[229] Quum præcipit quid, pareat mundus; et omnes osculemur verbum.--(Zw. Opp. iv. p. 176.) ŒCOLAMPADIUS.--"But since we have the spiritual eating, what need of the bodily one?" LUTHER.--"I do not ask what need we have of it; but I see it written, _Eat, this is my body_. We must therefore believe and do. We must do--we must do![230]--If God should order me to eat dung, I would do it, with the assurance that it would be salutary."[231] [230] _Man mus es thun_ sæpe inculcabat.--(Ibid.) [231] Si juberet fimum comedere, facerem.--(Ibid.) At this point Zwingle interfered in the discussion. "We must explain Scripture by Scripture," said he. "We cannot admit two kinds of corporeal manducation, as if Jesus had spoken of eating, and the Capernaites of tearing in pieces, for the same word is employed in both cases. Jesus says that to eat his flesh corporeally profiteth nothing (John vi. 63); whence it would result that he had given us in the Supper a thing that would be useless to us.--Besides there are certain words that seem to me rather childish,--the dung, for instance. The oracles of the demons were obscure, not so are those of Jesus Christ." LUTHER.--"When Christ says the flesh profiteth nothing, he speaks not of his own flesh, but of ours." * * * * * ZWINGLE.--"The soul is fed with the Spirit and not with the flesh." LUTHER.--"It is with the mouth that we eat the body; the soul does not eat it."[232] [232] Anima non edit ipsum (corpus) corporaliter.--(Zw. Epp. ii. p. 370.) ZWINGLE.--"Christ's body is therefore a corporeal nourishment, and not a spiritual." LUTHER.--"You are captious." ZWINGLE.--"Not so; but you utter contradictory things." LUTHER.--"If God should present me wild apples, I should eat them spiritually. In the Eucharist, the mouth receives the body of Christ, and the soul believes in his words." [Sidenote: THE SPIRITUAL EATING.] Zwingle then quoted a great number of passages from the Holy Scripture, in which the sign is described by the very thing signified; and thence concluded that, considering our Lord's declaration in St. John, _The flesh profiteth nothing_, we must explain the words of the Eucharist in a similar manner. Many hearers were struck by these arguments. Among the Marburg professors sat the Frenchman Lambert; his tall and spare frame was violently agitated. He had been at first of Luther's opinion,[233] and was then hesitating between the two Reformers. As he went to the conference, he said: "I desire to be a sheet of blank paper, on which the finger of God may write his truth." Ere long he exclaimed, after hearing Zwingle and Œcolampadius: "Yes! the Spirit, that is what vivifies!"[234] When this conversion was known, the Wittembergers, shrugging their shoulders, said, "Gallic fickleness!" "What!" replied Lambert, "was St. Paul fickle because he was converted from Pharisaism? And have we ourselves been fickle in abandoning the lost sects of Popery?"