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duty_n	child_n	law_n	parent_n	4,009	5	8.7116	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33967	The improvableness of water-baptism, or, A discourse concerning the gravity and seriousness of the action and the usefulness of the sacred institution of baptism instructing all parents how great a thing they do when they bring their children to that holy ordinance, and all persons, whether young or old, what obligations their baptism hath brought them under, what wrath it hath exposed wicked and impenitent persons to, and what use they may make of their baptism for confirmation of their faith, and quickening them to repentance and an holy life : discoursed from Rom. 6:3,4, by way of sermon / by John Collinges ...	Collinges, John, 1623-1690.	1681 (1681)	Wing C5321; ESTC R5112	38,449	47

Citizens and fellow-Soldiers so it ought to engage us to endeavour unity that we are fellow-members of the same body and fellow-Citizens of the same City There is but one body and we were all baptized into that one body 3. It is useful to quicken us both to the exercises of faith and To the Exercises of faith and of repentance repentance The force of this lyeth in the solemn dedication of the person to God and the Souls solemn engagement in it to be the Lords both which inseparably attend this holy Institution The soul thus reasoneth with it self I was by nature a child of wrath a great sinner blind unbelieving when I was baptized I was dedicated to God I solemnly engaged my self to the service of God I cannot be the Lords without repenting and believing his word and also a receiving of the Lord Jesus Christ whom God hath revealed to be the Saviour of them that believe Had I been an Heathen I ought not to have been baptized until I had given an evidence of my repentance my hearty imbracing the Doctrine of the Gospel and as hearty closing with the Lord Jesus Christ as my hope and my Saviour Now though I was baptized when a child in my parents right yet if I ever hope to be saved this cannot excuse me from those great duties of Repentance and Faith which God hath made inseparably necessary to salvation As Circumcision availeth nothing to those who did not keep the Law so Baptism availeth as little to those who perform not the terms of the Gospel Besides when I was baptized though an Infant I could not indeed engage for my self but my parents engaged for me that so far as lay in them I should repent and believe they have fulfilled their parts to me in calling upon me for it and pressing these things upon me or if they have not yet the Covenant of God is in my flesh and I am ingaged to do these things not only because they are the necessary terms of my salvation but in regard I have covenanted in Baptism to do it It is true it is not in my power without the special efficacious grace of God to repent or to believe but I am under the Oath of God to do what in me lyes to do it to avoid those gross sins which it is in my power to avoid by vertue of the common grace of God denied to no man Wherein I have offended to set down sadly to reflect on them and to beg of God a broken heart for them to wait upon all holy Institutions which may be conducive to these ends c. 4. To name no more It is useful to quicken us up to Holiness and that part of it especially which lyeth in the mortification of our To the exercise of Mortification members Why because saith the Apostle we are Baptized into his death and buried with him by baptism into death We are not only baptized into a belief and a profession of a belief of his death but into a fellowship with his death a part of which lies in a dying to sin as he dyed for sin For saith the Apostle Peter 1 Pet. 4. 1. He that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men but to the will of God Observe the words which go before v. 2. For as much therefore as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh arm your selves likewise with the same mind c. From whence I infer That our fellowship with Christs suffering in the flesh lyeth in our cessation from sin Now I have shewed you that in Baptism a Sacramental representation of Christs suffering in the flesh and our submission to that holy Institution engageth us to a conformity to the death of Christ and to a fellowship with it that is to a ceasing from sin For saith my text we are buried with him by baptism into death and it followeth That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the father even so we also should walk in newness of life And again v. 6. Knowing that our old man was crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed that henceforth we should not serve sin For he that is dead is free from sin The meditation of this is of great use to ingage us to Holiness as there is in this Ordinance an ingagement upon us to dye unto sin and to maintain that as well as other parts of the spiritual fight Thus I have shewed you the usefulness of this Ordinance to quicken the soul 3. It is useful likewise to corroborate and strengthen the soul Baptism how it is useful to help and strengthen the Soul and that both in the Exercises of faith and of holiness 1. In the exercises of faith Faith either respects the Proposition of the word which faith agreeth to as truth Or 2. The person of the Mediator who alone is the object of saving justifying faith the primary and more remote object though the promises of the Gospel be the proximate and mediate object in and by which the soul receiveth Christ and by means of which through the assistance of the Spirit the soul committeth it self to him as to all its spiritual concerns respecting eternal life and salvation As to both these Baptism is if made use of a great help Indeed all Sacramental signs are so and given for that end I remember when God instituted the Jewish Passover after the describing the rise of it Exod. 12. from v. 3. to v. 26. he addeth v. 26 and 27. And it shall come to pass that when your children shall say unto you What mean you by this service you shall say It is the sacrifice of the Lords Passover who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt when he smote the Egyptians and delivered our houses God foresaw that that great deliverance would in time be forgotten or not believed that God should shew such favour to a small oppressed number of people as to bring them out of slavery to slay one in every family of the Egyptians might be questioned especially considering the world was never very apt to believe stories of distinguishing Grace or Providence therefore God instituted the Passover to continue the memory and revive the faith of so great a salvation But how much greater a salvation was here For God to send forth his own Son the Antitype to that Paschal lamb to take upon him our flesh and to dye in our nature for sinners upon the Cross to agree to this was like to be a much harder exercise of faith To revive the memory and keep alive the exercise therefore of faith as to this miracle of salvation God instituted two Sacraments of the New Testament ordained two sacred Actions to be done that when our Children should say to us Father or Mother What is the meaning

Christ So that either these things must be true undoubtedly true or the whole Christian World in all ages hath been mistaken 2. It seateth and confirmeth this unto us That if we truly repent and receive the Lord Jesus Christ our sins shall be washed away with his blood and sin shall not have dominion over us These are the two great promises of the Gospel and in Baptism there is a mutual stipulation it is neither a single promise on Gods part to us nor a single vow on our part to God but it is a Covenant Gods Covenant in our flesh as God himself stiled Circumcision to which Baptism succeedeth being a seal of the same Covenant 3. It is a confirmation to us of our favour with God liberty of access unto God In baptism we have the Name of God put upon us the baptized person like the circumcised Jew is called by Gods Name In populum Dei adoptatur he is adopted into Gods family It is very pleasant to see and observe what use the servants of God have made of this being called by Gods Name in their pleadings with God Jer. 14 9. Thou O Lord art in the midst of us and we are called by thy name leave us not Jer. 15. 16. I am called by thy name O thou Lord God of Hosts Dan. 9. 18 19. O my God incline thine ear and hear and behold our desolations and the City which is called by thy name O Lord hear O Lord forgive O Lord hearken and do for thine own sake O my God for thy City and thy people are called by thy name Shall not a Christian that forgets not the kindness of his youth and the love of his Espousals go to God and say Lord leave me not I was baptized into thy name or Lord help me for I was baptized into thy name Mark how many Promises are made to those that are called by the Lords name 2 Chron. 7. 13 14. If I shut up heaven that there be no rain c. If my people which are called by my name shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land So Isa 46. 6 7. I will say to the North Give up and to the South Keep not back bring my sons from far and my daughters from the end of the earth even every one that is called by my name for I have created him for my glory I have formed him yea I have made him Admitting a soul to live up to his Baptismal-dedication and Covenant his Baptism furnisheth him with a great argument to go unto God with and with a great confidence and boldness in his addresses to the throne of Grace by reason of the promises to persons under those circumstances Thus I have largely shewed you the usefulness of this sacred Institution and finished this my first branch of Application I now proceed to further branches Instruct 2. Observe from hence how great the duty is which lieth upon all baptized persons I will open it to you in three or four particulars 1. There lyeth a duty upon them to hold fast the profession of the faith of the Gospel Jude v. 3. exhorteth that we should contend earnestly for the faith which was once delivered to the Saints St. Paul Phil. 1. 27. commands us together to strive for the faith of the Gospel The Apostle to the Hebrews calls to us to hold fast our profession Heb 4. 14. The profession of our faith Heb. 10. 23. This discourse will let you see the engagement which we have to do it we are baptized into it we are striving for needless Rites and Ceremonies things of no value and in the mean time forget this striving for the fundamental truths of the Gospel These are the things we are to strive to contend for to be tenacious of our Baptism layeth an engagement upon us as to this for we are not baptized into Moses but into Christ that is into the publick and steady profession of the Truths and Doctrine of the Gospel and whosoever apostatizeth from that profession renounceth his Baptism forgetting both his own dedication in it and his own Covenant and obligation by it Baptized persons have set to their seal that God is true and the Doctrine of his Gospel is true and that they will own it and persevere in it 2. Hence it appears That all baptized persons are by their Baptism obliged to the acceptation of Christ as their spiritual husband I have saith the Apostle espoused you to one husband that one husband is Christ the contract is made in Baptism the espousals are upon the admission of the soul into the fellowship of the Church upon the visible evidence of his faith and repentance You know sometimes there are Contracts betwixt persons that are not of age for the consummation of Marriage the contract is in verbis de futuro in words respecting the time that is to come the Marriage is in verbis de praesenti in words obliging for the present The differences are in those words I will take which are the words of a contract and I do take which are the words used in an actual Marriage Every person in Baptism is contracted to Christ Every person is not of age for an actual Marriage to which Repentance and Knowledge are precedaneous But every Baptized Infant saith I will take Christ for my wedded husband and Lord. The Act in Infant-baptism is indeed rather the Act of the Parents than the Childs which is not yet capable of a rational act But be it so the Parent hath such a right in the Child that it stands bound to abide by the Act of its Natural Guardian unless the child grown up can shew a sufficient reason to the contrary It is thus adjudged as to all legal Acts what the legal Guardian doth the Infant and person in Non-age doth It holdeth much more in things spiritual where there is a precedaneous obligation to any humane Law upon every child to confirm and justifie its Parents act For every soul is bound to this and the Parent herein engageth the child no further than was its precedaneous duty in obedience to God so as the Parents obligation that the child should accept of Jesus Christ as its Saviour and perform what God requireth of it in order to its salvation is really an obligation upon the child to do what its spiritual Guardian hath solemnly obliged for it so as every baptized person stands bound to believe in the Lord Jesus and to live an holy life 3. It followeth from hence That there is a duty incumbent upon all good Christians even with their blood to maintain and defend the truth of the Gospel I would be rightly understood not that all men are engaged in such cases to take up Arms in the defence of the greatest Truths of the Gospel that requireth a lawful authority to call them to

THE IMPROVABLENESS OF Water-Baptism OR A DISCOURSE CONCERNING The Gravity and Seriousness of the Action AND THE Vsefulness of the Sacred Institution of BAPTISM Instructing all Parents how great a thing they do when they bring their Children to that Holy Ordinance And all Persons whether young or old what Obligations their Baptism hath brought them under what Wrath it hath exposed wicked and impenitent persons to and what Vse they may make of their Baptism for Confirmation of their Faith and quickning them to Repentance and an holy Life Discoursed from Rom. 6. 3 4. by way of SERMON By JOHN COLLINGES D. D. Minister of the Gospel in NORWICH Gal. 3. 27. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ Ambros lib. de Sacr. Venisti ad sontem ingressus es considera quid videris quid locutus sis diligenter Et alibi Non sanat Baptismus perfidiorum non mundat sed polluit c. London Printed by A. Maxwell and R. Roberts 1681. TO THE READER Christian Reader THE Age wherein we live hath been so fruitful in good books of all sorts above all the Ages that have gone before us that were it not for the former part of that Prophecy Isa 11. 9. They shall not hurt nor destroy in my holy mountain at which work we daily see Papists and Atheists yet very busie We should conclude this the very time there prophecied of when the earth should be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the Sea So as were it not for some particular subjects not yet so fully handled and the vanity of humane nature rather to affect to read the same thing in a new book and a new stile than in one of ancienter date there might a supersedeas be given to the Press that the world might contain the books of men Amongst other subjects something in my opinion as yet too little discoursed of is this of Baptism It hath been discoursed by many Systimatically and by many Polemically but by few Practically The Papists who for a thousand years had held the far greater part of the Christian World in subjection to their most erroneous Doctrines and superstitious usages attributed so great a vertue to the work of Baptism done whether by a Priest or a Midwife and had laid so much of their hay and stubble on this foundation that men of sense and Religion could by no means agree to them and some on the other extreme began to think Baptism in the whole was but a needless Ceremony because the Papists had added so many idle ceremonies to it Bellarmine reckons no less than Twenty-two 1. The propounding the name 2. The scrutiny whether the persons were competent 3. The Renouncing the Devil and all his works 4. A profession of the persons faith 5. The sign of the Cross 6. Exorcisms 7. Breathing on the person baptized 8. Salt put into the mouth 9. Touching the Childs nose and ears with Spittle 10. Unction with Oyl 11. Laying the Priests hands on the child to bless it 12. Abstenence from wine and flesh These he makes Ceremonies necessary before Baptism At Baptism 13. The giving of the name to the person baptized 14. Sureties 15. The Consecration of the water 16. Dipping thrice 17. That it be at Easter or Whitsontide After Baptism he makes necessary 18. An holy kiss 19. An anointing the crown of the head with Oyl 20. Putting a lighted Wax-candle into the baptized persons hands 21. Putting upon him or her a white garment 22. Giving the person baptized Milk Honey or Wine How vain doth man become in his imaginations as to sacred things when he leaves the word of God! Our Forefathers were imployed in throwing out the Popish rubbish and restoring the Ordinance to the purity of its Administration and while they were doing that they were troubled with the Socinians whose opinions in this the Quakers now espouse making Baptism needless and with the Antipaedobaptists denying its use as to Children and multitudes of books have been wrote on these Arguments By this time another generation appeared maintaining Baptismal Regeneration or rather real and true Regeneration as well as Justification upon Baptism Some few books have been wrote on this argument And I perswade my self that one great thing which hath led some Divines of note to assert that the baptized persons are forthwith justified and regenerated is because they have thought it absurd so much as to imagine that Christ should create an Ordinance that should have no real effect or usefulness and what effect they should ascribe to it less than this worthy of so great an Institutor they could not tell Besides that this notion excelently served the design of others who without this discharge of the guilt of Adam's and Original sin would have found it an hard task to have maintained a power in mans will to what was spiritually good or Justification any other way than by the imputed Righteousness of Christ These controversies have so imployed the Pens of those great and learned men who have wrote about Baptism that scarce any hath wrote fully and practically upon it to satisfie the world of the usefulness of Baptism or to instruct it concerning the exceeding solemnity gravity and seriousness of the Action It is thirty years since I at that time a very young man endeavoured my own satisfaction in the case and then communicated my Meditations from the Pulpit to the people to whom God had at that time set me in relation Lately I fell upon my Notes and revised them adding some things from my maturer judgment Discoursing them privately I was desired by a first and a second person who heard me to give them the Copies of them they being persons whose Piety and Judgments I had reason to value I thought they might also be useful to others and resolved to give them both to them and others from the Press Two fruits of this Discourse I would hope for and shall pray for which if I obtain I shall gain my great end in the Publication of it First That those Parents into whose hands it shall come and to whom God shall hereafter give Children which they shall offer to God in Baptism would as sadly reflect upon their former perfunctory performance of their duties in this grave and most solemn action and their neglects in minding their children when they have come to years of this dedication and of the solemn Oath to God in which they engaged them and call upon them to remember it to fulfil it so that they would be more grave and serious in those actions for the time to come and not make Christnings as they call them meerly times for Compotations Collations upon friends and banquets I did not think it necessary but I bless God this Ordinance had always that awe upon me that I chuse to baptize my Children on the Lords-days in the publick Congregation and with very little company attending from

most dear and blessed Saviour To thee O most holy Spirit To the only living and true God! I here dedicate my child and my desire is that thou wouldst accept him that as long as he lives he may be the Lords Is not here now a most grave and solemn action requiring all our thoughtfulness seriousness gravity and attention imaginable Was the dedication of an house to God so serious an action that Solomon at it offered a sacrifice of 22000 Oxen and an 120000 Sheep and kept a feast seven days and then a solemn assembly Was the dedication of an Altar so solemn an action that it took seven days time 2 Chron. 7. 8 9. And can the dedication of a child a piece of our selves flesh of our flesh unto God be judged a slighty action so as that there needs no more than for parents without any praevious thoughts on the sudden to send for a Minister and he in great haste to read over two or three prayers and sprinkle water on it saying I baptize thee c. I wish this slighty kind of Administration of this sacred Ordinance flow not from that novel conceit of the necessity of Baptism to salvation or the certain effect of it upon all that shall not afterwards run on the score with God for the washing away of the guilt of Original sin Whatsoever it be which hath incouraged such hasty and perfunctory Administrations I am sure they no way sute the grave nature of this solemn Administration Dedications if they were of no more than wood and stone and other inanimate things were wont to be more serious actions and done in a more grave and serious manner 2. But there is in Baptism not only a solemn dedication of the A solemn ingagement of the Soul to God party baptized unto God but also a solemn adstriction or obligation of the person to God Circumcision of old was called Gods covenant in their flesh Gal. 17. 13. Baptism under the Gospel succeeds into its place It is Gods Covenant in our flesh We read in Scripture of three ways of making Covenants betwixt parties 1. By words only Thus God made a Covenant with Abraham saying I will be thy God and of thy seed 2. By words and a ceremony or sign Such a Covenant you read made of betwixt Jacob and Laban Gen. 31. 46. 3. By a Ceremony alone Thus the Masters boring through the ear of his servant with an Awl the servant submitting to it was a covenant though at the time the servant said nothing yet he was by that submission obliged to be his Masters servant for ever Thus with us the Soldiers taking Press-money or the Kings Colours is an actual obligation upon him to keep to the Kings service and subjects him to death if he deserts it Baptism is such a ceremony The person brought under it is by such submission actually engaged in the service of Christ no longer to live unto himself nor to dye unto himself but unto him who hath dyed for him the sign of whose blood he hath received in the sprinkling or pouring of water upon him The man or woman that is baptized doth in effect say Let the blood of Christ signified by this water be a witness against me let is be upon me for ever to confound me if I ever apostatize from the profession of the Doctrine of the Gospel and the Faith of Christ or wilfully and presumptuously live contrary to his law Is not this a most serious action think we Marriage is but a Covenant betwixt man and wife wherein God is no party but only called in as a witness in it the husband and wife mutually bind themselves each to other for the term of one of their natural lives yet it is a most grave and serious action I have always thought that the most of men and women trifle a great deal too much with that and should be much more grave and serious than they are and take many more serious thoughts before they give away themselves each to other and put themselves out of a power over their own bodies and that the cursed Atheistical lives of very many husbands and wives their discontents and breaches and the perverse spirit mixed betwixt them is but the effect and just punishment of men and womens hasty slighty and inconsiderate engagements in that Covenant this is a Covenant of another nature a Covenant betwixt the great God and the baptized person where God is not a witness only but a party Ought we not to be serious in such an action O let this mind you that hear me to bring your Children to Baptism and to attend the administration of it with much more gravity and seriousness of thoughts than is usual Believe me it is no light action to Dedicate a child to God not to covenant with God that your child shall be his servant for ever If afterward you direct it otherwise or shew it an example to the contrary or omit to instruct it and mind it of its duty and to call upon it for the performance of it or as much as in you lyeth to hinder it from the contrary the child shall perish for its Apostacy because the Oath of God was upon it but its blood shall also be required at your hands 2. But I told you that as the action is serious so the Institution The usefulness of Baptism is useful There are too many who slight this great Institution because they cannot understand the usefulness of it There are others that will make an usefulness of it beyond what I can find in holy Writ making it upon the work done to wash away the guilt of Original sin and to set the soul rectum in curia right in the Court of Heaven I cannot allow this but doubt not to evince to you That leaving this effect only to the blood of Christ sprinkled upon the conscience Baptism is a very useful thing and that upon a fourfold account 1. To repel temptations to sin and this as it is a pre-ingagement To repel temptations upon the soul It is an excuse you often put men off with in your converses with the world when you have no mind to meet or treat or converse with them you tell them you are pre-engaged you cannot meet with them or deal with them or be for them indeed you tell them you are pre-engaged thus you look often upon pre-engagements as very useful to you You have this from your Baptism to answer all tempters all temptations to sin be they from what tempters they will if Satan if your own lusts if the world sollicit you to Apostacy either from the profession of faith which you have made or from your practice of holiness When the Devil makes any such impressions upon your souls you can say to him Satan I am ingaged When the men of the world the sinful companions in it tempt you to cast in your lot with them you can say to

these but so necessary that by it Original sin is certainly washed away and without it a child cannot be saved which is that which I call a groundless fancy if not a Relique of Popery It is true we have no certain time limited for Baptism To give you my opinion in the case The best argument we have for Infant-Baptism is the Analogy betwixt Circumcision and Baptism they being both seals of one and the same Covenant of grace which is not straitned under the Gospel-dispensation God prescribed the Eighth day as a certain time for Circumcision yet were not the Jews tyed to the eighth day under undue circumstances All the while the people were travelling in the Wilderness which was forty years there were no Children circumcised as you may read Josh 5. 5 7. I would fain know how Baptism is more necessary to the salvation of Christians than Circumcision was to the salvation of the Jewish Children I am sure they were both seals of the same Covenant the contempt of an Ordinance of God that is damnable but the omission of it under undue circumstances as suppose the sickness of the child c. is far from being so it may be our duty that the Ordinance of God may be more gravely and thoughtfully administred But from that Popish opinion of the absolute necessity of Baptism to salvation and the efficacy of it as a work done have risen many abuses and prophanations of this holy Ordinance of God Hence came up the practice of Midwives baptizing which held amongst us till King James his time hence the slighty and perfunctory administration of this Ordinance by too many at this day For my own part supposing other due circumstances to concur I should not omit the baptizing my child beyond the Eighth day Nor on the other side sear that if due circumstances did not concur the delaying of it longer But this is but a digression Let me beg of you that are Parents with all seriousness and gravity and due forethinking what you do to bring your Children to this most facred Institution Remember that in it you present your Children before the Lord you dedicate your Children unto the Lord. What a great action this is What gravity reverence seriousness deliberation is sufficient for such an action With what fear ought the Lord to be served in such an action 2. The second thing which I would call to you for shall be a faithfulness to your children whom you have so dedicated to God Your child knoweth not what is done unto it it knoweth not that it is baptized that it is so dedicated to Christ that such an Oath of the Lord is upon it it knoweth of no vow that it hath made no Covenant with God in which it is engaged you have brought it under this engagement If now you shall not tell the child its state what you have done as to it under what a Vow and Oath of God you have brought it but it shall give up it self to the service of the Devil and live contrary to its most solemn ingagements your child shall perish but shall not its blood be required at your hands When God fell upon Moses and had like to have killed him in the Inn for not circumcising his child it is said his wife Zipporah in a passion cut off the childs foreskin and threw it at Moses saying A bloody husband hast thou been to me because of the circumcision How many thousand children hereafter will throw the very coles of Hell at their Parents and say Ah! Bloody Fathers bloody Mothers have you been to us because of our Baptism you dedicated us to God when we were Children we lived with you ten twenty years and you never told us of it but let us run into those sins which have brought us into these flames you brought us under a solemn Vow and Covenant to God in our Baptism and never told us what you vowed or ingaged for us we never heard a word from you of our Baptismal vows if we had we should probably not have violated them as we have done Bloody damning Parents have you been to us Thus much shall serve for what I have to say to Parents Br. 2. I speak to you that are Children That which I have to say to you is Remember you have been baptized into Christ That you have been by your Parents dedicated to Christ and are under a vow to be his servants Remember that you have vowed the profession and defence of his truth the acceptance of him as your Lord and Saviour an adherence to him a living up to his law being baptized into his death and buried with him by baptism into death It may be some of your Parents never minded you of this I now tell you of it and indeed I have sometimes thought that one end of Gods instituting us Ministers hath been to supply the defects of Parents and Masters of families in this debaucht and declining age of the world Let all therefore hearken to me this day I suppose I speak to none but have been baptized into Christ in the larger sense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into the Name of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost And if so If your Parents have forgot to tell it you or neglected their duty I tell it you you are all dedicated unto Christ yea and God hath accepted you for he hath bidden us Go and baptize in the Name of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost We have baptized you in the name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost What follows hence You are sacred persons not sanctified in a spiritual sense but sacred in a ceremonial sense in which sense all the Jews were called an holy people and the Apostle saith 1 Cor. 7. 14. our children are not unclean but holy sanctified ceremonially externally ritually that is set a part for God sanctified as the Tabernacle the Temple the Vessels of the Temple under the law were sanctified I tell you again that you are under a Vow and Covenant to own the profession of Christ and to defend it to accept of Christ as the Saviour of the World as your Saviour in particular to commit all your spiritual concerns unto him to live to Christ not to lusts not to the world as to these things you were buried with Christ by baptism into death Do not think to evade this by saying it was none of your own act your parents did it you did it not It is in the power of parents to ingage you in a debt by the laws of men to which all the estate you inherit by them shall be lyable for payment though there be no antecedaneous obligation upon you from the law of God to pay such debts It is in your parents power to dispose of you in Marriage in your Nonage and before God you will be bound when of age so to dispose of your selves unless you can give a sufficient reason to the contrary As to God it is in your parents power to render you obnoxious to his wrath and justice so as for their sins you shall answer as far as your lives and estates go though indeed they cannot withour a guilt of your own subject you to the eternal wrath of God your prrents have as to this dedicated you to God to be his servants they have brought you under the Vow and Oath of God to be his servants to own profess and defend his Gospel and the truths of it to accept of the Lord Jesus Christ as the Saviour of the World as your Saviour and spiritual husband to live unto him in disclaiming the service of lusts and of the world Take heed now of Sacriledge Perjury and Apostacy A loose leud life contrary to the Gospel brings you under all this guilt and subjecteth you by the righteous God to be dealt withall as sacrilegious persons who being holy have stollen away your selves from the service of God and robbed God of his right as false and perjured persons who have sworn your selves unto God and have violated the Oath of God upon you As Apostatized persons who have put your hands to the Lords plow and have drawn it back again There is yet a time for you to repent and to remember the kindness of your youth and the love of your Espousals O neglect it not To day while it is called to day harden not your hearts through Impenitency nourish not unbelief in your Souls Return you Shulamites return Remember from whence you are fallen and how the Oath of God presseth you Let no baptized person go down to the pit that will but add oyl to the fire that shall never go out It will be more tolerable for an unbaptized Turk or Indian than for a baptized Christian in the day of judgment if he stands at the Judges left hand in that day Br. 3. Lastly I speak to you all Men Brethren and Fathers 1. Labour to see your selves baptized into Christ you are all baptized in the name of Christ but rest not here Give your Souls no rest until you find that you are baptized into Christ that you have put on Christ how you may know that I have shewed you that you are concerned in it will appear from the insignificancy as to your eternal state of Water-Baptism O think not that the pouring or spirinkling of a little water upon your face can wash away the sin of the soul Beg of God that you may be born again of water and of the spirit without which our Lord hath told you you can never enter into the Kingdom of God that you may be baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire burning up the dregs and dross of lusts and corruptions which Water-Baptism leaveth in every soul Nay remember your Water-Baptism without this will be but as the Water of jealousie to the guilty woman as Gods water of Witness the more to confound your souls to all eternity 2. Let all persons reflect on their Baptism Let the unconverted reflect upon it and study it to ingage them to faith and repentance because of their Oath and ingagement in Baptism to do it Let the converted reflect upon it and fetch strength from it more to dye unto sin and to live unto righteousness remembring they were baptized into Christ baptized into his death and buried with him by baptism into death But this is enough to have spoken on this argument God give his blessing FINIS