Thy holy Spirit more and more, until he come to Thine everlasting kingdom. Amen. IX. Confirm and strengthen them CHAP. Then the bishop shall (G) cross them in the forehead, and lay his hands upon their heads, saying, N. I sign thee with the sign of the cross, and lay my hand upon thee. In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. And thus shall he do to every child, one after another. Omitted in Bucer. The peace of the Lord abide with you. And with thy spirit. [Common Prayer. Then shall the bishop say.] Let us pray. Almighty everliving God, which maketh us both to will, and to do those things that be good and acceptable unto Thy Majesty: we make our humble supplications unto Thee for these children, upon whom (after the example of Thy holy 249 Apostles) we have laid our hands, to certify them (by this sign) of Thy fabour, and gracious goodness toward them: let Thy fatherly hand, we beseech Thee, eber be over them, let Thy holy Spirit ever be with them, and so lead them in the knowledge and obedience of Thy word, that in the end they may obtain the everlasting life, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who with Thee and the Holy Ghost libeth and reigneth one God, world without end. Amen. Then the bishop shall bless the children, saying thus, The blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, be upon you, and remain with you for ever. Amen. The curate of every parish, or some other, at his appointment, shall diligently upon Sundays and holy-days, half an him given, shall, upon some Sunday e [1 B. of Edw. VI. "once in six weeks at the least, upon warning by СНАР. enclosed hour before even-song, openly in the church, instruct and And all fathers, mothers, masters, and dames, shall cause their children, servants, and apprentices, which have not learned their Catechism, to come to the church at the time appointed, and obediently to hear, and be ordered by the curate, until such time as they have learned all that is here appointed for them to learn. And whensoever the bishop shall give knowledge for children to be brought afore him to any convenient place, for their confirmation; then shall the curate of every parish either bring or send in writing (H) the names of all those children of his parish which can say the Articles of the Faith, the Lord's Prayer, and the Ten Commandments, and also how many of them can answer to the other questions contained in this Catechism. The words And there shall none be admitted to the holy Commu- I nion, until such time as he [can say the Catechism,] and be confirmed. thus [ omitted in the 1 B. of Edw.VI. d [1 B. of Edw. VI. " which are not yet confirmed."] e [1 B. of Edw. VI. "day."] 251 ANNOTATIONS UPON A CHAPTER IX. IX. (A) Confirmation, in what sense a Sacrament. The closing ceremony of CHAP. baptism. Why very expedient at this time. The Directory defective towards her own principles. (B) Confirmation, by what names anciently called. (C) The necessity of catechising. What catechists were; a dissent from learned men; catechists not presbyters; usually laymen. Women catechised by women, and why; an especial reason for it in the Greek Church. Sanctimonial catechumens, what; not the same with audientes, as is commonly supposed in what sense sometimes called audientes. Lent set apart for catechising. Competents, what. The excellency of our Catechism. King James's most judicious direction. (D) The language of the hand. What imposition of hands denoteth. (E) Confirmation peculiar to the Apostles, and their successors, bishops. Why so. Never performed by presbyters. What meant by presbyteri consignant in the counterfeit Ambrose. (F) Unction, or chrism, an ancient ceremony belonging to confirmation; why separated at length from it and indulged to presbyters. The Arausican council; diversity of readings. Sirmundus's edition defended. Whence two chrismations in the Church of Rome. (G) Signing with the cross a companion of unction. (H) Children when anciently confirmed. (I) Communication of the Eucharist to succeed presently upon confirmation. CONFIRMATION is by the Church of Rome held for a Sacrament, and so some of the ancient fathers represent it. St. Cyprian, speaking of baptism and confirmation: tunc esse filii Dei esse possunt, si utroque Sacramento nascantur: "then are they made the sons of God, when they are born again by both Sacraments." So St. Augustine mentions chrismatis Sacramentum, and in both their senses (they applying that title to all things of mysterious import in a large construction, as Augustine not less than nineteen times in his de Celebratione Pasche) we will allow this for a Sacrament. But a Epist. Ixxii. ad Stephanum. Lib. ii. cont. lit. Peril. 239. IX. CHAP. that it is so, in true propriety of speech, our adversaries shall never obtain from us, until they can find verbum et elementum, and both of Christ's institution, to meet in it; neither of which, as they confess, are yet to be found, their great cardinal putting us off for both to "tradition unwritten." But although we entertain it not as a Sacrament, yet being of Apostolical practice, and exercised with the product of such marvellous effects and operations, we, who pretend not to any such miraculous gifts, have not yet so slight a value for it as absolutely to reject it, being well persuaded that, accompanied with such fervent prayers, it will be the readier way to convey those graces of the Holy Spirit into the soul of the party baptized, which are necessary to "establish him in every good word and work." For the gift of the Holy Ghost, in order to which this rite is used, is not so much an effect 252 of the hands imposed, as of the invocation then applied: ad invocationem sacerdotis Spiritus Sanctus infunditur, saith St. Ambrosed very well, "at the invocation of the bishop the Holy Ghost is infused." This ceremony was considered by the Apostles, and succeeding fathers, as the completory and close of baptism, not that baptism was ineffectual without it, but as an assistant to it; and therefore confirmation in persons adult immediately succeeded the very act of baptizing and dipping. And if the primitive Church held herself obliged to preserve it upon the score of Apostolical usage, and to tender it to such as were of full growth, much more reason have we to continue it, with whom pædo-baptism is almost the sole practice. Baptism, as the Apostle St. Peter describeth it, is τῆς ἀγαθῆς συνειδήσεως Éπηpóτnμa eis Ocóv: "the answer," or rather an interrogatory, "of a good conscience towards God:" that is, a question how the party stands disposed towards God, not unlike our interrogatory, "dost thou forsake the devil," &c. To take off the supposed vanity of this interrogatory administered to infants, who are in no capacity to reply, the Church, their most tender mother, hath devised this expedient of assigning sureties to undertake in their behalf, what Christianity requireth from them; they being thus charitably provided for, in the minority of their intellectuals, extreme rational it is, that the Bellarm. de Sacram. Confirm., c. 8. ત [De Sacramentis, lib. iii. cap. 2.] B IX. Church exact from them, and that they render to her, an ac- CHAP. count when they come to riper years, what progress they have made in learning the elements of the Christian faith; exceeding proper it is they enter new security to her that they will, by God's grace, make good those stipulations and promises which their sureties undertook before in their behalf, and that after all these they may receive the Church's benediction, administered to them by the bishop, their spiritual father. There is not any thing wherein the late pretended reformers amaze me more than in this particular. I hear them declare, "that all who are baptized in the Name of Christ, do renounce, and by their baptism are bound to fight against the devil, the world, and the flesh." And yet by abolishing of sureties, they render infants unable to make such abrenunciation, or take such an engagement by their proxies, and do not any where throughout all their appointments, require from persons baptized, when they become adult, any such actual promise. Where is then this renunciation and obligation entered against those common enemies these men talk of? If they say they are mental, supposed and implied, I answer, that it is not enough; the Church must take cognizance of all her members, that they are all of a piece, that they agree in unity of profession, which she cannot, unless they give her not only some verbal account of their knowledge in the principles of religion, but also explicit promises to live agreeable to those principles. And therefore it surpasseth my understanding with what colour of reason they can admit such persons to the highest degree of Christian society, the blessed Communion, who never engaged to conform to the rules of Christianity. Have all things necessary for their salvation.] The outward essentials of baptism are the element, water; and the words of institution, "I baptize thee in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost." These, without more ado, constitute a seal all-sufficient to initiate children within the gospel covenant; no absolute necessity have they, as children, of any thing else. But though, as children, they want nothing necessary for their salvation, yet have they not all things necessary for years more adult, when of another Sa • Directory. |