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A42248
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The grounds of infant-baptism briefly explained
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1693
(1693)
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Wing G2138C; ESTC R222580
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20,167
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16
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THE GROUNDS OF Infant-Baptism Briefly EXPLAINED GOD's Word plainly declareth That it is sufficient Qualification for Baptism if Persons be Believers If thou believest withal thine heart thou mayest be baptized Act. 8. 36 37. Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved Mark 16.15 16. Now the Infants of Christian Parents are either Believers or Unbelievers or neither Believers nor Unbelievers but a third kind middle between both A third kind of Persons who are neither Believers nor Unbelievers but middle between both cannot be the Scripture knoweth none such it is contrary to the Tenour of God's Word and to the Grounds of Religion and to the Common Belief of Christendom and will Ubi ponis parvulos baptizatos Profecto in numero credentium August de Verbis Apostoli Ser. 14. infer one of these two impious Absurdities either that Infants are bruit Beasts or that dying in Infancy they are neither saved not damned but remain in a Third State middle between Heaven and Hell for ever If you suppose the Infants of Christian Parents to be Unbelievers then in reason you must suppose that they be all so and dying in Infancy Unbelievers they must needs be damned For Christ plainly saith That he which believeth not shall be damned he is condemned already he shall not see life but the wrath of God abideth on him Mark 16. 16. John 3. 18 36. And if all the Infants of Christian Parents dying in Infancy are damned Unbelievers we have much more reason to conclude that all the Infants of Heathen Parents dying in Infancy are so too But sure that Doctrine cannot be true which adjudgeth all Infants taken away in Infancy to inevitable Damnation for ever It remains then that the Infants of Christian Parents are Believers and therefore baptizable § II. Though Infants are not capable of actual Faith after the similitude of vigilant grown Men yet they are capable of the inward Seed and Root thereof after the similitude of grown Men in their Sleep while their Sleep 1 Joh. 3. 9. Luk. 1. 15 35. Jer. 1. 5. lasteth and as Jeremy and John Baptist were sanctified from the Womb and as the Infant Jesus was holy and as David was made to hope when he was upon his Psal 22. 9. mothers breasts The Soul of each Infant is a Spiritual Substance and being so it must needs be immortal and some way or other in act from the time that it is put into the Body and while it is in the Body it doth animate and quicken the Body and is the Life thereof and is always upon its way to Eternity without 1 Cor. 7. 14. all stop or stay and either it is by supernatural Grace inwardly holy in the sight of God and so in the way to Heaven or it is destitute of supernatural Grace and then it is inwardly unholy and unclean in the sight of God and so in the way to Hell Our Brethren the Opposers of Infant Baptism confess That from Their Confession of Faith p. 24. Adam and Eve the Common Parents of us all corrupted Nature was conveyed to all their Posterity descending from them by ordinary Generation being now conceived in Sin and by Nature Children of Wrath the Servants of Sin the Subjects of Death and all other Miseries Spiritual Temporal and Eternal unless the Lord Jesus set them free Now Infants being inwardly infected and defiled with Sin and Corruption as the Great Disease of lapsed Humane Nature they must needs be by Divine Grace capable of Cure and Remedy which Cure and Remedy cannot be without super natural Regeneration whereby their Souls are inwardly renewed and made Partakers of the Divine and Godly Nature conformably to the Image of the Infant Jesus whose Soul while he was an Infant did overflow 2 Pet. 1. 4. H b. 1. 9. 2. 11 12. Rom. 8. 29. Joh. 20. 17. Luk. 1. 35. 2.40 Joh. 3. 3 5 6. with the Seed of Divine Faith Hope Love Meekness Piety and all other Coelestial Graces a degree and measure whereof God worketh in all Elect Infants in respect whereof the Infant Jesus and they are Brethren and Fellows there is spiritual similitude between them The Infant Jesus is considerable two ways First In respect of the Natural Substance of his Soul and Body and so there is similitude between him and all other Infants for they also have Souls and Bodies no less than the Infant Jesus this similitude is natural and common Secondly In the Infant Jesus besides the natural Substance of his Soul and Body there is by supernatural Grace and gracious Donation and Endowment the Seed and Root of all Divine and Heavenly Vertues which are the Life of the Soul like as the Soul is the Life of the Body these Divine and Heavenly Vertues did emidently shine forth in the Life of Christ when grown up Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favour with God and man The Seed and Luke 2. 52. Root of all Heavenly Vertues was by supernatural Grace in his Soul while he was in the Virgin 's Womb and as soon as he was born of her but did not appear till he was arrived to some maturity When he was grown to Man's Estate he did use to take his Rest in Sleep and while be slept the inward Heavenly Vertues and Graces of his Mind did not appear but the Seed and Root thereof lay hid in his Soul Now between such Infants as Jeremy and John Baptist who are by supernatural Grace born of God and holy from the Womb and the Infant Jesus there is spiritual and special similitude But between Infants unregenerate and unholy and the Infant Jesus there is no spiritual and special similitude Gen. 3. 15. Isa 42. 1. Rom. 9 8. but contrariety as between the Seed of the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman between Non-Elect and Elect. No reason can be rendred why the Infants of Christian Parents should not be as truly capable of being Believers as the Infant Jesus was of being a Saviour Vnto you is born this day in the city of Luk. 2. 11. Mat. 1. 21. David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. She shall bring forth a Son and thou shalt call his name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins As if you suppose the Infant Jesus Christ not to be the Saviour of Souls it cannot be declared when he comes to be the Saviour of Souls So if you suppose the Infants of Believing Parents not to be a kind of Believers it cannot be declared when the Children born of Believing Parents come to be in the Number of Believers in what Year of their Lives If the Infancy of Jesus Christ could not barr him from being Jesus Christ the Mediator between God and Men the Head of the Church and the Saviour thereof when he sucked his Mother's Breasts By the same reason the state of