only in a small cake but also in the least part thereof. Many other things might be recounted regarding this opinion, but I intend that these shall be sufficient for our treatise. He that desires more may read the Master of the Sentences in the place which we cited, together with many interpreters of him. And of the change or transubstantiation, these arguments they bring.
Chapter 1:
The Persuasion of Holy Scripture