nant, who nevertheless had no title to baptism prior to a profession of repentance and faith. To infer, therefore, from this passage in Ezekiel, as Mr. Henry does in his note on the place, that "the children of [Christian] parents that are members of the visible church, are to be looked upon as born unto God, and his children;" is to place us under the Sinai covenant-is to confound the old, with the new economy. Consequently, every argument formed on this, or any similar text, in order to prove the right of infants to baptism, only betrays, either the weakness of the disputant, or the want of substantial evidence that evidence, which is agreeable to the nature of a positive institution. For with equal propriety does the Council of Trent produce Ezekiel the thirty-sixth and twenty-fifth, to prove that all sin, original and actual, is pardoned through the admirable efficacy of baptism;* as any of our opposers appeal to this passage, in proof of infants being the subjects of that ordinance.

Reflect. II. If there be any propriety in producing this passage against us, it certainly proves much more than many of our opposers wish to establish. For nothing can be more plain, than that the children here mentioned were the offspring, not of regenerate and godly, but of apostate and idolatrous parents. Consequently, if this divine oracle had any relation to baptism, it would infer the right of all children to that ordinance, whose parents profess Christianity, be those parents ever so idolatrous, or ever so profligate. In this light it is understood and applied by some Pædobaptists. Thus, for example, the Leyden Professors: "We do not exclude those infants from a participation of baptism, who descend from parents of a Christian race, and [are] baptized; though their parents, by a wicked life or an impure faith, render the efficacy of the covenant sealed in baptism entirely void, with regard to themselves....

* Catechism of Council of Trent, p. 166.

Because, under the new covenant, the son does not bear the iniquity of the father, and God nevertheless continues the God of such children, as himself testifies, Ezek. xvi. 20; where he calls the children of those wicked Israelites his sons, whom they had brought forth to God, though they had offered them to Moloch. Whence also he commanded the children of those Israelites, many of whom had died in their impiety, no less than the children of the godly, to be circumcised."*- Mr. Blake, thus: "Those that bring forth children to God, have a right, in the sight of God, to be of his household, and to be taken into it. This is plain, especially to those that know the law of servants in families, that all the children, in right, were the master's, and had their relation to him. But those that are short of justifying faith, bring forth children to God, (Ezek. xvi. 20, 21.)"-To which Mr. Baxter answers: 66 This argument is sick of the common disease of the rest; the conclusion is a stranger to the question. Quâ tales, they bring not forth children to God, in any church sense.”†

It is really surprising to think, that wise and godly men should send us to the seventeenth of Genesis, and the sixteenth of Ezekiel, to learn the mind of our Lord, when he said, "Teach all nations, baptizing them to get information who are the proper subjects of a positive ordinance peculiar to the New Testament! It is not, however, quite so strange, we freely acknowledge, as to send us to the Talmud for the same purpose; yet even that is frequently done! Mr. Baxter, I find, had abundant reason to make the following acknowledgment: "I cannot deny, but some divines have argued weakly for infant baptism, and used some unfit phrases, and brought some misapplied scriptures" in support of it. Nay, he informs us that, in his younger days, these weak arguments and misapplied texts had like to have made a Baptist of him. Thus he speaks: I was doubtful for * Synopsis Pur. Theolog. disput. xliv. § 50.

Disputat of Right to Sac. p. 181.

some time," by reason the scripture spoke so sparingly to the point; and the many weak arguments which I met with in the words and writings of some divines,were not the least stumbling-block in my way. I resolved, therefore, silently to forbear the practice, while I farther studied the `point. This, one would think, might have taught Mr. Baxter to have treated the Baptists with a less degree of severity than he sometimes did; but, alas, he seems on certain occasions to have quite forgotten it.†

Mr. Warren, when extolling the English Common Prayer, explains those words of Paul, Toba denσeis, that prayers be made, of composing a liturgy; ‡ and with as much reason, for any thing I can perceive, as our opposers infer baptism from the text before us. For the reader's amusement, and to show what strange applications of scripture a fondness for hypothesis will produce when real argument is wanting, I will conclude my remarks on this passage, with the reasoning of pope Innocent the Third, in favour of the Papal supremacy. His holiness, writing to the patriarch of Constantinople, says; "When our Lord appeared on the shore to his disciples then in a ship, Peter cast himself into the sea, while his companions came to land in the ship.-Now as, by the sea, the world is intended, Peter's casting himself into the sea expresses that peculiar privilege of the pope, by which he received the whole world to govern." §

§ 4.-Matt. xix. 14. "Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven."

Mr. Poole's Continuators.-"We must take heed we do not found infant baptism upon the example of

* Plain Scrip. Proof, p.7, and Preface, p. 3.

† See Vol. I. p. 233, 234, 235, 236.

In Mr. Peirce's Vindicat. of Dissent. part iii. p. 113. See 1 Tim. ii. 1. § Apud Venem. Hist. Eccles. cent. xiii. § 203.

Christ in this text, for it is certain that he did not bap-. tize these children. Mark only saith, He took them into his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them. The argument for infant baptism from this text, is founded upon his words, uttered on this occasion, not upon his practice." Annotations on the place.

2. Dr. Whitby." But, say the Antipædobaptists, Christ neither did baptize them, [the little children,] nor commanded the apostles to do it. Answ. That is not to be wondered at, if we consider that-Christian baptism was not yet instituted; and that the baptism then used by John and Christ's disciples, was only the baptism of repentance, and faith in the Messiah which was for to come, (Acts xix. 4;) of both which infants were incapable." Annotation on the place.

3. Mr. Burkitt." They [the little children] were brought unto Jesus Christ: but for what end? Not to baptize them, but to bless them.... But, say some, Christ did neither baptize them, nor commanded his disciples so to do. Answ. That is not to be wondered at, if we consider that they had already entered into covenant with God by circumcision, and Christian baptism was not yet instituted. John's baptism was the baptism of repentance, of which infants were incapable." Expos. Notes on the place.

4. Dr. Doddridge." I acknowledge, these words of themselves will not prove infant baptism to be an institution of Christ; but if that appears from other scriptures to be the case, (which I think most probable,) there will be proportionable reason to believe, that our Lord might here intend some reference to it." Note on the place.

5. Anonymous." Here a question starts, Did our Lord baptize these children? I answer, No; nor was baptism at that time a Christian institution; nor was circumcision abolished." Simple Truth, p. 16, 17.See Chap. II. No. 8.

REFLECTIONS.

Reflect. I. It appears from these authors, That the little children here mentioned were neither baptized by our Lord, nor by his apostles; that it is dangerous to the cause of Pædobaptism, to found it on the conduct of Christ as here narrated; and that infants were not baptized in those times. Dr. Doddridge, indeed, thinks it most probable, that the scripture in other places represents infant baptism as an institution of Christ; whence he infers a proportional probability, that our Lord intended a reference to it in these words: and Bengelius roundly asserts, that if the parents of these children had requested baptism for them, it would not have been denied.* But the conduct of our Lord's disciples, in rebuking those who brought the children, renders it far more likely that infants were considered as incapable of the baptism then administered; as Whitby and Burkitt observe. For is it not strange, unaccountably strange, that our Lord's most intimate friends should have been offended with the persons who brought those children, if it had then been customary to baptize infants? Such a practice could not have commenced, much less have been common among the followers of Jesus Christ, but these disciples must have known it; for, as Jesus himself baptized not, they must have been the administrators. Now had that been the case, or had they known and approved the modern grounds of Pædobaptism; such as the proselyte plunging, Jewish circumcision, the Abrahamic covenant, and the relative state of infants whose parents are believers; there is no reason to imagine they would have acted as they did in this instance. Our opponents would fain persuade us, that these disciples were all Pædobaptists: but were any of our Pædobaptist Brethren at this day to have an opportunity, equally favourable with that of the Lord's disciples, of showing how they

* Gnomon, ad Matt. xix. 13.