Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	holy_a	scripture_n	tradition_n	3,213	5	9.1899	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A75851	A modest reply humbly offer'd, as an answer to, and confutation of seven arguments collected and deliver'd by Mr. Samuel Lawrence, in a sermon preach'd at his meeting-house in Namptwich, Octob. 16th, 1691, whereby he would shew, that the infants of professing Christians ought to be baptized : with a seasonable word to my brethren of the baptized church / presented by the most unworthiest of her servants, S.A.	Acton, Samuel, d. 1740?; Lawrence, Samuel.	1692 (1692)	Wing A452aA; ESTC R203313	36,660	49

direct us in all things necessary and therefore to the Word they joyn their own Traditions for the rendring it a more compleat and perfect Rule the other accounts it Useless and therefore directs all for Instruction to the Dictates of the Light within Of both these I have only to say Lord deliver my Soul from coming into their Secrets But you and we being agreed in all things touching the Authority and Sufficiency of the Scriptures I presume from thence an equal Freedom in us to refer the Tryal of the things wherein we differ to the Determination of Holy Writ being firmly resolved for myself to abide by its Award sincerely desiring that nothing may pass for Truth but upon their Testimony Now I shall not take notice of any thing you offer in your Sermon preach'd from 1 Cor. 7.14 Else were your children unclean but now are they holy before you come to state the Question 1. Because I would not have this Paper to swell into too great a Bulk 2. Because there is not any thing material but what I shall meet with under one or other of your Arguments shall therefore recite your Doctrine which was this Doctrine That the Seed of Professing Christians have a Right to Baptism and ought thereby to be admitted into the Church or Body of Christ Whether your Text doth preach the same Doctrine you do from it I question and conclude that there is no more a-kin between your Question stated and your Words rightly consider'd in their proper place then there would have been had you drawn the same Conclusion from the first words in Genesis which tells us That in the beginning God made the heaven and the earth as I trust hereafter will be made evident to every judicious and unprejudiced Reader You proceed and say Here I shall not undertake to produce all the Proof that is for it nor answer every Quibble that is brought against it but lay that Foundation which if of God standeth sure and if it stands the contrary must needs fall Ans That you have produced more Proof then the Scripture affords you for your Practice is plain and Scripture-Arguments that strongly make head against your Practice be by you accounted Quibbles is not strange but very strange it is that you see cause to query whether your Foundation be of God and yet dare lend a hand to support a sinking and falling Dagon The Idol could not stand before the Art even so Lord in this our day let Errour fall before thy Truth and help you so to discern the Sandiness of that Foundation upon which all Errour with that of Infant-Baptism is built as that you may better improve the Certainty of its Ruine then those biggotted Priests and blind Philistines did the Fall and Ruine of their adored Dagon 1 Sam. 5.3 4. I now come to your seven Arguments you offer as Proof and Evidence though reasonably we might have expected for Proof and Confirmation of a Doctrine of so great moment two or three Witnesses from Holy Scripture but knowing that no such Evidence is to be found there we shall weigh and allow of your Authority provided your Arguments are strongly concluded in and truly deduced from the Scriptures and because I would not in the least be thought to injure you in my Reply I shall at large recite your several Arguments and so well as I can with the help of some Collections endeavour the Confutation of them And you say in your First ARGUMENT 1. I argue from the Command of Christ Matth. 28.19.20 For 1. the Command is so general as to include not exclude Infants surely they will be allowed to be a considerable Part of the Nations 2. Christ doth here prescribe the way of gathering his Church and preserving it to the end of the World now his Church consists of Infants as well as grown Persons and both are to be dealt with according to that State As to grown Persons First teach them and baptize them as to Infants finding them Disciples baptize them in order to their being taught when capable of it 3. All Nations is set in Opposition to the Jewish Nation therefore as the Disciples would have understood what and whom Christ meant if he had said Go circumcise all Nations c. So and its observable that Baptism was of use amongst them though not a Sacrament before as Maimonides speaks That they baptized the Infant or little Stranger upon the knowledge of the House of Judgment i. e. on their desire in behalf of their Children 4. The Practice of the Apostles in Baptising whole Houshoulds is a plain Comment on the Text and shews how they understood it Acts 16.15.33 1 Cor. 1.16 5. Infants are Disciples Acts 15.10 together with their Parents therefore may be baptized if not Disciples of Man's making so neither was Paul yet of God's making who graciously accepts them and takes them into his Covenant If any object That such Disciples are meant as are capable of observing Christ's Command Ans It 's true as to grown Persons with whom the Apostles had most to do in gathering a Church out of the World to Christ but as the Proselites were first taught and then circumcised but there Children were first circumcised before they were taught so it may and ought to be here nothing in Christ's Commission gainsaying it First ANSWER Whether all that you have said here doth not directly tend to darken Knowledge I refer to your own Conscience and shall leave all wise men to judge when the Text is read and the order of it laid down Our Lord Jesus Christ after he had declared himself invested with absolute Power given him of the Father to be Soveraign Lord and supream Law-giver to the whole World through all Ge-Generations He saith as Mat. 28.19 20. Go ye therefore and teach all Nations baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you And lo I am with you alway even unto the end of the World This Command is so extensive as authorizes the Apostles of our Lord to take in by Baptism all Nations Discipled or so many of all Nations as should be made Disciples but how it includes one Infant that neither is made nor is capable as such of being made a Disciple I see not otherways than as Infants are a considerable part of all Nations and if therefore to be baptized then are all Nations to be baptized by the lump even Infidels Idolaters prophane and abominable persons as they are a part yea the greatest part of all Nations And this will as truly follow as the other if this Command may be understood without restriction but if not then the limitation must needs lye in the Word which says Teach or Disciple then neither the Infant nor prophane person can be admitted by this Text if the Order in which it is laid down be duly considered which

is thus 1. Our Lord Jesus commands them to go to all Nations 2. To teach all Nations or Disciple them 3. That they baptize such so taught or Discipled 4. That they shall further Teach and Instruct such baptized Disciples to observe all other things that Christ hath commanded Now that this and no less than this is intended here will appear with great Evidence from the Consent of such as dissent from us And therefore Mr. Baxter speaking of this Text shews the several Work and Duty of the Apostles in their several Places and Orders who tells us in his second Disputation of Right to Sacraments Pag. 149 150 Their 1. Task is to make Disciples which Mark calls Believers 2. Their work is to baptize them whereunto is annexed the Promise of Salvation 3. Their work is to teach them all other things which are after to be learned in the School of Christ Further saith he To contemn this Order is to contemn all Rules of Order for where can we expect to find it if not here I profess my Conscience is fully satisfied from this Text that it is one sort of Faith even Saving-Faith that must go before Baptism the profession whereof the Minister must expect And in his Poor Man's Family-Book pag. 168. saith The Church never knew any Baptism but such as was joyned with a present profession of present Faith Repentance and Renunciation of the Devil the World and the Flesh and a total devotedness to God and Christ with more to this purpose And the Author of the Annotations began by Mr. Poole upon this Text expresly saith I cannot be of their mind who think persons may be baptized before they be taught we want Presidents of any such Baptisms in the Scripture tho' indeed we find Presidents of persons baptized who had but a small degree of knowledge of the Gospel but it should seem that they were all taught and then baptized Now what this Author saith farther with reference to Infant-Baptism because they are a part of all Nations I leave as that which may justly evidence him guilty of Self-Contradiction and Inconsistence You add further That Christ is here prescribing a way to gather his Church and of preserving it to the Worlds end and That the Church consists of Infants as well as grown persons Answ As to the first we grant that Christ here is prescribing a way of gathering his Church but that his Church was made up of Infants as well as grown persons professing Believers is a bold Assertion and a meer Imposition upon your Auditory having not the least Light or Evidence nor being able to give so much as one Instance of any one Infant that was ever admitted by any of the Apostles a Member of any Church by Baptism in their days Could you do this you would do something to purpose but to undertake this Task would be to labour under an utter Impossibility knowing the old Maxim that says That which appears not is not You further say Had Christ said Go circumcise all Nations the Disciples would have understood what and whom he meant Answ It seems then in your Apprehension the Apostles were ignorant of what Christ meant and what they did in pursuance to his Command they did at a venture Is not this peevish Reasoning and a manifest impeaching Christ and his Disciples Was Christ so dark and unintelligible in what he commanded them that they could not apprehend him Is not Go teach and baptize all Nations as easie to be understood as Go circumcise every Male at eight days old Surely they did understand Christ and you may if you will not put out your own Eyes which I entreat you to have a care of lest continuing to preach up and practise things contrary too or at least not agreeable with the Doctrin of Christ and his Apostles you become culpable and so liable to that Anathema pronounc'd against all tho' an Angel from Heaven that shall preach another Gospel Gal. 1.8 And Maimonides tells you no more than what we allow you That the Jews of old did baptize the Proselyte and little Stranger but in that they did not use Baptism as a Sacrament as you your self acknowledge is a Tradition of the superstitious Jews an Authority sufficient to warrant you in your sprinkling Infants as a Gospel Ordinance Sure Sir this your Practice as well as some of their Traditions bespeaks Christ's Command to be void and of none effect and in plain terms gives the Lye to Mr. Baxter and more in their Comments upon the Commission of Christ For Mr. G. Lawson in his Magna Charta dedicated to Hen. B. of London pag. 27 28. tells us That the word Teach before baptizing imports a teaching with success so as to cause the persons taught to learn i. e. to receive their Doctrin understand it approve it be convinced of the Truth of it and be converted by it so far as to be made Christians And so the Apostles understood Christ as is evident by their whole practise and if you dare not say that they were mistaken in the mind of Christ I am sorry you give me occasion to tell you that you are and as a Friend I advise you to correct the mistake you are under and act for time to come more conformably to Christ's Doct●in and his Apostles Practice But you further urge The practice of the Apostles in baptizing whole Housholds for your practice in baptizing Infants Answ That Housholds was baptized we grant but that Infants was in those Houses is more than you can prove and the best ground you have for your Practice here is Probability there may be and may not be is too slight a Ground to build so great an Ordinance upon as Baptism We could give you an account of as many Housholds in this County if not in this Town that are baptized and that have no Children in them as you read of in the Gospel but admit there were Children which remains for you to prove yet it follows not that they were baptized it being usual in Scripture to take a part for the whole as 1 Sam. 1.21 saith All the House went up to offer the yearly Sacrifice yea the 22 23. Verses say expresly That Hannah and her Child Samuel went not up yet all the House So Luke 2.1 In those days went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed yet who will understand any other part of the World than that within his own Dominions and within the bounds of his own Territories yet all the world And so in many other places But to speak of these Housholds in particular will if I mistake not turn your own Artillery against you which we shall do in a few words and 1. To the Houshold of Lydia 'T is said she and her Household was baptized Acts 16.15 but no ground to conclude that there were any Infants there but a fair ground to suspect the contrary and that she might