Then, having taken the bread and given it to His disciples, He made it His own body, by saying, "This is my body," that is, the figure of my body. A figure, however, there could not have been, unless there were first a veritable body (Against Marcion, Bk 4).Ignatius is saying the same thing. It is a quite typical mode of expression under the platonic mode of relating type to archetype. There is a relationship, and it can be expressed very directly, "A is B," and still have the sense of what we moderns would think of as a symbolic reference.
quoted from an article here: http://www.justforcatholics.org/a181.htm
St. Ignatius, St. Justin Martyr, and St. Irenaeus are then cited extensively for this literal view of the Eucharist as the body and blood of Christ. Stone continues concerning Tertullian’s view of the Eucharist and Sacraments —
“A very imperfect idea of the Eucharistic doctrine of Tertullian would be given if attention were confined to those passages in his writings in which he describes the Eucharist as the ‘figura’ of the body of Christ and the means by which our Lord ‘makes His body present.’ To understand it rightly, it must be viewed in the general setting of sacramental principle which Tertullian emphasizes. In his eyes the Incarnation has introduced new aspects of the relation of man to God. The human flesh which the Lord then took is an abiding reality. ‘That same Person who suffered,’ he declares, ‘will come from heaven; that same Person who was raised from the dead will appear to all. And they who pierced Him will see and recognize the very flesh against which they raged’ [De carn Christi, 24]. With this Christ, thus retaining His human body and blood, Christians are closely united. The baptised are clothed with Christ; in them Christ lives [De fug 10; De poen 10]. By the daily reception of the bread of life there is continuance in Christ and abiding union in His body [De orat 6]. Before the Incarnation the flesh was far off from God, ‘not yet worthy of the gift of salvation, not yet fitted for the duty of holiness’; but Christ’s work, accomplished in the flesh, has changed all that [De pud 6]. Since the Incarnation Sacraments have become necessary and effectual [De Bapt 11,13]; and that which in the ordinances of the Church touches the flesh benefits the soul [De carn res 8].
“It is in harmony with these general sacramental principles that Tertullian not only calls the Eucharist ‘the holy thing’ [De spectac 25], but also often and naturally refers to it as the body of Christ.” (Stone, vol 1, pg 36-37)
Stone then gives six clear examples of Tertullian’s literal view —
(1) It is a matter of anxious care that no drop of the wine or fragment of the bread should fall to the ground (De cor 3).
(2) It was the Lord’s body which the disciples received at the Last Supper (Adv Marc iv,40).
(3) It is the Lord’s body which the communicant receives in the Church or reserves for his Communion at home (De orat 19).
(4) It is the Lord’s body with the richness of which the Christian is fed in the Eucharist (De pud 9).
(5) It is Christ’s body and blood with which “the flesh is clothed, so that the soul also may be made fat by God” (De carn res 8).
(6) Even in unworthy Communions it is the body of the Lord which wicked hands approach, the body of the Lord which wicked men outrage and offend
for a more complete view of Tertullian and the Eucharist.
Zwingli and old school Baptists did not believe anything like this.
If you want to know the truth, you have to go to the source
This is My Body
Jesus Christ, 33ad