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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
doctrine_n	know_v	scripture_n	tradition_n	2,389	5	9.3614	5	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
B23662	The controversie about infants church-membership and baptism, epitomized in two treatises the first, shewing the certainty of the salvation of all dying infants, against the doctrine of the Pædo-baptists, who deny salvation to all infants that die unbaptized, either directly, or by the natural consequence of their arguments : the second, being a plain confutation of Mr. J.B. his second book of more than 60 queries, about infants church-membership and baptism, by a proportionable number of antiqueries : being an essay towards a more Christian accomodation between the Pædo-baptists, and the baptized believers, published for that happy end / by Thomas Grantham.	Grantham, Thomas, 1634-1692.; Grantham, Thomas, 1634-1692. Querist examined.	1680 (1680)	Wing G1529	50,899	65

THE CONTROVERSIE ABOUT Infants Church-Membership and BAPTISM Epitomized In two TREATISES The First Shewing the certainty of the Salvation of all Dying Infants against the Doctrine of the Paedo-Baptists who deny Salvation to all Infants that die Unbaptized either directly or by the natural Consequence of their Arguments The Second Being a plain Confutation of Mr. J. B. his second Book of more than 60 Queries about Infants Church-Membership and Baptism by a proportionable number of Antiqueries Being an Essay towards a more Christian Accommodation between the Paedo-Baptists and the Baptized Believers Published for that happy end By THOMAS GRANTHAM Author of The Querist Examined wherein Fifty Queries gathered and propounded by the said J. B. are Redargued Mr. Baxter tells us in his Saints Rest p. 179. 3 d Edit That in the Primitive Times none were Baptized without an express Covenanting wherein they renounced the World the Flesh and the Devil and engaged themselves to Christ and promised to obey Him LONDON Printed in the Year 1680. To Mr. J. B. Collector of the Queries c. SIR I Shall here requite your Thanks you gave me in your last by returning Thanks to you for your endeavours for Peace among differing Christians and particularly for the terms propounded for an Accommodation and I find the same delivered lately by Mr. Baxter himself for which I return him thanks also For methinks there wants but a little more than is offered towards the obtaining so much Union between the Baptists and Paedo-Baptists as might make them a great Blessing one to another But Sir now give me leave to blame you and Mr. Baxter also for misrepresenting your Friends the Baptized Churches Whilst you in your Epistle and he in his Books do represent us to the World as a People who exclude Infants from Gospel Grace deny them to be capable of Pardon by a gracious Covenant as if we left all Infants in the Kingdom of the Devil took away all Comfort from Parents concerning their dying Infants When yet it is most certain all these things are utterly untrue and it is also certain that our Doctrine concerning dying Infants is far more comfortable than yours as I am persuaded will appear to such as read the ensuing Treatises And I am also persuaded could there be once a free and friendly Debate between the Baptists and Pedo Baptists about Infants interest in the Covenant of Grace and the certainty of their Salvation by Christ without incumbring that Discourse with Baptism it were easie to compose their Difference in that Point Which done it 's hoped might be no impossible thing to accommodate their difference in the case of Baptism it self But whilst these two things are confounded Disputes are Perplexed in so much as that a right understanding can hardly be attained on either side Nor do many Readers understand what Mr. B. means when he would have Infants admitted Members of the Visible Church by the Law of Infants Church-Membership unrepealed any more than they know what is intended on Mr. T 's part by their being taken to be Members by a Transient Fact both passages being too occult for every Reader Sir let me say this farther Could but the Reformed Christians once get over this stumbling-block of Paedo-Rantism and resolve upon the way of Believers Baptism which is so perspicuous in the Scripture and in the mean time take the most solemn way which might be warrantable to dedicate their Infants to God in the Name of Christ It would certainly prove the best Expedient to bring down the Papal Confidence for as they know and acknowledg that usage to stand upon the authority of Tradition and not upon the Scripture Warrant so they glory over the Protestant for his Inconstancy in denying unwritten Tradition and yet their very Baptism hath no other Foundation But were the Doctrine of Baptism purged from this Leven and restored to its Primitive Purity it would find all the Universities of the Papists as much business to defend their Infant Sprinkling as ever they were at to defend their Transubstantiation What you write concerning my Querist Examined I shall take little Notice of especially for that I find it attended with overmuch Levity and at the most is but a kind of Carping at Words rather than a solid Answer and there seems to me an unwillingness in you to understand what you flirt at about the Messenger's Office and about Imposition of Hands which being no Scriptureless Matters as your Paedo-Rantism is requires your more serious thoughts whether you understand or like my Sentiments there or not I am your Real Friend THO. GRANTHAM The Controversie of Infants Church-Membership and Baptism Epitomized The first Treatise shewing the certainty of the Salvation of all Dying Infants SECTION I. IT is evident by the Writings of many Paedo-Baptists both Papists Prelatists and Presbyterians that they do all either hold absolutely that no Unbaptized Infant can be saved or at least that their Salvation is very doubtful And among these Mr. Baxter and from him Mr. J. B. hath not a little amused the Minds of Men about this Matter Only they have used a more subtle way coupling the Church-Membership of Infants with Baptism confounding thereby the Readers and themselves too they not being able to say which hath the Precedency for if Infants be Church-Members without or before they be Baptized let them say so and let them prove it well I shall be glad to see it done But then let them never say as Mr. J. B. doth in his Epistle and Mr. Baxter in his Books That Infants are not so much as seemingly in a state of Salvation that Parents can have no comfort of their dying Children Making Baptism the soveraign Antidote against their Griefs and Fears when they are removed in Infancy As will appear more fully in the Examination of the Queries in the second Treatise Now this new art of pleading for Infant-Baptism by virtue of their Church-Membership and not from the Scriptures directly as others have assayed to do but could never perform the Task and therefore have been forced to take sanctuary with the Papists in unwritten Traditions and that with ill success I say considering this new Subtilty of Mr. Baxter I perceived the Controversie to rise very high and Questions thereupon to be greatly multiplied especially upon the Point of Infants Church-Membership Hereupon I thought it needful to consider this Matter for I perceived very good Men engaged on both sides and as I conceive much more straining in the Point than needed by which means the Reader shall sooner fill his Head with amazement than satisfaction in tracing the several windings of their Disputations Nor do I think my self wiser than they but having the advantage to stand and view whilst they engage I hope I have thereby been led to the consideration of a Medium which if duly considered and improved by better Pens than mine will I am much persuaded reconcile the difference about Infants visible

did the thing indeed Suppose any should bring Infants to the Lord's Table what evil can you shew us in the nature of the thing that we cannot as well shew you in the nature of your Crossing or Sprinkling And how dare you crack it up to be more solemn than our way of Baptizing Repenting Believers Do we deny any to be present when we Baptize that are fit to be present And why do you count the Footsteps of Christ and his Flock immodest in comparison of your own Tradition But more of your Immodesty anon J. B. If God would have Infants to be Church-Members and so entered by Baptism are not all these Objections against God and a Carping at his Way T. G. Whether this be not an idle Query And seeing it does not appear that it is the Will of God that Infants should be admitted to the Church professing the Gospel by Baptism are not you evidently the Men that carp at the People of God and complain because Men will not lay aside the Command of God and observe your Fancies and Traditions DIVISION VI. About deferring or delaying Infant-Baptism J. B. 1. Where do you find one word of Precept or Example in all the Bible for the deferring the Baptism of any Child of a Christian till years of Discretion Should you not bring some Scripture for your Way c. T. G. Whether it be not vain in you to talk of our delaying Baptism when we take the first tender of any Person unless we have just cause to the contrary to dispence that sacred Ordinance Does not DELAY suppose a present capacity and obligation for Duty and then to put it off But what Scripture have you to Baptize Members of the Church and then to delay their other Duties and Privileges for 15 or 16 Years And what Precept or Example have you to Baptize Persons when they are asleep As your Infants often are when you Sprinkle them And who taught you to Baptize Persons per force whether they will or no As that is your common practice As is confessed when we are told by Austin That Infants do strive against Baptism with great Crying J. B. 2. Is not your Way inconsistent with obedience to the Rule Is it not Christ's Rule that Persons shall be Baptized without delay when they are first made Disciples Doth not this appear Mat. 28. 19 20. How can you Baptize any when they are first made Disciples unless it be in their Infancy c. T. G. Why do you not come forth and make some one Infant at least a Disciple according to Mat. 28. 19 Would not such a thing done by you do more to decide this Controversy than a thousand Queries I require you to come to the Test here or else may we not justly count you vain Talkers and especially you of the Presbyterians who whilst you boast more of making Infants Disciples than other Pedo-baptists yet you do no more than they that is just nothing And why do you suggest that we cannot tell when a Person is first made a Disciple Did the Apostles know this or not And why may not others know this as well as they Seeing they judged not in this case by immediate Revelation but by Persons gladly receiving their Doctrine Acts 2. 40 41. And how can you tell when an Infant is first made a Disciple Are you not ashamed to pretend to know with ease what is not to be known at all that so you might make all Men ignorant of that they ought to know J. B. 3. Would not this Practice of yours necessarily fill the Church with perpetual Contentions as being about a Matter that cannot be determined by any known Rule c. T. G. May I not be confident that it is hard for any Man to query more indiscretly than he that formed this Query But Sir we are sure your Practice hath filled the World with Contention both in former and latter Ages your Bishops could not agree on what Day to Baptize Infants you cannot tell us the Day He that should not be Baptized till you Ministers agree this Point by one Voice should he ever be Baptized As for us we have a known Rule to walk by and that is to Baptize them the same day they are Converted if they reject it not Acts 2. 41. Then they that gladly received the Word were Baptized and the same day was added unto them about three thousand Souls Yet it may be thought that the noble Bereans were longer about it because they searched the Scriptures daily to see whether things were so Yet who but such as feed on Fancies would imagine the time when they were to be Baptized could not be determined by any known Rule And why Forsooth because they came gradually to the knowledg of the Truth spectatum admissi c. J. B. 4. When you pretend to ground your practice on Mat. 28. 19 20. would not your Doctrine turn Baptism for most part out of the Churches of the Saints For according to you only they that are made Disciples by Ministerial Teaching directly should be Baptized c. T. G. Whether this your talk of directly indirectly and remotely discipling the Seed in the Parent be not plain Barbarisms rather than the Simplicity of the Gospel And that cunning Craftiness whereby you deceive your Admirers And whether such your indirect doings have not turned holy Baptism for the most part out of the World But do you not err to suggest that we would have none made Disciples but by immediate Ministerial Instruction Does not Mat. 28. 19 20. shew that Ministers are to teach those whom they have discipled to observe the things which Christ commanded his Apostles and is there not liberty sufficient here for every one to spread the knowledg of the Gospel as he is able in his Family or elsewhere as God gives him opportunity And is it not a great shame that you should thus forge an Opinion to be ours which we never owned and then to quibble upon it as you do I profess I am ashamed to reade you in this and many of these your imprudent Queries which I cannot perceive to have any design but to throw stumbling Blocks in the way of Christians generally and to make them question almost every thing DIVISION VII About the manner of Baptizing J. B. 1. Your ordinary practice of Baptizing by Dipping over Head in cold Water which you use as necessary is it not a breach of the Sixth Commandment Thou shalt not kill c. T. G. Is not this Query blasphemous In that it reproacheth the Footsteps of God's Anointed Was not Christ Baptized of John into Jordan So the Greek reads it Was not that cold Water seeing he was Baptized in the Winter season for he was born about Mid-winter and Baptized when he began to be about thirty Years of Age must it not then be about the same time of Winter Is there any Form of Baptism necessary Or hath God left that to