John Hales wrote a work entitled On the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, and concerning the Church’s mistaking itself about Fundamentals, about the year 1635.  In this work he says concerning the Eucharist:

“First, In the Communion there is nothing given but bread and wine.

Secondly, The bread and wine are signs indeed, but not of anything there exhibited, but of somewhat given long since, even of Christ given for us upon the cross sixteen hundred years ago and more.

Thirdly, Jesus Christ is eaten at the Communion Table in no sense, neither spiritually by virtue of anything done there nor really, neither metaphorically nor literally.  Indeed that which is eaten (I mean the bread) is called Christ by a metaphor, but it is eaten truly and properly.

Fourthly, The spiritual eating of Christ is common to all places as well as the Lord’s Table.

Last of all, The uses and ends of the Lord’s Supper can be no more than such as are mentioned in the Scriptures, and they are but two.

1.The commemoration of the death and passion of the Son of God, specified by Himself at the institution of the ceremony.

2.To testify our union with Christ, and communion one with another, which end St Paul hath taught us.

In these few conclusions the whole doctrine and use of the Lord’s Supper is fully set down; and whoso leadeth you beyond this doth abuse you.” (Hales, On the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, and concerning the Church’s mistaking itself about Fundamentals, in Stone, 1909: II, 314-315).

Hales in his writing on the Eucharist denies realism and affirms nominalism.  In denying realism he denies both moderate and immoderate forms, arguing that Christ is not eaten in the Eucharist or the bread and wine in any literal, metaphorical or spiritual sense.  There is no real presence of Christ in the Eucharist for Hales, since the bread and wine and the body and blood of Christ are self-enclosed and separate entities.  Christ’s body and blood are not present in the Eucharist, only bread and wine as signs.  As signs they do not contain or exhibit anything, but serve only as reminders of the past event of Christ’s death.  Christ however, is said to be spiritually eaten in several places, including in the Eucharist, but this seems to mean in light of the first three propositions, that the spiritual eating has nothing to do with the bread and wine of the Eucharist.  The Eucharist therefore serves the purposes of commemorating Christ’s death at his command (in the sense of remembering a past event but not it seems in the sense of memorial remembrance or anamnesis) and of testifying union with Christ and communion with others.  There is no sense in Hales view of Christ’s body and blood being instantiated in the Eucharist or the bread and wine in any realist sense (moderate or immoderate) and there is no sense in which the benefits of Christ’s sacrifice are instantiated in the Eucharist in any realist sense (moderate or immoderate).  The presence of Christ’s body and blood and the sacrifice of Christ are separated from the Eucharist and the bread and wine, which serve the purposes of signs and reminders of past, completed events.  Hales’ views therefore correspond with that of nominalism, whereby there can be no instantiation of Christ’s presence or sacrifice in the Eucharist or the bread and wine, and where the body and blood of Christ and the bread and wine of the Eucharist, remain separate and self-enclosed entities.