have said nothing about it, yet, while it appears that Solomon had such a clear discernment of it when recording his inspired song, we are obliged to exclaim with the alarmed servant of an ancient prophet, "Alas, master, how shall we do?" For though, by the friendly assistance of Pædobaptists, we have parried the thrust of our adversaries from other texts; yet this unexpected attack affects us in such a manner, that we have no inclination to make a defence, or to look out for auxiliaries. We shall, therefore, only just mention a few instances of similar ingenuity in defence of different hypotheses, and one remark upon them. Dr. Barrow, when speaking of the Papal supremacy, and of the Roman Catholics, tells us, That "they have found the pope in the first chapter of Genesis; for, if we believe pope Innocent the Third, he is one of the two great luminaries there; and he is as plainly there as any where else in the Bible.*-Cardinal Bona is very confident that Paul's cloak, which he left at Troas, was a priestly vestment."-Once more: Dr. Nichols has invincibly proved the propriety of our English clergy wearing a surplice, by the following observation: "At our Saviour's transfiguration, he himself, together with Moses and Elias, appeared in bright raiment, as white as snow. The angels in their appearances are generally said to have appeared in white." So easy is it to demonstrate Pædobaptism, Papal supremacy, and canonical robes, to be of divine right!-The remark follows: "These doctrines of the doctor's are collected and raised from the text," says Mr. Alsop, "just as our collectors raise a tax upon indigent, non-solvent people, who come armed with a law and a constable to distrain for that which is not to be had, rather than the king should lose his right. And, certainly, never was text so strained and distrained * On the Pope's Supremacy, p. 155. + In Bingham's Orig. Eccles. b. xiii. chap. viii. § 1. to pay what it never owed; never man so racked to confess what he never thought; never was a pumicestone so squeezed for water which it never held; nor ever a good cause so miserably put to its shifts, as to press those innocent texts against their wills, which refuse to come in as volunteers."* SECT. 5.Apostolic Tradition, and the Impracticability of pointing out the Time when Padobaptism commenced. J. A. Turrettinus.-" Tradition is a convenient word, to excuse and retain those things that were brought into religion without the authority of scripture, by the ignorance of the times and the tyranny of men." Cogitat. et Dissertat. tom. i. p. 44. 2. Bp. Burnet." To convince the world how early tradition might either vary or misrepresent matters, let the tradition, not only in, but before St. Irenæus's time, concerning the observation of Easter be considered, which goes up as high as St. Polycarp's time....If, then, tradition failed so near its fountain, we may easily judge what account we ought to make of it at so great a distance." Four Discourses to the Clergy, p. 247, 248. 3. Mr. Robinson.-" If-whatever we find to have been a general and prevailing custom a few hundred years after the apostles, must necessarily be allowed to have been the practice of their times too, I am afraid we must not only have forms of prayer, but also prayers for the dead, and invocations of saints and angels, and so on." Review of the Case of Liturgies, p. 111. 4. Mr. Poole." That the fathers were oftentimes deceived in the point of traditions, and in matters of fact, is acknowledged by several of the most learned Papists; and Baronius gives us divers examples of their * Mischief of Impositions, Epist. Dedicat. p. 18. mistakes, in sundry parts of his annals, and that too among the first fathers, who had far greater opportunities to know the truth than their followers, and greater integrity to deliver nothing contrary to their knowledge; and much more mistakes there might be committed by those who came after them." Nullity of Romish Faith, p. 66, 67. 5. Anonymous." The church of Rome-will not acknowledge their points of doctrine to be erroneous, unless we can assign the time, and point out the persons who first broached them.... If a man be sick of a consumption, will he refuse help of the physician, except he can resolve him whether his lungs or his liver were first infected, and show the time when and the occasion how his body grew first distempered?" Popery Confuted by Papists, p. 26, 27. 6. Bp. Taylor." The fathers were infinitely deceived in their account and enumeration of traditions; sometimes they did call some traditions such, not which they knew to be so, but by arguments and presumptions they concluded them so. Such as was that of St. Austin: Those things which the universal church holds, that are not found appointed by councils, descended, it is credible, by tradition from the apostles'*....Clemens of Alexandria pretended it a tradition, that the apostles preached to them that died in infidelity, even after their death, and then raised them to life.... He affirmed it to be a tradition apostolical, that the Greeks were saved by their philosophy....Tertullian and S. Basil pretend it * " Just," says the bishop in another place, as if one were to give a sign how to know whether lying were lawful or unlawful, and for the determination of this question should give this rule; Whatsoever mankind do universally which they ought not to do without God's law, that certainly they have a law from God to do. But all mankind are given to lying; and yet nothing can make it lawful to lie, unless there be a warranty, or no prohibition from God to lie: therefore, certain it is, that to lie descends from the authority of God.". Ductor Dub. p. 378, 379. an apostolical tradition, to sign in the air with the sign of the cross.... There are yet some points of good concernment, which, if any man should question in a high manner, would prove undeterminable by scripture, or sufficient reason; and yet, I doubt not, their confident defenders would say, they are opinions of the church, and quickly pretend a tradition from the very apostles, and believe themselves so secure that they could not be discovered; because the question never having been disputed, gives them occasion to say, That which had no beginning known, was certainly from the apostles....The baptism of infants is called a tradition by Origen * alone, at first, and from him by others....It is said to be a tradition apostolical, that no priest should baptize without chrism, and the command of the bishop....There is no pretence of tradition, that the church in all ages did baptize all the infants of Christian parents. It is more certain that they did not do it always, than that they did it in the first age. St. Ambrose, St. Hierom, and St. Austin, were born of Christian parents, and yet not baptized until the full age of a man, and more.... That it was the custom so to do in some churches, and at some times, is without all question; but that there is a tradition from the apostles so to do, relies but on two witnesses, Origen and Austin; and the latter having received it from the former, it relies wholly on one single testimony, which is but a pitiful argument to prove a tradition apostolical. He is the first that spoke it; but Tertullian, that was before him, seems to speak against it, which he would not have done, if it had been a tradition apostolical. And that it was not so is but too certain, if there be any truth in the words of Ludovicus Vives." Liberty of Prophesying, sect. v. p. 84, 89, 90, 93, 94. Dissuasive from Popery, part ii. lib. ii. sect. iii. The latter of these in Dr. Wall's Hist. Inf. Bap. part. ii. chap. ii. § 10. * This, it has already appeared, is a mistake. See Vol. I. p. 387–391. 7. Hospinianus." In the time of Austin it was commonly believed, that whatever was received by the church as a devotional custom, proceeded from apostolic tradition and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit.... Not all things of which the ancients boast, under the title of apostolic tradition, are to be immediately received as such." Hist. Sacram. 1. ii. p. 41; 1. v. p. 424. 8. Mr. Henry." Irenæus, one of the first fathers, with this passage, [John viii. 57,] supports the tradition, which he saith he had from some that had conversed with St. John, that our Saviour lived to be fifty years old, which he contends for. See what little credit is to be given to tradition!" Exposition on John viii. 57. 9. Anonymous. -"Our Popish pettifoggers-to prove their church to be the very same [that the church at Rome was in the time of Paul,] thus argue: 'If things which we maintain and the Protestants condemn, were indeed errors and innovations, sprung up since the primitive age, then might you certainly assign the particular times when, and by whom they were first advanced. But this you are not able to do. Ergo, they are no such upstart errors, but primitive truths, at all times extant in, and owned by the church.' This very argument is no less frequent than plausible with our seminary seducers. Both the propositions are false. The first, because many times the truth may be abandoned, and error advanced in its stead, and yet no certainty left to posterity of the precise time when the same happened. The second, because, in many things held by the church of Rome at this day, we can-assign the respective times of alteration....The errors of the Romish church are now so notorious, it were better to redeem the time by correcting them, than to enquire after the times and persons that hatched them. For, if a man be sick of a consumption, will he refuse help of the physician, except he can resolve him whether his lungs or his liver were first infected, and show the exact time when, |