baptized unto Moses in the Cloud and in the sea so by a double figure foretelling That as they were initiated to Moses Law by the Cloud above and the Sea beneath so should all the persons of the Church Men Women and Children be initiated unto Christ by the Spirit from above and the Water below for it was the design of the Apostle in that discourse to represent that the Fathers and we were equal as to the priviledges of the Covenant he proved that we do not exceed them and it ought therefore to be certain that they do not exceed us nor their children ours But after this something was to remain which might not onely consign the Covenant which God made with Abraham but be as a passage from the Fathers thorough the Synagogue to the Church from Abraham by Moses to Christ and that was Circumcision which was a Rite which God chose to be a mark to the posterity of Abraham to distinguish them from the Nations which were not within the Covenant of Grace and to be a seal of the righteousness of faith which God made to be the spirit and life of the Covenant But because Circumcision although it was ministred to all the males yet it was not to the females and although they and all the Nation was baptized and initiated into Moses in the Cloud and the Sea yet the Children of Israel by imitation of the Patriarchs the posterity of Noah used also Ceremonial Baptisms to their women and to their Proselytes and to all that were circumcised and the Jews deliver That Sarah and Rebecca when they were adopted into the family of the Church that is of Abraham and Isaac were baptized and so were all strangers that were married to the sons of Israel And that we may think this typical of Christian Baptism the Doctors of the Jews had a Tradition that when the Messias would come there should be so many Proselytes that they could not be circumcised but should be baptized The Tradition proved true but not for their reason But that this Rite of admitting into mysteries and institutions and offices of Religion by Baptisms was used by the posterity of Noah or at least very early among the Jews besides the testimonies of their own Doctors I am the rather induced to believe because the Heathen had the same Rite in many places and in several Religions so they initiated disciples into the secrets of a Mithra and the Priests of Cotyttus were called b Baptae because by Baptism they were admitted into the Religion and they c thought Murther Incest Rapes and the worst of Crimes were purged by dipping in the Sea or fresh Springs and a Proselyte is called in Arrianus {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} intinctus a baptized person But this Ceremony of baptizing was so certain and usual among the Jews in their admitting Proselytes and adopting into institutions that to baptize and to make disciples are all one and when John the Baptist by an order from Heaven went to prepare the way to the Coming of our blessed Lord he preached Repentance and baptized all that professed they did repent He taught the Jews to live good lives and baptized with the Baptism of a Prophet such as was not unusually done by extraordinary and holy persons in the change or renewing of Discipline or Religion Whether John's Baptism was from heaven or of men Christ asked the Pharisees That it was from Heaven the people therefore believed because he was a Prophet and a holy person but it implies also That such Baptisms are sometimes from men that is used by persons of an eminent Religion or extraordinary fame for the gathering of Disciples and admitting Proselytes and the Disciples of Christ did so too even before Christ had instituted the Sacrament for the Christian Church the Disciples that came to Christ were baptized by his Apostles And now we are come to the gates of Baptism All these till John were but types and preparatory Baptisms and John's Baptism was but the prologue to the Baptism of Christ The Jewish Baptisms admitted Proselytes to Moses and to the Law of Ceremonies John's Baptism called them to believe in the Messias now appearing and to repent of their sins to enter into the Kingdom which was now at hand and Preached that Repentance which should be for the remission of sins His Baptism remitted no sins but preached and consigned Repentance which in the belief of the Messias whom he pointed to should pardon sins But because he was taken from his office before the work was compleated the Disciples of Christ finished it They went forth preaching the same Sermon of Repentance and the approach of the Kingdom and baptized or made Proselytes or Disciples as John did onely they as it is probable baptized in the Name of Jesus which it is not so likely John did a And this very thing might be the cause of the different forms b of Baptism recorded in the Acts of baptizing In the Name of Iesus and at other times In the Name of the Father Son and holy Ghost the former being the manner of doing it in pursuance of the design of John's Baptism and the latter the form of institution by Christ for the whole Christian Church appointed after his Resurrection the Disciples at first using promiscuously what was used by the same authority though with some difference of Mystery The Holy Jesus having found his way ready prepared by the preaching of John and by his Baptism and the Jewish manner of adopting Proselytes and Disciples into the Religion a way chalked out for him to initiate disciples into his Religion took what was so prepared and changed it into a perpetual Sacrament He kept the Ceremony that they who were led onely by outward things might be the better called in and easier inticed into the Religion when they entred by a Ceremony which their Nation alwayes used in the like cases and therefore without change of the outward act he put into it a new spirit and gave it a new grace and a proper efficacy He sublim'd it to higher ends and adorned it with stars of Heaven He made it to signifie greater mysteries to convey greater blessings to consign the bigger Promises to cleanse deeper then the skin and to carry Proselytes further then the gates of the institution For so he was pleased to do in the other Sacrament he took the Ceremony which he found ready in the Custom of the Jews where the Major domo after the Paschal Supper gave Bread and Wine to every person of his family he changed nothing of it without but transferr'd the Rite to greater mysteries and put his own Spirit to their Sign and it became a Sacrament Evangelical It was so also in the matter of Excommunication where the Jewish practise was made to pass into Christian discipline without violence and noise old things became new while he
Righteousness the garment of gladness vestment of Light or rather Light it self And for this reason it is that Baptism is not to be repeated because it does at once all that it can do at a hundred times for it admits us to the condition of Repentance and Evangelical Mercy to a state of pardon for our infirmities and sins which we timely and effectually leave and this is a thing that can be done but once as a man can begin but once he that hath once entred in at this gate of life is alwayes in possibility of pardon if he be in a possibility of working and doing after the manner of a man that which he hath promised to the Son of God And this was expresly delivered and observed by S. Austin That which the Apostle sayes Cleansing him with the washing of water in the word is to be understood that in the same laver of regeneration and word of sanctification all the evils of the regenerate are cleansed and healed not onely the sins that are past which all are now remitted in Baptism but also those that are contracted afterwards by humane ignorance and infirmity Not that Baptism be repeated as often as we sin but because by this which is once administred is brought to pass that pardon of all sins not onely of those that are past but also those which will be committed afterwards is obtained The Messalians denyed this and it was part of their Heresie in the undervaluing of Baptism and for it they are most excellently confuted by Isidore Pelusiot in his third Book 195 Epistle to the Count Hermin whither I refer the Reader In proportion to this Doctrine it is that the holy Scripture calls upon us to live a holy life in pursuance of this grace of Baptism And S. Paul recals the lapsed Galatians to their Covenant and the grace of God stipulated in Baptism Ye are all children of God by faith in Iesus Christ that is heirs of the promise and Abrahams seed that promise which cannot be disannulled increased or diminished but is the same to us as it was to Abraham the same before the Law and after Therefore do not you hope to be justified by the Law for you are entred into the Covenant of Faith and are to be justified thereby This is all your hope by this you must stand for ever or you cannot stand at all but by this you may for you are Gods children by faith that is not by the Law or the Covenant of Works And that you may remember whence you are going and return again he proves that they are the children of God by faith in Jesus Christ because they have been baptized into Christ and so put on Christ This makes you children and such as are to be saved by faith that is a Covenant not of Works but of Pardon in Jesus Christ the Author and Establisher of this Covenant For this is the Covenant made in Baptism That being justified by his grace we shall be heirs of life eternal for by grace that is by favor remission and forgiveness in Jesus Christ ye are saved This is the onely way that we have of being justified and this must remain as long as we are in hopes of heaven for besides this we have no hopes and all this is stipulated and consigned in Baptism and is of force after our fallings into sin and risings again In pursuance of this the same Apostle declares That the several states of sin are so many recessions from the state of baptismal grace and if we arrive to the direct Apostasie and renouncing of or a contradiction to the state of Baptism we are then unpardonable because we are faln from our state of pardon This S. Paul conditions most strictly in his Epistle to the Hebrews This is the Covenant I will make in those days I will put my laws in their hearts and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more Now where remission of these is there is no more offering for sin that is our sins are so pardoned that we need no more oblation we are then made partakers of the death of Christ which we afterwards renew in memory and Eucharist and representment But the great work is done in Baptism for so it follows Having boldness to enter into the Holiest by the blood of Iesus by a new and living way that is by the vail of his flesh his Incarnation But how do we enter into this Baptism is the door and the ground of this confidence for ever for so he addes Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water This is the consignation of this blessed state and the gate to all this mercy Let us therefore hold fast the profession of our faith that is the Religion of a Christian the faith into which we were baptized for that is the faith that justifies and saves vs Let us therefore hold fast this profession of this faith and do all the intermedial works in order to the conservation of it such as are assembling in the Communion of Saints the use of the word and Sacrament is included in the precept mutual Exhortation good Example and the like For if we sin wilfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth that is if we sin against the profession of this faith and hold it not fast but let the faith and the profession go wilfully which afterwards he cals a treading under foot the Son of God a counting the blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing and a doing despite to the Spirit of Grace viz. which moved upon these waters and did illuminate him in Baptism if we do this there is no more sacrifice for sins no more deaths of Christ into which you may be baptized that is you are faln from the state of pardon and repentance into which you were admitted in Baptism and in which you continue so long as you have not quitted you baptismal Rights and the whole Covenant Contrary to this is that which S. Peter calls making our calling and election sure that is a doing all that which may continue us in our state of Baptism and the grace of the Covenant And between these two states of absolute Apostasie from and intirely adhering to and securing this state of Calling and Election are all the intermedial sins and being overtaken in single faults or declining towards vitious habits which in their several proportions are degrees of danger and insecurity which S. Peter calls {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} a forgetting our Baptism or purification from our sins And in this sense are those words The just shall live by faith that is by that profession which they made in Baptism from which if they swerve not they shall be supported in their spiritual life It is a grace which
things are possible And as to the event of things it is evident in the story of the Gospel That the faith of their relatives was equally effective to children and friends or servants absent or sick as the faith of the interested person was to himself As appears beyond all exception in the case of the friends of the Paralytick let down with cords thorough the tyles of the Centurion in behalf of his servant of the noble man for his son sick at Capernaum of the Syrophoenician for her daughter and Christ required faith of no sick man but of him that presented himself to him and desired for himself that he might be cured as it was in the case of the blinde men Though they could believe yet Christ required belief of them that came to him on their behalf And why then it may not be so or is not so in the case of Infants Baptism I confess it is past my skill to conjecture The Reason on which this further relies is contained in the next Proposition 4. No disposition or act of man can deserve the first grace or the grace of pardon for so long as a man is unpardoned he is an evemy to God and as a dead person and unless he be prevented by the grace of God cannot do a single act in order to his pardon and restitution so that the first work which God does upon a man is so wholly his own that the man hath nothing in it but to entertain it that is not to hinder the work of God upon him and this is done in them that have in them nothing that can hinder the work of grace or in them who remove the hinderances of the latter sort are all sinners who have lived in a state contrary to God of the first are they who are prevented by the grace of God before they can choose that is little children and those that become like unto little children So that Faith and Repentance are not necessary at first to the reception of the first grace but by accident If sin have drawn curtains and put bars and coverings to the windows these must be taken away and that is done by faith and repentance but if the windows be not shut so that the light can pass thorough them the eye of heaven will pass in and dwell there No man can come unto me unless my Father draw him that is the first access to Christ is nothing of our own but wholly of God and it is as in our creation in which we have an obediential capacity but cooperate not onely if we be contrary to the work of grace that contrariety must be taken off else there is no necessity and if all men according to Christs saying must receive the Kingdome of God as little children it is certain little children do receive it they receive it as all men ought that is without any impediment or obstruction without any thing within that is contrary to that state 5. Baptism is not to be estimated as one act transient and effective to single purposes but it is an entrance to a conjugation and a state of blessings All our life is to be transacted by the measures of the Gospel-Covenant and that Covenant is consigned by Baptism there we have our title and adoption to it and the grace that is then given to us is like a piece of leaven put into a lump of dow and faith and repentance do in all the periods of our life put it into fermentation and activity Then the seed of God is put into the ground of our hearts and repentance waters it and faith makes it subactum solum the ground and furrows apt to produce fruits and therefore faith and repentance are necessary to the effect of Baptism not to its susception that is necessary to all those parts of life in which Baptism does operate not to the first sanction or entring into the Covenant The seed may lye long in the ground and produce fruits in its due season if it be refreshed with the former and the latter rain that is the repentance that first changes the state and converts the man and afterwards returns him to his title and recalls him from his wandrings and keeps him in the state of grace and within the limits of the Covenant and all the way faith gives efficacy and acceptation to this repentance that is continues our title to the Promise of not having righteousness exacted by the measures of the Law but by the Covenant and Promise of grace into which we entred in Baptism and walk in the same all the dayes of our life 6. The holy Spirit which descends upon the waters of Baptism does nor instantly produce its effects in the soul of the baptized and when he does it is irregularly and as he please The Spirit bloweth where it listeth and no man knoweth whence it cometh nor whither it goeth and the Catechumen is admitted into the Kingdome yet the Kingdome of God cometh not with observation and this saying of our blessed Saviour was spoken of the Kingdome of of God that is within us that is the Spirit of Grace the power of the Gospel put into our hearts concerning which he affirmed that it operates so secretly that it comes not with outward shew neither shall they say Lo here or lo there which thing I desire the rather be observed because in the same discourse which our blessed Saviour continued to that assembly he affirms this Kingdome of God to belong unto little children this Kingdome that cometh not with outward significations or present expresses this Kingdome that is within us For the present the use I make of it is this That no man can conclude that this Kingdome of Power that is the Spirit of Sanctification is not come upon Infants because there is no sign or expression of it It is within us therefore it hath no signification It is the seed of God and it is no good Argument to say Here is no seed in the bowels of the earth because there is nothing green upon the face of it For the Church gives the Sacrament God gives the grace of the Sacrament But because he does not alwayes give it at the instant in which the Church gives the Sacrament as if there be a secret impediment in the suscipient and yet afterwards does give it when the impediment is removed as to them that repent of that impediment it follows that the Church may administer rightly even before God gives the real grace of the Sacrament and if God gives this grace afterwards by parts and yet all of it is the effect of that Covenant which was consigned in Baptism he that defers some may defer all and verifie every part as well as any part For it is certain that in the instance now made all the grace is deferred in Infants it is not certain but that some is collated or infused however be it
wholly nothing and infirm upon an infinite account and the second may conclude that Infants can no more be saved then be baptized because Faith is more necessary to Salvation then to Baptism it being said He that believeth not shall be damned and it is not said He that believeth not shall be excluded from Baptism it follows that the doctrine of those that refuse to baptize their Infants is upon both its legs weak and broken and insufficient Upon the supposition of these grounds the Baptism of Infants according to the perpetual practise of the Church of God will stand firm and unshaken upon its own base For as the Eunuch said to Philip What hinders them to be baptized If they can receive benefit by it it is infallibly certain that it belongs to them also to receive it and to their Parents to procure it for nothing can deprive us of so great a grace but an unworthiness or a disability They are not disabled to receive it if they need it and if it does them good and they have neither done good nor evil and therefore they have not forfeited their right to it This therefore shall be the first great argument or combination of inducements Infants receive many benefits by the susception of Baptism and therefore in charity and in duty we are to bring them to Baptism 1. The first effect of Baptism is That in it we are admitted to the Kingdome of Christ offered and presented unto him In which certainly there is the same act of worship to God and the same blessing to the children of Christians as there was in presenting the first-born among the Jews For our children can be Gods own portion as well as theirs and as they presented the first-born to God and so acknowledged that God might have taken his life in Sacrifice as well as the Sacrifice of the Lamb or the Oblation of a beast yet when the right was confessed God gave him back again and took a Lamb in exchange or a pair of Doves So are our children presented to God as forfeit and God might take the forfeiture and not admit the babe to the Promises of Grace but when the presentation of the childe and our acknowledgement is made to God God takes the Lamb of the World in exchange and he hath paid our forfeiture and the children are holy unto the Lord And what hinders here cannot a creeple receive an alms at the Beautiful gate of the Temple unless he go thither himself Or cannot a gift be presented to God by the hands of the owners and the gift become holy and pleasing to God without its own consent The Parents have a portion of the possession Children are blessings and Gods gifts and the Fathers greatest wealth and therefore are to be given again to him In other things we give something to God of all that he gives us all we do not because our needs force us to retain the greater part and the less sanctifies the whole but our children must all be returned to God for we may love them and so may God too and they are the better our own by being made holy in their presentation whatsoever is given to God is holy every thing in its proportion and capacity a Lamb is holy when it becomes a Sacrifice and a Table is holy when it becomes an Altar and a House is holy when it becomes a Church and a man is holy when he is consecrated to be a Priest and so is every one that is dedicated to Religion these are holy persons the others are holy things and Infants are between both they have the sanctification that belongs to them the holiness that can be of a reasonable nature offer'd and destin'd to Gods service but not in that degree that is in an understanding choosing person Certain it is that Infants may be given to God and if they may be they must be for it is not here as in goods where we are permitted to use all or some and give what portion we please out of them but we cannot do our duty towards our children unless we give them wholly to God and offer them to his service and to his grace The first does honour to God the second does charity to the children The effects and real advantages will appear in the sequel in the mean time this Argument extends thus far that Children may be presented to God acceptably in order to his service And it was highly praeceptive when our blessed Saviour commanded that we should suffer little children to come to him and when they came they carried away a blessing along with them He was desirous they should partake of his merits he is not willing neither is it his Fathers will that any of these little ones should perish And therefore he dyed for them and loves and blessed them and so he will now if they be brought to him and presented as Candidates of the Religion and of the Resurrection Christ hath a blessing for our children but let them come to him that is be presented at the doors of the Church to the Sacrament of Adoption and Initiation for I know no other way for them to come 2. Children may be adopted into the Covenant of the Gospel that is made partakers of the Communion of Saints which is the second effect of Baptism parts of the Church members of Christs Mystical body and put into the order of eternal life Now concerning this it is certain the Church clearly hath power to do her offices in order to it The faithful can pray for all men they can do their piety to some persons with more regard and greater earnestness they can admit whom they please in their proper dispositions to a participation of all their holy prayers and communions and preachings and exhortations and if all this be a blessing and all this be the actions of our own charity who can hinder the Church of God from admitting Infants to the communion of all their pious offices which can do them benefit in their present capacity How this does necessarily infer Baptism I shall afterwards discourse * But for the present I enumerate That the blessings of Baptism are communicable to them they may be admitted into a fellowship of all the Prayers and Priviledges of the Church and the Communion of Saints in blessings and prayers and holy offices But that which is of greatest perswasion and convincing efficacy in this particular is That the children of the Church are as capable of the same Covenant as the children of the Jews But it was the same Covenant that Circumcision did consign a spiritual Covenant under a veil and now it is the same spiritual Covenant without the veil which is evident to him that considers it thus The words of the Covenant are these I am the Almighty God walk before me and be thou perfect I will multiply thee exceedingly Thou shalt be a father of many Nations Thy
actions It is certain that they that can receive the new birth are capable of it the effect of it is a possibility of being saved and arriving to a supernatural felicity If Infants can receive this effect then also the new birth without which they cannot cannot receive the effect And if they can receive salvation the effect of the new birth what hinders them but they may receive that that is in order to that effect and ordained onely for it and which is nothing of it self but in its institution and relation and which may be received by the same capacity in which one may be created that is a passivity or a capacity obediential 4. Concerning pardon of sins which is one great effect of Baptism it is certain that Infants have not that benefit which men of sin and age may receive He that hath a sickly stomach drinks wine and it not onely refreshes his spirits but cures his stomach He that drinks wine and hath not that disease receives good by his wine though it does not minister to so many needs it refreshes him though it does not cure him and when oyle is poured upon a mans head it does not alwayes heal a wound but sometimes makes him a chearful countenance sometimes it consigns him to be a King or a Priest So it is in Baptism it does not heal the wounds of actual sins because they have not committed them but it takes off the evil of Original sin whatsoever is imputed to us by Adams prevarication is washed off by the death of the second Adam into which we are baptized But concerning Original sin because there are so many disputes which may intricate the Question I shall make use onely of that which is confessed on both sides and material to our purpose Death came upon all men by Adams sin and the necessity of it remains upon us as an evil consequent of the disobedience For though death is natural yet it was kept off from man by Gods favour which when he lost the banks were broken and the water reverted to its natural course and our nature became a curse and death a punishment Now that this also relates to Infants so far is certain because they are sick and dye This the Pelagians denied not But to whomsoever this evil descended upon them also a remedy is provided by the second Adam That as in Adam all dye even so in Christ shall all be made alive that is at the day of Judgement then death shall be destroyed In the mean time death hath a sting and a bitterness a curse it is and an express of the Divine Anger and if this sting be not taken away here we shall have no participation of the final victory over death Either therefore Infants must be for ever without remedy in this evil consequent of their Fathers sin or they must be adopted into the participation of Christs death which is the remedy Now how can they partake of Christs death but by Baptism into his death For if there be any spiritual way fancied it will by a stronger argument admit them to Baptism for if they can receive spiritual effects they can also receive the outward Sacrament this being denyed onely upon pretence they cannot have the other If there be no spiritual way extraordinary then the ordinary way is onely left for them If there be an extraordinary let it be shewn and Christians will be at rest concerning their children One thing onely I desire to be observed That Pelagius denyed Original sin but yet denyed not the necessity of Infants Baptism and being accused of it in an Epistle to Pope Innocent the first he purged himself of the suspicion and allowed the practise but denyed the inducement of it which shews that their arts are weak that think Baptism to be useless to Infants if they be not formally guilty of the prevarication of Adam By which I also gather that it was so universal so primitive a practise to baptize Infants that it was greater then all pretences to the contrary for it would much have conduced to the introducing his opinion against Grace and Original sin if he had destroyed that practise which seemed so very much to have its greatest necessity from the doctrine he denyed But against Pelagius and against all that follow the parts of his opinion it is of good use which S. Austine Prosper and Fulgentius argue If Infants are punished for Adams sin then they are also guilty of it in some sense Nimis enim impium est hoc de Dei sentire justitiâ quod à praevaricatione liberos cum reis voluerit esse damnatos So Prosper Dispendia quae flentes nascendo testantur dicito quo merito sub justissimo omnipotentissimo judice eis si nullum peccatum attrahant arrogentur said S. Austin For the guilt of sin signifies nothing but the obligation to the punishment and he that feels the evil consequent to him the sin is imputed not as to all the same dishonour or moral accounts but to the more material to the natural account and in holy Scripture the taking off the punishment is the pardon of the sin and in the same degree the punishment is abolished in the same God is appeased and then the person stands upright being reconciled to God by his grace Since therefore Infants have the punishment of sin it is certain the sin is imputed to them and therefore they need being reconciled to God by Christ and if so then when they are baptized into Christs death and into his Resurrection their sins are pardoned because the punishment is taken off the sting of natural death is taken away because Gods anger is removed and they shall partake of Christs Resurrection which because Baptism does signifie and consign they also are to be baptized To which also adde this appendant Consideration That whatsoever the Sacraments do consign that also they do convey and minister they do it that is God by them does it lest we should think the Sacraments to be meer illusions and abusing us by deceitful ineffective signs and therefore to Infants the grace of a title to a Resurrection and Reconciliation to God by the death of Christ is conveyed because it signifies and consigns this to them more to the life and analogy of resemblance then Circumcision to the Infant sons of Israel I end this Consideration with the words of Nazianzen {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Our birth by Baptism does cut off every unclean appendage of our natural birth and leads us to a celestial life and this in children is therefore more necessary because the evil came upon them without their own act of reason and choice and therefore the grace and remedy ought not to stay the leisure of dull Nature and the Formalities of the Civill Law 5. The Baptism of Infants does to them the greatest part of that benefit which belongs to the remission of sins
For Baptism is a state of Repentance and pardon for ever This I suppose to be already proved to which I onely adde this Caution That the Pelagians to undervalue the necessity of supervening grace affirmed That Baptism did minister to us grace sufficient to live perfectly and without sin for ever Against this S. Jerome sharply declaims and affirms a Baptismum praeterita donare peccata non futuram servare justitiam that is non statim justum facit omni plenum justitiâ as he expounds his meaning in another place Vetera peccata conscindit novas virtutes non tribuit dimittit à carcere dimisso si laboraverit praemia pollicetur Baptism does not so forgive future sins that we may do what we please or so as we need not labour and watch and fear perpetually and make use of Gods grace to actuate our endevours but puts us into a state of pardon that is in a Covenant of Grace in which so long as we labour and repent and strive to do our duty so long our infirmities are pityed and our sins certain to be pardoned upon their certain conditions that is by virtue of it we are capable of pardon and must work for it and may hope it And therefore Infants have a most certain capacity and proper disposition to Baptism for sin creeps before it can go and little undecencies are soon learned and malice is before their years and they can do mischief and irregularities betimes and though we know not when nor how far they are imputed in every moneth of their lives yet it is an admirable art of the Spirit of grace to put them into a state of pardon that their remedy may at least be as soon as their necessity And therefore Tertullian and Gregory Nazianzen advised the Baptism of children to be at three or four years of age meaning that they then begining to have little inadvertencies hasty follies and actions so evil as did need a lavatory But if Baptism hath an influence upon sins in the succeeding portions of our life then it is certain that their being presently innocent does not hinder and ought not to retard the Sacrament and therefore Tertullian's Quid festinat innocens aetas ad remissionem peccatorum what need Innocents hasten to the remission of sins is soon answered It is true they need not in respect of any actual sins for so they are innocent but in respect of the evils of their nature derived from their original and in respect of future sins in the whole state of their life it is necessary they be put into a state of pardon before they sin because some sin early some sin later and therefore unless they be baptized so early as to prevent the first sins they may chance dye in a sin to the pardon of which they have yet derived no title from Christ 6. The next great effect of Baptism which children can have is the Spirit of Sanctification and if they can be baptized with Water and the Spirit it will be sacriledge to rob them of so holy treasures And concerning this although it be with them as S. Paul sayes of Heirs The heir so long as he is a childe differeth nothing from a servant though he be lord of all and children although they receive the Spirit of Promise and the Spirit of Grace yet in respect of actual exercise they differ not from them that have them not at all yet this hindres not but they may have them For as the reasonable soul and all its faculties are in children Will and Vnderstanding Passions and Powers of Attraction and Propulsion yet these faculties do not operate or come abroad till time and art observation and experience have drawn them forth into action so may the Spirit of Grace the principle of Christian life be infused and yet lye without action till in its own day it is drawn forth For in every Christian there are three parts concurring to his integral constitution Body and Soul and Spirit and all these have their proper activities and times but every one in his own order first that which is natural then that which is spiritual And as Aristotle said A man first lives the life of a plant then of a beast and lastly of a man is true in this sense and the more spiritual the principle is the longer it is before it operates because more things concur to spiritual actions then to natural and these are necessary and therefore first the other are perfect and therefore last And who is he that so well understands the Philosophy of this third principle of a Christians life the Spirit as to know how or when it is infused and how it operates in all its periods and what it is in its beeing and proper nature and whether it be like the soul or like the faculty or like a habit or how or to what purposes God in all varieties does dispense it These are secrets which none but bold people use to decree and build propositions upon their own dreams That which is certain is that The Spirit is the principle of a new life or a new birth That Baptism is the laver of this new birth That it is the seed of God and may lye long in the furrows before it springs up That from the faculty to the act the passage is not alwayes sudden and quick That the Spirit is the earnest of our inheritance that is of Resurrection to eternal life which inheritance because children we hope shal have they cannot be denied to have its Seal and Earnest that is if they shall have all they are not to be denyed a part That children have some effects of the Spirit and therefore do receive it and are baptized with the Spirit and therefore may with Water which thing is therefore true and evident because some children are sanctified as Jeremy and the Baptist and therefore all may And because all signification of persons is an effect of the holy Ghost there is no peradventure but they that can be sanctified by God can in that capacity receive the holy Ghost and all the ground of dissenting here is onely upon a mistake because Infants do no act of holiness they suppose them incapable of the grace of Sanctification Now Sanctification of children is their adoption to the inheritance of sons their presentation to Christ their consignation to Christs service and to Resurrection their being put into a possibility of being saved their restitution to Gods favour which naturally that is as our nature is depraved and punished they could not have And in short the case is this Original Righteousness was in Adam after the manner of nature but it was an act or effect of grace and by it men were not made but born righteous the inferior faculties obeyed the superior the minde was whole and right and conformable to the Divine Image the Reason and the Will alwayes concurring the Will
followed Reason and Reason followed the Laws of God and so long as a man had not lost this he was pleasing to God and should have passed to a more perfect state Now because this if Adam had stood should have been born with every childe there was in Infants a principle which was the seed of holy life here and a blessed hereafter and yet the children should have gone in the road of nature then as well as now and the Spirit should have operated at natures leisure God being the giver of both would have made them instrumental to and perfective of each other but not destructive Now what was lost by Adam is restored by Christ the same Righteousness onely it is not born but superinduc'd not integral but interrupted but such as it is there is no difference but that the same or the like principle may be derived to us from Christ as there should have been from Adam that is a principle of obedience a regularity of faculties a beauty in the soul and a state of acceptation with God And we see also in men of understanding and reason the Spirit of God dwells in them which Tatianus describing uses these words {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} The soul is possessed with sparks or materials of the power of the Spirit and yet it is sometimes ineffective and unactive sometimes more sometimes less and does no more do its work at all times then the soul does at all times understand Adde to this That if there be in Infants naturally an evil principle a proclivity to sin an ignorance and pravity of minde a disorder of affections as experience teaches us there is and the perpetual doctrine of the Church and the universal mischiefs issuing from mankinde and the sin of every man does witness too much why cannot Infants have a good principle in them though it works not till its own season as well as an evil principle If there were not by nature some evil principle it is not possible that all the world should choose sin In free agents it was never heard that all individuals loved and chose the same thing to which they were not naturally inclined Neither do all men choose to marry neither do all choose to abstain and in this instance there is a natural inclination to one part but of all the men and women in the world there is no one that hath never sinned If we say that we have no sin we deceive our selves and the truth is not in us said an Apostle If therefore nature hath in Infants an evil principle which operates when the childe can choose but is all the while within the soul either Infants have by grace a principle put into them or else sin abounds where grace does not superabound expresly against the doctrine of the Apostle The event of this discourse is that if Infants be capable of the Spirit of grace there is no reason but they may and ought to be baptized as well as men and women unless God had expresly forbidden them which cannot be pretended and that Infants are capable of the Spirit of grace I think is made very credible Christus infantibus infans factus sanctificans infantes said Irenaeus Christ became an Infant among the Infants and does sanctifie Infants and S. Cyprian affirms Esse apud omnes sive infantes sive majores natu unam divini muneris aequitatem There is the same dispensation of the divine grace to all alike to Infants as well as to men And in this Royal Priesthood as it is in the secular Kings may be anointed in their Cradles Dat Deus sui Spiritus occultissimam gratiam quam etiam latentèr infundit in parvulis God gives the most secret grace of his Spirit which he also secretly infuses into Infants And if a secret infusion be rejected because it cannot be proved at the place and at the instant many men that hope for heaven will be very much to seek for a proof of their earnest and need an earnest of the earnest For all that have the Spirit of God cannot in all instants prove it or certainly know it neither is it yet defined by how many indices the Spirits presence can be proved or signified And they limit the Spirit too much and understand it too little who take accounts of his secret workings and measure them by the material lines and methods of natural and animal effects And yet because whatsoever is holy is made so by the holy Spirit we are certain that the children of believing that is of Christian parents are holy S. Paul affirmed it and by it hath distinguished ours from the children of unbelievers and our marriages from theirs and because the children of the Heathen when they come to choice and reason may enter to Baptism and the Covenant if they will our children have no privilege beyond the children of Turks or Heathens unless it be in the present capacity that is either by receiving the holy Ghost immediately and the Promises or at least having a title to the Sacrament and entring by that door If they have the Spirit nothing can hinder them from a title to the water and if they have onely a title to the water of the Sacrament then they shall receive the Promise of the holy Spirit the benefits of the Sacrament else their privilege is none at all but a dish of cold water which every village nurse can provide for her new born babe But it is in our case as it was with the Jews children our children are a holy seed for if it were not so with Christianity how could S. Peter move the Jews to Christianity by telling them the Promise was to them and their children For if our children be not capable of the Spirit of Promise and Holiness and yet their children were holy it had been a better Argument to have kept them in the Synagogue then to have called them to the Christian Church Either therefore 1. there is some holiness in a reasonable nature which is not from the Spirit of holiness or else 2. our children do receive the holy Spirit because they are holy or if they be not holy they are in worse condition under Christ then under Moses or if none of all this be true then our children are holy by having received the holy Spirit of Promise and consequently nothing can hinder them from being baptized And indeed if the Christian Jews whose children are circumcised and made partakers of the same Promises and Title and Inheritance and Sacraments which themselves had at their conversion to the faith of Christ had seen their children now shut out from these new Sacraments it is not to be doubted but they would have raised a storm greater then could easily have been suppressed since about their Circumcisions they had raised such Tragedies and implacable disputations and there had been great reason to look for a storm for their children were
circumcised and if not baptized then they were left under a burthen which their fathers were quit of for S. Paul said unto you Whosoever is circumcised is a debtor to keep the whole Law These children therefore that were circumcised stood obliged for want of Baptism to perform the Laws of Ceremonies to be presented into the Temple to pay their price to be redeemed with silver and gold to be bound by the Law of pollutions and carnal ordinances and therefore if they had been thus left it would be no wonder if the Jews had complained and made a tumult they used to do it for less matters To which let this be added That the first book of the New Testament was not written till eight years after Christs Ascension and S. Marks Gospel twelve years In the mean time to what Scriptures did they appeal by the analogy or proportion of what writings did they end their Questions whence did they prove their Articles They onely appealed to the Old Testament and onely added what their Lord superadded Now either it must be said that our blessed Lord commanded that Infants should not be baptized which is no where pretended and if it were cannot at all be proved or if by the proportion of Scriptures they did serve God and preach the Religion it is plain that by the Analogy of the Old Testament that is of those Scriptures by which they proved Christ to be come and to have suffered they also approved the Baptism of Infants or the admitting them to the society of the faithful Jews of which also the Church did then principally consist 7. That Baptism which consigns men and women to a blessed Resurrection doth also equally consign Infants to it hath nothing that I know of pretended against it there being the same signature and the same grace and in this thing all being alike passive and we no way cooperating to the consignation and promise of grace and Infants have an equall necessity as being lyable to sickness and groaning with as sad accents and dying sooner then men and women and less able to complain and more apt to be pityed and broken with the unhappy consequents of a short life and a speedy death infelicitate priscorum hominum with the infelicity and folly of their first Parents and therefore have as great need as any and that is capacity enough to receive a remedy for the evil which was brought upon them by the fault of another 8. And after all this if Baptism be that means which God hath appointed to save us it were well if we would do our parts towards Infants final interest which whether it depends upon the Sacrament and its proper grace we have nothing to relye upon but those Texts of Scripture which make Baptism the ordinary way of entring into the state of salvation save onely we are to adde this that because of this law Infants are not personally capable but the Church for them as for all others indefinitely we have reason to believe that their friends neglect shall by some way be supplyed but Hope hath in it nothing beyond a Probability This we may be certain of that naturally we cannot be heirs of Salvation for by nature we are children of wrath and therefore an eternal separation from God is an infallible consequent to our evil nature either therefore children must be put into the state of grace or they shall dwell for ever where Gods face does never shine Now there are but two wayes of being put into the state of grace and salvation the inward by the Spirit and the outward by Water which regularly are together If they be renewed by the Spirit what hinders them to be baptized who receive the holy Ghost as well as we If they are not capable of the Spirit they are capable of Water and if of neither where is their title to heaven which is neither internal nor external neither spiritual nor sacramental neither secret nor manifest neither natural nor gracious neither original nor derivative And well may we lament the death of poor babes that are {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} concerning whom if we neglect what is regularly prescribed to all that enter heaven without any difference expressed or case reserved we have no reason to be comforted over our dead children but may weep as they that have no hope We may hope when our neglect was not the hinderance because God hath wholly taken the matter into his own hand and then it cannot miscarry and though we know nothing of the children yet we know much of Gods goodness But when God hath permitted it to us that is offered and permitted children to our ministery whatever happens to the Innocents we may well fear lest God will require the souls at our hands and we cannot be otherwise secure but that it will be said concerning our children which S. Ambrose used in a case like this Anima illa potuit salva fieri si habuisset purgationem This soul might have gone to God if it had been purified and washed We know God is good infinitely good but we know it is not at all good to tempt his goodness and he tempts him that leaves the usual way and pretends it is not made for him and yet hopes to be at his journeys end or expects to meet his childe in heaven when himself shuts the door against him which for ought he knows is the onely one that stands open S. Austin was severe in this Question against unbaptized Infants therefore he is called durus Pater Infantium though I know not why the original of that opinion should be attributed to him since S. Ambrose said the same before him as appears in his words above quoted in the margent And now that I have enumerated the blessings which are consequent to Baptism and have also made apparent That Infants can receive these blessings I suppose I need not use any other perswasions to bring children to Baptism If it be certain they may receive these good things by it it is certain they are not to be hindred of them without the greatest impiety and sacriledge and uncharitableness in the world Nay if it be onely probable that they receive these blessings or if it be but possible they may nay unless it be impossible they should and so declared by revelation or demonstratively certain it were intolerable unkindness and injustice to our pretty innocents to let their crying be unpityed and their natural misery eternally irremediable and their sorrows without remedy and their souls no more capable of relief then their bodies of Physick and their death left with the sting in and their Souls without Spirits to go to God and no Angel guardian to be assigned them in the Assemblies of the faithful and they not to be reckoned in the accounts of God and Gods Church All these are sad stories There are in Scripture very many other probabilities to