jury to offer; and we admit, that every voluntary human association may decree its own terms of membership; and that every religious association of people ought to regulate their conduct in this business by what they deem the rule of Jesus Christ. Our Baptist brethren, we deem conscientious in excluding us from the Lord's table; but still we think it would give them pleasure to receive new light on this subject, and doubt not but that their consciences, when well informed, would approve of that very course of conduct which they now condemn.

"The practice of incorporating private opinions," says Mr. Hall," and human inventions with the constitutions of a church, and with the terms of communion, has long appeared to him untenable in its principle, and pernicious in its effects. There is no position in the whole compass of theology, of the truth of which he feels a stronger persuasion, than that no man, or set of men, are entitled to prescribe as an indispensable condition of communion, what the New Testament has not enjoined as a condition of salvation. To establish this position, is the principal object of the following work; and though it is more immediately occupied in the discussion of a case which respects the Baptists and the Pædobaptists, that case is attempted to be decided entirely upon the principle now mentioned, and it is no more than the application of it to a particular instance." P. 5.

In other words, if any person applies for the privilege of communion in celebrating the Lord's death, to any particular church, that church should say to him, "if thou believest on the Lord Jesus Christ to the saving of the soul, thou mayest celebrate this supper with us."

The church, however, cannot ascertain the fact, whether he has faith and shall be saved or not; the church, therefore, must admit to communion, or reject one, according to their judgment of the credibility of his profession. This is the doctrine of the book in our hand, that every section of the Christian church ought to admit to occasional or stated fellowship at the Lord's table, as circumstances may require, every one who is, in their judgment of charity, savingly united to the Redeemer of sinners; or every one whose professions and conduct induce them to judge, that he is an heir of salvation. This sentiment we are ready to defend; and most sincerely

wish our Baptist brethren in the United States would either refute the arguments of Mr. Hall, or give some public testimony of their approbation of them. So far as our information extends, they have done neither, but seem inclined to have this treatise on Christian communion buried in oblivion.

The task which our author undertook to perform is more difficult for a Baptist, than one of any other denomination, unless it should be a member of the Reformed Presbyterian church, commonly called a "Covenanter." Against a Baptist, who should attempt to maintain the position, every one who knows the commonly received. opinion concerning immersion will object, "you cannot admit one who has not been buried in water to belong to the visible church; baptism is the initiating rite; and how can the Lord's supper be dispensed to an unbaptized person?"

Mr. Hall has not written without first counting the cost, and considering the consequences of his doctrines:he is willing, therefore, to meet all the arguments which can be adduced against him, when they are presented in their fairest light.

He commences his course of reasoning with this broad and general principle, that the visible church of God is ONE; and thence is led to infer, that the different members of this society, which God has erected in the world, ought to walk together as brethren so far as they are agreed.

Nothing more abhorrent," he observes," from the principles and maxims of the sacred oracles can be conceived, than the idea of a plurality of churches, neither in actual communion with each other, nor in a capacity for such communion. Though this rending of the seamless garment of our Saviour, this schism in the members of his mystical body, is by far the greatest calamity which has befallen the Christian interest, and one of the most fatal effects of the great apostacy foretold by the sacred penman, we have been so long familiarised to it as to be scarcely sensible of its enormity, nor does it excite surprise or concern, in any degree proportioned to what would be felt by one who had contemplated the church in the first ages. To see Christan societies regarding each other with the jealousies of rival empires, each aiming to raise itself on the

ruin of all others, making extravagant boasts of superior purity, generally in exact proportion to their departures from it, and scarcely deigning to acknowledge the possibility of obtaining salvation out of their pale, is the odious and disgusting spectacle which modern Christianity presents. The bond of charity, which unites the genuine followers of Christ in distinction from the world, is dissolved, and the very terms by which it was wont to be denoted, exclusively employed to express a predilection for a sect. The evils which result from this state of division are incalculable: it supplies infidels with their most plausible topics of invective; it hardens the consciences of the irreligious, weakens the hands of the good, impedes the efficacy of prayer, and is probably the principal obstruction to that ample effusion of the Spirit which is essential to the renovation of the world." P. 13.

This is a sketch from a master's hand: and these few strokes present a perfect likeness. We would gladly see all the members of the household of faith commemorating together the death of Jesus in rotation in their different houses for worship; and we would admit too the pious Arminian, Hopkinsian, Episcopalian, Methodist, Lutheran, Catholic, and Quaker, to a seat at the Master's feast; while we should be far from admitting them to the office of a public teacher, or to a participation in the government of the Presbyterian section of the body of Christ, or from believing that the Quakers as a society, make any part of the visible church. If other sections, which think them qualified, elect them to the offices of Bishops, or Pastors, Deacons, Elders, Helps and Governments, they have the privilege of doing so, but because we love them, and the more because we should meet them at the supper of our common Lord, we should continue, with the best wishes for their welfare and the prevalence of the truth, to write, preach, and pray against what we conceive to be their errors; and would have them, like honest men, act a similar part in opposition to us, until the members of the universal church shall have the felicity of conforming to one system of doctrine and one mode of government. In this way we expect to be instrumental in the introduction of the millennial glory of Zion. The most unpleasant circumstances which attend on a scriptural contending for the faith once deliver

ed to the saints, are, that many good people think every argument against error, a firebrand thrown into the temple of the Lord; and that few can read a sensible, spirited and pungent reply to any thing which they have written, without accounting the respondent an enemy, and feeling emotions of anger and resentment. Why should it be thus? Have men no wit, no pith of their own, that they should be indignant at these things in others? Is their mental frame so tender that it falls asunder, if touched by the little finger of criticism? How can our errors be detected if we are never to be met by controversy?

We affirm that we can review a literary friend or a theological foe with severity, without feeling one unkind emotion; and we have never had any disposition to write for the sake of retaliation on those who have written pamphlets and even octavo volumes against us. We intend, if this Theological Review shall meet with encouragement, to treat them with all due respect, in some future numbers.

Mr. Hall has managed his publication in such a way that none can be offended, unless it be the departed spirit of the venerable Booth; for he makes it his business to refute directly his arguments, and his alone, for the close or strict communion of the Baptists. Those who consider baptism by immersion a necessary prerequisite to the Lord's supper under all circumstances, practise what is called "strict communion, while the opposite practise of admitting sincere Christians to the eucharist, though in our judgment not baptized, is styled free communion. Strict communion," he observes, "is the general practise of our churches, though the abettors of the opposite opinion are rapidly increasing both in numbers and respectability." p. 20. The work under review is divided into two parts; in the first of which the author considers, and refutes, the arguments in favour of strict communion; and in the second, exhibits "the positive grounds on which we justify the practice of mixed" or "free com

munion."

The arguments offered against free communion are derived from the supposed priority of baptism to the Lord's supper in the order of institution; from the order VOL. I.

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of words in the apostolic commission to "teach all nations, baptizing them;" from apostolical precedent; from the different significations of the two institutions; and from the general suffrages of all denominations in favour of "baptism as a necessary preliminary to communion."

Mr. Hall shows the fallacy of these arguments, and in doing it, proves, that John's baptism was not Christian baptism. This has long been the doctrine of other denominations; but the Baptists in general have opposed it; being probably induced to look with an unfavourable eye upon it, because their principal arguments in favour of immersion are drawn from the supposed practise of John the Baptizer. He proves to our satisfaction, and we publicly challenge the American Baptists, who have men of learning among them, especially in Philadelphia, to disprove the proposition, if they can, that Christian baptism is an institution of Christ that had no existence before his resurrection. Of course it follows, that in the order of institution the Lord's supper was antecedent to that of baptism in Christ's name. The apostles commemorated the death of the Redeemer in the former ordinance, before they were commissioned to go forth, and baptize the nations, by the authority of him who had finished his work of humiliation; and before they had been themselves partakers of this seal of the new covenant. It is not even certain that the eleven disciples ever were the subjects of it; and it is manifest that the baptism of Christ himself, was not the same with that which he subsequently enjoined. Christ, by his personal ministers, made and baptized disciples, even while John was fulfilling his mission; but it was among the Jews exclusively, for until his resurrection his apostles were forbidden to go, even to the circumcised Samaritans. The baptism of John and that of Christ's disciples before they received their commission to evangelize every creature, were of the same nature; and had particular respect to the speedy introduction of the gospel dispensation.

From the fact, that the apostles celebrated the Lord's supper before they had any knowledge of Christian baptism, our author infers, that there is nothing in the nature of the two institutions that should render the ob