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from PART IV - History and philosophy
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 August 2016
About the author
Thomas Fuller (1607/8–61), a renowned preacher, charmed auditors with his ‘mellifluous discourse’. His clerical career suffered during the Interregnum period because of his moderate religious beliefs and he thus embarked on antiquarian projects, including the first full Protestant history of England's church. His extraordinary memory was fabled.
Joseph's Particoloured Coat
About the text
The text collects eight sermons in addition to the eponymous one of the title, which starts the volume off. ‘Joseph's Particoloured Coat’ is an exegetical sermon, proffering close commentary on each verse of Paul's letter 1 Corinthians 11:18–30. The sermon's relatively fair treatment of putative heretics and schismatics may have recommended a tacit corrective to the uncompromising harshness that Archbishop Laud and his fellow Church of England officers inflicted upon dissenters at the time. The passage in question comments upon verse 26, ‘For as often as ye eat of this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's body til he come’, specifically, the clause ‘ye do show the Lord's body’.
The arts of memory
Fuller describes the Eucharist as an artificial memory that imaginatively returns the celebrant to the scene of Christ's sacrifice. The art of memory opens up the ‘heart’ of memory, so to speak. Fuller exploits its visual orientation in order to convey the Pauline insistence on showing or proclaiming Christ's body.
Textual notes
Thomas Fuller, Ioseph's partie-colored coat containing, a comment on part of the 11. chapter of the 1. epistle of S. Paul to the Corinthians (London, 1640), I3v.
Joseph's Particoloured Coat
Say not then in thine heart, ‘How shall I get to Jerusalem to see the place of Christ's suffering?’ See faith can remove mountains. Mount Calvary is brought home to thee; and though there be μεγά χάσμα, a great gulf, or distance of ground betwixt England and Palestine, yet if thou beest a faithful receiver, behold Christ sacramentally crucified on the communion-table. Say not in thine heart, ‘How shall I remember Christ's Passion? It was time out of mind, 1600 years ago’. Christ here teacheth thee the art of memory, what so long was past is now made present at the instant of thy worthy receiving.
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