3. 5. it thinketh no evil Charity believeth all things it hopeth all things especially since it cannot appear that the little children of infidels have by any actual sin bard themselves or deserved any more then others to be exempted from the General state of little children declared in Scripture Ergo to doubt that little children of infidels have the holy Ghost is a breach of Christian Charity In which though both propositions be flatly false yet I call heaven and earth to witness whether all that you bring in proof of the Minor do not prove it as much breach of Christian charity to doubt that any infants as t is to doubt that believers infants have the holy spirit one infant having no more deserved ill by actual sin then another Thus all that ever you have done hitherto is utterly undone for the Argument you began upon and the basis of your building is that believers infants for their baptism only you plead denying the baptism of other infants as well as we have the holy spirit this upon denial of any sufficiencie in all your former proofs to make it appear is at last undertaken by you to be made sufficiently appear in this last Syllogism which if it do not make it as sufficiently appear concerning unbelievers infants considering your own matter used to prove the Minor as concerning the other then my candle is quite gone out but if it do then surely the very light that is in you is utter darkness In the next place you dispute upon us by way of Question and Interogation thus Disputation 1. How do those men and women that are baptized at years make it appear to those that baptize them that they have faith and the holy spirit If it be answered by their profession 3. Whether their profession since it is possible they may lie can make it appear infallibly If it be answered no. 3. What judgement then can they that baptize them passe upon them to be the subjects of baptism as they call them whether any other than that of charity If it be answered that of charity T is replyed then let them passe the same judgement upon those little infants of whom in general the Scripture hath given so good a report and against whom in particular no exception can be raised and the controversie between us is at an end Disproof First whereas you quere how those we baptize make it appear that they have the holy spirit before we baptize them I answer I know no necessity of making it appear that persons have the holy spirit before their admission to baptism for though we find once that God Anticipated his promise and gave the holy spirit before baptism Act. 10. yet I know not nor yet do you any promise there is wherupon in an ordinary way we can expect it of receiving the holy spirit of promise till after faith repentance obedience turning to God baptism and asking of it Prov. 1. 23. Iohn 7. 38. 39. Act. 2. 38. chap. 5. 32. chap. 8. 16. 19. Luke 11. 13. Ephes. 1. 13. Secondly as for the holy spirits appearing infallibly I answer first it may possibly appear infallibly to be in some in whom it is as Act. 10. 44. 45. 46. 47. by sundry fruits and manifestations of it which may warrant us to say God is in them of a truth Mat. 7. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 1 Cor. 12. 7. 1 Cor. 14. 25. It may I say undoubtedly appear to be in men and women but cannot any way at all so appear to be in infants if we may believe your selves who tell us p 8. that infants have not the exercise and fruit offaith and p. 18. that instruction of the understanding in matter of faith in some sort must go before any act of faith can be discovered and that no judgement of science can be past upon infants till the acts themselves be seen and examined for a posteriore onely the discovery of habits is made and that unlesse it could be certainly presumd what children have it what have not there can be no conclusion made And howbeit I am not of the seekers mind that an appearance of the holy spirit in any person before baptism in water doth exempt him from it but am well assured that it strictly rather ingages him to it or else Peter could not have commanded them in name of the Lord to be baptiz'd in water upon whom the holy spirit fell Act. 10. but must rather have forbid it as frustraneous and altogether superfluous yet that the spirit should appear at all to be in men in order to their baptism much more that it should appear infallibly to be in them is a matter of no necessity that I know of sith in the word it s not required that persons be baptized with the holy spirit first in order to their baptism with water but that they be first baptized in water in order to their receiving the holy spirit Act. 2. 38. for the baptism of the spirit as t is promised onely to believers so we believing obeying the Gospel and asking the holy spirit t is signified to us as one thing that shall be given among the rest in that very way of water baptism so that its enough for us as to the baptism of persons to take cognizance of it that they believe and repent which things though they cannot do without the spirit performing its common office of striving drawing moving inlightning convicting of good and evil sin and righteousness c. in all which it acts to the whole world Gen. 6. Rom. 1. 20. Iohn 16. 8. Act. 7. 51. yet they not only may do them without but must dothem before they can by promise expect the spirit in those special respects wherein he is promised to believers and calld that holy spirit of promise And now because you ask how we know they have faith whom we baptize I answer by their profession which gives though not infallibility yet by your leave for all your preferring the Eulogies given in general to all infants above any mans personal profession for himself in this case a far clearer and better grounded judgement of charity concerning them that they have faith then that you have concerning infants which at best is but charity mistaken for cruelty whilst it takes that to be in infants and that on pain of their damnation too they dying without it viz. believing see p. 8. which infants are utterly uncapable of and whilst it takes even that too without which it holds no infants are saved to be in but very few infants viz. believers infants onely and so damns all other dying infants which are far more innumerable and as capable of faith and as little barring themby actual sin from salvation and as little deserving damnation as the other so that whether we or you plead the cause of innocent infants let the world judge And whereas you suppose that because in charity onely we judge men and women
way of quaere and so let it passe viz. First if the seales in plurall marke your words therefore both at least yet both are but signs neither in true locution must both follow the right of the inheritance of which children are in capacity as well as men then to fill you with your own phrase why is not one seal of the same inheritance of the same salvation given to infants by you as well as the other i. e. the supper as well as baptism Secondly if these in plurali or if no more then baptism be to be given to children consequently upon no more then capacity of salvation the capacities of infants being equal and they quoad nos all alike capable to enjoy it if God who is neither bound nor barred please to bestow salvation why are not both these or at least that one sign of baptism which you give to some infants given by you to all infants as well as some i. e. to ungodly mens children as well as to those of godly parents the Dr. strives with all his strength and straines one point more yet to strain Tertullians testimony to his turn yet will it not do in any wise Babist Tertullian in that text mentions not onely childrens being holy but he mentions also that place Iohn 3. 4. in relation to children except a man be born again of water and of the spirit c. from which we may perceive that Tertullian grounds infants baptism upon Scripture Baptist. To which first supposing that by that birth of water and the spirit is meant nothing but baptism in that place of Tertullian we are yet upon I reply Secondly thus viz. appealing to the Drs own conscience and Mr. Marshals also whether he speak that very clause of Scripture in that very place of his we are now upon to that very intent as to ground infant baptism upon it or whether if it be read with a right and true Emphasis and reference it doth not of the two rather suppose it was not to be in infancy for having as Mr. Marshal understands confessed so far of infants of the faithful that they are designati sanctitatis et salutis i. e. to be held in the mean time to wit in childhood and before baptism as holy and happy reputatively only yet he saies that none of all them are sancti i. e. holy indeed for that we see is Tertullians sense of the word enter into the kingdom unlesse they be born of water and the spirit that is as I conceive till they be converted and baptized which thing that it is at all to the infants of the faithful in their minority he saith not at all here nor any thinglike it but elsewhere mentioning the same Scripture Iohn 3. 5. as he puts the water and the spirit together so both before and behind it he puts teaching and dipping faith and baptism as things that by the law of dipping are imposed as of necessity to go together saying he hath bound faith to the necessity of baptism therefore all believers speaking of none else were baptized and then Paul when he believed was baptized in his book de baptismo advers Quintil. Editio de la. cerda vol. 2. p. 153. ibid. c. 13. as Mr. Blackwood quotes him in his storm of Antichrist p. 28. 29. so that in the quotation were are yet upon the Antithesis lies thus in my conscience as I read him viz. infants of the faithful in their infancy may be reputatively holy but not really holy none being really holy till such time as they be born of water and the spirit which was not in infancy in Tertullians apprehension as it seems to me in that very place which the Dr. and Mr. Marshall make so much of as the words designati sanctitatis non sancti do shew whereupon I perswade my self it was that in that other place of his that I must return to he uses disswasion from dispensing and perswasion to deferring baptism to all but specially to infants not of infidels onely but believers also as I shall shew clearly to Mr. Marshal now who scruples it and that by such reasons as shall take that rub and stumbling block of his out of the way I mean this last text of Tertullian of his own and Dr. Holmes his alleading by which they were both gravelled from believing Tertullian to be ours for indeed whereas that place he last alleadged did give him supposed ground to scruple whether Tertullians disswasion from baptizing of infants were from any but the infants of infidels I hope to shew him such a necessity of understanding his disswasion to be from the baptism of any infants whatsoever as shall give him contrarily sure ground of belief that howbeit Tertullian would have some infants higher accounted on then some yet he would not from thence have any baptized to which end I shall set down Tertullians disswasions of infant baptism in English as I find them quoted by Mr Marshall in latin who I observe seldom Englishes what may make against him p. 34. of Mr. Marshall against Mr. Tombes and in p. 122. of Dr. Holmes in English and more largely then by either of them by Mr. Blackwood in his storm p. 29. together with the grounds why he would not have little ones baptized and leave it to be judged what little ones he means Tertullians words are these viz. According to every ones condition and disposition and age the delay of baptism is more profitable but especially concerning little children for what necessity is there if it be not so much a necessity as to have the sureties also brought into danger who may both by their own mortallity fail of fulfilling their promises and by the increase of an ill disposition be deceived The Lord saith indeed forbid them not to come unto me let them come therefore when they grow up to youth c. thus far Mr. Marshal and the Dr. Mr. Blackwood writes further thus Let them come whilst they are young whilst wherein they come they are taught let them become Christians when they know Christ a little further he saith shall it be done more warily insecular things that to whom earthly substance is not committed Divine should be committed they shââ¦ll know to beg salvation that thou mayst seem to give it to him that asketh it al so in the 20 chapter of the same book he saith it behoves them that are about to enter into baptism to pray with frequent prayers fastings kneeling and watchings and with the confession of their sins past in all these words is he recorded by the three authors above named disswading from baptizing infants now whereas Mr. Marshall professes he stands much inclined to believe that these little ones to whom Tertullian would have baptism delayed are to be interpreted of the infants of infidels onely and Dr. Holmes helps him what he can in this by quoting the words of learned Iunim upon the place who is just of the same opinion
Christs death buriall and resurrectiby our descending into abiding in and comming up out of the water take heed least you be of those that adde to Gods word least he reprove you as a lyar and adde unto you the plagues written in his book for I know not any Word of God wherein this representation is necessarily implyed much lesse expressed Thus whereas he saies elsewhere as I have shewed above that the end of baptism was to represent the spiriual grace as well as signify it and that the spiritual grace or thing signified and to be cleerly represented is mortification and vivification or communion with Christs death and resurrection which things t is strange he should say against the word of God for he protests it to be against the word when we say it and if there be any word expressing or implying a representation which himself so much talks on I am sure there is none like those two which we produce viz. Rom. 6. Cot. 2. which most lively shew it as I shall shew anon and undeniably declare yet here in the passage last cited he that talks of this representation and resemblance of Christs death and resurrection and ours with him as needful to be made in baptism is a lyar with him and an adder to the word which warrants no where to presse a resemblance of the thing signified in the dispensation of the outward sign no not so much as in those Scriprures Rom 6. Col. 2. So this representation in baptism is with him it seems a matter that must be and yet must not be and yet must be And yet for all this which is the wonder of me and will be of many more but specially of every wise man that hath his wits about him and would have bin of Mr Woodcock too who without taking notice of any weaknesse in it extoll'd the Book in the beginning of it and put it forth to Sir Iohn Burgoines patronage had he well weighed these passages of it Mr. Cook wheeles about once again and will needes have a representation and resemblance of the thing signified by baptism in the manner of administration of it and argues stiffely for it to but the representation must be of what he pleases among the things signified and not of the main thing signifyed in baptism it must be of sanctification as t is called a washing a cleansing a purging a pouring of the spirit on us a sprinkling of the blood of Christ on us and so be done by sprinkling water but not as it stands divided into its two parts mortification and vivification a death and resurrection or else if there must be a resemblance of this death and resurrection in baptism then by an As for example fetcht from the old world that was drowned dead buried by an infusion of water not an immersion and from the Ark which was rained upon only and not overwhelmed this death and resurrection must needs and may better be resembled by an infusion and sprinkling then by total immersion or dipping in water for if we urge to have the death and resurrection resembled by dipping i. e. a descension into the water and ascention out of the water which we all know was the way of Christs and the Eunuchs baptism we must urge also burial which is principally expressed Rom. 6. Col. 2. to be resembled too by biding of the whole man under the water for some time answerable to Christs three daies biding in the bowels of the Earth which cannot be without danger quoth he yea certainty of drowning and if sprinkling should not so fitly resemble as dipping and plunging yet the Scripture no where requires the washing of the whole body to all which I answer Resp. 1. which thing of his called sprinkling of water on the face for all he saies it may as well or better sith so many were of old killed and buried by sprinkling or raining on them in the daies of Noah serve to resemble our death and burial then dipping does yet in truth resembles a death burial and resurrection little more then a knock o' th' pate Secondly which drowning of the old world as it would make not a jot for such a purpose as he pleads for had it been by such a way as he dreames it was by viz. sprinkling raining on them by infusion and not immersion yet in very deed and so hee l see when he is awake and his eyes are open was by immersion immediately and not infusion for it might have rained long enough upon the earth before the men that had houses to shelter themselves in from that would have bin killed and buried under water if the waters had not prevailed by a flood so high over the earth as to overwhelm the men under it and plunge them ore head and ears and if he call that sprinkling and infusion let him sprinkle or infuse water in such abundance till the water sprinkled or infused become of such depth about the parties he is about to sprinkle as to swell ore their heads and to swill them wholly under it and I shall own such infusion for right baptism yet none of Christs ordinance neither unlesse dispenst to a right subject i. e. babes or beginners in the faith Thirdly which elegant allusion of his to the ark as that on which water was onely powred or sprinkled whence he seemes to argue thus viz. that it rained onely on the Ark or water was onely powred or sprinkled upon the Ark which Ark was a type of baptism Ergo baptism must be dispenst by sprinkling is as simple a delusion as ever was devised for if he intend that for an argument to prove that baptism is to be done by sprinkling and if not what does it there it does rather conclude that baptism must be sprinkled as the Ark was for reduce his matter into the form of a syllogism and see how sillily it concludes viz. thus The Ark was a Type of baptism But the Ark was only sprinkled with the rain not dipt Ergo baptism its antitype is to be dispenst by sprinkling He concludes more then he can possibly squeeze out from those premises and another thing then what is asserted of the Ark in his minor whereas in right form it should run thus The Ark typified baptism But the Ark was rained on baptized or wetted by infusion onely Ergo baptism must be rained on baptized or wetted by infusion onely But then what simple stuff were this what a logical lump of artificial non-sense Besides if it would follow that because the Ark which was a type of baptism was sprinkled therefore the way of baptism is sprinkling it would more truly follow that because the Ark was half dipt and half sprinkled one part of it being under the water another sprinkled with rain aboue the water therefore the way of baptism is to dip one half of the person and to sprinkle the other half but alas the Ark was a type of baptism as t
concerning the needfulnesse of water baptism to all who will not be under a just account of rejecting the counsell of that Prophet and rebelling against the command of King Jesus among which I shall set down none but such as to my own knowledge have been made and among them I shall not fail to set down if not all yer at least ââ¦hose that by the opposite party in this point are called and counted the principal for so is one parcel of the ensuing reasons stiled in a certain coppy of them which was given to me lately while I was at the presse viz. The principall Reasons why believers need not be baptized whereby you may ghesse how little worth answering the lesse principal are are on this wise Ranterist The Baptism mentioned Mat. 28. 18 19. 20. was not water baptism but the baptism of the spirit Baptist. Your blind boldnesse and buzzardly blindnesse in this I inwardly blush at when I as I hope your self will also when you consider 1. that it was a baptism enjoined and commanded to be dispensed and that 2. By meer men Who never were yet since the world stood so highly prerogativ'd from the Father as to be made administrators of more then water baptism or to be baptizers with the spirit for that was ever yet now is and ever will be the peculiar prerogative royal of Christs own royal person never to be imparââ¦ed to any other to give i. e. to baptize persons with the holy spirit the father by him and he immediately by himself without imparting any of that power which he only had to do it to others to give it in his name is the sole giver of every good and perfect gift Iam. 1. 17. So Luke 9. 13. Your heavenly Father will give the holy spirit to them that ask him So Act. 5. 32. the holy spirit which God hath given to all them that obey him 2 Cor. 5. 5. God who hath given us the earnest of his spirit 1 Ephes. 13. 14. sealed with the holy spirit of promise which is the earnest c. The Baptism with the spirit is the inward seal upon the heart that only God sets and not any meer man meer man is commissionated and impowerd from God to dispense no more but the outward sign i. e. water baptism which is not the seal of the New Covenant as the Priests call it for that 's the spirit which God onely gives throw Christ the Son for him onely hath God the Father sealed i. e. authorized honoured with that priviledge viz. to be under himself the sole dispenser of the spirit Iohn 6. 26. which wherever it s given gives gifts in such wise as seems good unto him 1 Cor. 12. 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11. There are diversities of gifts but the same spirit all these worketh that one and the self same spirit distributing to every one severally as he will There are differences of administrations diversities of operations meaning internal administrations and operations upon the soul for there be outward administrations and operations ad extra as preaching praying water baptism laying on of hands with prayer breaking bread in which men act to God ward in order to his acting toward us in the other for men may promise us the spirit and shew us what to do and baptize us in water in order to our having the spirit and pray for us that we may receive the holy spirit c. and minister to us outwardly in the ordinances of divine service which this new Testament hath which in respect to the old Testament is called the ministration of the Spirit because God gives down to them that wait on him sincerely and believingly in these outward waies of the Gospel which are to see to but foolish instruments earthen vessels in some measure here the heavenly treasure of his spirit and hereupon as they hold forth the word of the gospel in the hearing of which the spirit is received as t was not in the hearing of the law for the spirit was not the promise of that Covenant of Circumcision but the old Canaan for I will circumcise thy heart c. was a Gospel promise though made in the time of the law and in these respects viz. as preaching and dispensing gospel ordinances they may be stiled and in such a sense onely are they so stiled 2 Cor. 3 6. Ministers not of the Letter i. e. the Law but of the spirit i. e. the Gospel But thereis but one and the same Lord and t is one and the same God who worketh all in all All in All is Christs own glorious title Paul and Apullos and the Ministers by whom we believe may work and do all that is to be done without to all men they may baptize in water by commission from Christ for so he himself baptized not but his disciples viz. Iohn Baptist and the rest and wicked men may by his permission baptize i. e. overwhelm us with suffering shame c. But himself onely baptizes us with that holy spirit of his that must support us under suffering he sends the comforter he was the onely baptizer of them upon whom the spirit fell in the Apostles ministration of baptism with water in which case the spirit was promised Act. 2. and of laying on hands with prayer in which way though not ever yet ordinarily it was dispensed I indeed baptize you in water saies Iohn i. e. we men can minister no further to you being but messengers from him to do that but he shall baptize you with the holy spirit and fire Mat. 3. 11. so see how Iohn peculiarly indigitates him Iohn 11. 33. as in sole right to that service the same is he that baptizeth with the holy spirit and as Iohn did baptize onely with water so with no more then water did all the disciples and Apostles after Christ crucified baptize not with the spirit for that Christ onely did in their due dispensation of the other they had no promise any where that I find of such a priviledge I find it promised to them Act. 1. 9. that they should be baptized with the holy spirit not many daies thence but never that they should baptize with the holy spirit Christ keeps himself the right of powring that out upon all men as they turn to him Proverbs 22. 23. I am ashamed therefore at the cloudy conceits of such as say that was not water baptism with which Christ commanded his disciples to baptize the Nations after teaching Mat. 28. 18 19. 20. And the rather because Secondly it s as clear as if it were written with a beam of the sun that what was done most immediately and more remotely by the disciples in obedience to that commssion when once power was come on them to go forth till when they were to stay and forbear their testimony Luke 24. 47. 48. 49. Act. 1. 8. which was no more but teaching and as to baptism the baptizing in water for Act. 2.
38. Peter promised them indeed that they should receive or be baptized with the holy spirit in case they would repent and be baptized but the baptism he prest them to and upon which he promises the other cannot be that of the spirit but water unlesse wee l feign Peter to have spoken such Tautological non-sense as this to them viz. repent and be baptized with the spirit and then you shall receive the holy spirit and as the beginning of their execution of Christs commission was no other save what they promised as to their dispensation of baptism then teaching and baptizing in water and after praying for the Spirit with laying on hands so were all their proceedings suitable hereunto for he is fast asleep with his eyes open resolving to see and say nothing in favor of water baptism but to cry it down against light that shall say that those which are said to be baptized in the name of the Lord Iesus Act. 8. 12. 16. Act. 19. 5. and to be commanded by Peter to be baptized in the name of the Lord Act. 10. 48. were baptized by Philip Paul Peter or any man else with any more then meer water baptism for the baptism with the spirit is in all these places spoken of as received from God in way of laying on of hands in prayer and preaching besides the other as either preceding or succeeding it as the Lord pleased in his own season to dispense it Ranterist If it were water baptism that was meant Mat. 28. and that was practised by Peter Philip Paul and the other primitive ministers yet that water baptism was no other then the baptism of John onely and not of Christ that was ere long to cease and to vanish before the baptism of Christ i. e. that of the spirit when that should come in and not to continue as a standing dispensation to be used and practised to the end John the Baptist Mat 3. 11. opposeth his baptism to the baptism of Christ which could not have been done if the baptism with water was an inseparable companion of Christs doctrine how could John say verily I baptize you with water but he shall baptize you with the holy spirit if Christ had been commanded to baptize with water as well as Iohn if so the words of John would have run thus verily I baptize you with onely water but he shall baptize you also with the holy spirit Baptist. Here again I cannot but professe my to be ashamed at this curious conceit of yours who distinguish the baptism of water and that of the spirit into Iohns and Christs and oppose these two one to the other as if the one of these were destructive to the other as if that of Iohns were his own and none of Christs when yet that is so undeniably evident as it is that this of water as well as that of the spirit was given out by Christ himself so plainly as a part of his will and testament to abide together with teaching believing and repenting to the worlds end You talk as if the baptism with water was an ordinance of Iohn a baptism of which not Christ but Iohn was under God the main Moderator pro tempore while it stood in force as if Iohn had instituted and ordained it and Christ put an end to it as if Iohn were the Author of it and Christ the finisher to cause it to cease whereas nothing is more clear then that Christ himself was both the Author and finisher of it in another sense i. e. he that first ordained and appointed it to be administred even by Iohn himself and after Iohns decease yea and after his own death and resurrection too gave order to its continuance and for the observation of it among all Nations now as thitherto it had been observed only among the Jews I say its clear that the baptism with water was Christs baptism and howbeit it be called Iohns as Iohn was the first minister and messenger from Christ to begin it for behold I send my messenger and he shall prepare my way before me saith Christ of Iohn Mal. 3. 1 yet Christ himself was the chief Author of it in whose name and not in Iohns it was begun and dispensed ever even in that jnncture wherein Iohn himself was living and verst about it and before Christ had so specially commanded the continuance of it in all Nations to the worlds end in his own and the fathers and the spirits name as he does Mat. 28. 18. 19. 20. and ever after that also as we may see Act. 2. 29. where Peter preaching the same doctrine that Iohn himself did viz. the baptism of repentance for remission of sins sayes repent and be baptized in the name of Iesus Christ for remission of sins so Act. 8. 16. they were baptized with this water baptism in the name of the Lord Iesus so Act. 10. 47. he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord so Act. 19. 3. 4. where after that to certain disciples who were baptized with Iohns baptism Paul had said Iohn veryly baptized with the baptism of repentance saying unto the people that they should believe on him that should come after that is on Christ Jesus it is said that when they heard this they were baptized i. e. in water in the name of the Lord Iesus We see therefore that though its called the baptism of Iohn as Iohn began it yet it is that which Christ who was no minister servant or disciple of Iohn for Iohn was his so owned as his as not onely to honour it with his own submission to it though in no such need of it as we more above it then any of us to fulfil all righteousnesse of his own law i. e. the Gospel for example sake to us but also in his own ministry to give order to his disciples to administer it to all the disciples they should make and this not onely before as Iohn 3. 11. Iohn 4. 1. 2. but likewise after his own death and resurrection even when he was now ready to ascend Mat. 28. Mark 16. which sure he would not have done if there had been such opposition as you speak of betwen the baptism with water that was called Iohns and that bapââ¦sm of the spirit which because he onely baptizes with that is called Christs that they must not both abide together in the world to the end but one vanish away presently before the other and it had not been the mind of Christ that water baptism should be rather as you deny it to be an inseparable companion of his doctrine nay surely instead of confirming the doctrine and practise of wateâ⦠baptism as Christ did in his ministry before his death practising it i. e. by the hands of his disciples on all the disciples which he himself made as Iohn 3. 22. 4. 1. 2. and after his resurrection and immediately before hisascension gââ¦ving commandments to his disciples to
observe it and teach all Nations to observe the same as Mat. 28. 18. 19. 20. he would rather have confiââ¦cated it instead of causing it to continue by giving new and fresh commission for it he would have caused it to cease by some intimation or other that when the holy spirit should be given and men begin to be baptized therewith then there should be no longer attendance given to the baptism with water he would have said go teach all Nations beginning at Ierusalem that there must be now no more bapzing with water but that in the way of repentance and faith onely without that baptism they shall be baptized with the spirit Peter knowing his mind would have said to them Act 2 39. when they askt what they should do repent you of all your sins and believe in Christ in order to the remission of them but in the name of Jesus Christ be not baptized in water as some while since every penitent was used to be for that was a dispensation and baptism of Iohn that had its time a while meerly to prepare the way of Christ but is now abolished and out of date we must forsake Iohn now and not be baptized nor walk after those customes but expect a baptism with the spirit onely also Act. 10. 47. who can require these persons to be baptized in water that have received the spirit and are baptized with the spirit as well as we Thus I say they would have said and done as Paul when circumcision and the Law was to cease as much as he condescended in the case of Timothy yet never commanded it to continue but taught all the Jewes that were among the Gentiles to forsake Moses saying that they should not circumcise their children nor walk after the customes Acts 21. 21. if there had been such opposition such inconsistency between the baptism in water and that of the spirit that they must not stand together if baptism in water must not have remained rather in a certain continual subserviency to the other if it were not to be according to Christs will an inseperable companion of his doctrine but we find not the least hint or intimation of the mind of Christ when expressed either by his own mouth or the mouth of his Apostles that were to deliver and command nothing to people but what they had received of the Lord Jesus and what was commanded them of the Lord as concerning the cessation of that service or any toleration of any one person to omit it but as we find it a part of Christs Gospel and Testament even from the very beginning of it which was in Johns baptizing with water So for ought I find it was as jure to continue as a part of his Testament among other things not a tittle of which Testament is yet annihilated till he whose will and Testament the whole is shall come to take account of all men how as to the preceptory part of it they have observed it Whereas therefore you seem to be of this opinion that Christ was not commanded i. e. not commissionated from the Father to baptize with water as well as Iohn because it s said by Iohn I verily baptize you with water but he shall baptize you with the holy spirit as if Christ had had nothing to do to meddle with that water baptism as any ordinance of his or to give any order about it as if he had had no more power to dispense or enjoin that then Iohn had power to meddle in Christs peculiarity or to take on him to baptize with the spirit I must tell you that Christ had command and commission from the Father to that service of water baptism though it being the external inferiour matter he committed the actual administration of it to his disciples and Ministers among whom I look on Iohn as the chief or else sith he commanded others to do it and so baptized per alios at least if not per se Iohn 3. 22. 4. 12. his testimony of himself Iohn 12. 49. 50. Iohn 16. 31. is not true which indeed were blasphemy to think for ãâã there professes that he spake nothing of himself but the Father which sent him gave him commandment what he should say and what he should speak ââ¦nd that whatever he spake even as the father gave him commandment so he spake and likewise that as the Father gave him commandment so he did whereupon since he did by his disciples baptize with water in Iudaea while Iohn and his disciples in Aenon Ioh. 3. 22. 23. and made and baptized more disciples then Iohn for all came and flockt to his dispensations of water baptism at last and left John in somuch as he in his Ministry even of water baptism increased and Iohn decreased Iohn 3. 26. 27. 28 29 30 those words of Iohn as much as you think it absurd to understand them so must necessarily run so in any solid understanding though the terms onely and also be not expressed viz. I verily baptize you with water onely i. e. I can go no further then to that outward administration of water but he shall baptize you also with the holy spirit i. e. he is impowered to dispense higher matters to you then water only with which he baptizes too as well as I i. e. not himself but his disciples viz. that baptism with the holy spirit in which words you cannot say properly that Iohn opposeth his baptism to the baptism of Christ as if that which is called his were none of Christs but rather that John magnifies the person of Christ above himself as who should say I can dispense no more then the bare outward sign but Christ who though he came after me yet was preferred before me in whose name and not in my own I baptize and whose the baptism is that I dispense and not mine he is able besides the sign to vouchsafe you the very thing signifyed thereby This baptism then of water in the name of Christ together with repentance from dead works and faith in his name Iohn Baptist was the first Minister to begin in which respect it is sometimes stiled his but he left it after a while to Christ himself and his disciples to carry on who all ãâã Christ was actually crucifyed preacht and practised the self same things that Iohn did viz. repentance and saith in a Christ yet to suffer for remission of sins and baptism in water in token thereof and saving some circumstantiall difference the very same in substance even afââ¦er Christ was crucified too For herein onely the baptism with water which was Christs and of which Iohn was but a Minister as we are differs since Christ crucified from what it was before he was crucified viz. that then it was the baptism of repentance and faith for remission of sins by a Christ that was ere long to suffer for so Iohn preached Act. 19. 4. and baptized Matth. 3. 2. saying repeat for the
and imposition of hands in order to their obtaining the spirit of promise some not having faith in the thing whether that baptism with the spirit Peter speaks of Act. 2. 39. and Iohn baptist Mat. 3. 11. doth belong to them or no though there promised to all that are and shall be repenting and believing baptized in water even as many as the Lord shall call whereupon the fourth principle of Christs doctrine will not down with them but when they come to that lesson in Christs A B C they must skip it and take forth and because it likes them not turn ore a new leaf to the doctrine of the supper and Church fellowship before they are prefecty past their primmer to all which confused pro and con congregations and mongrill kind of ministry and people that speak half in the language of Canaan and half of Ashdod I le here say no more but this viz. si eo quo caepistis pede perrexerit is c. proceeding as you begin and thriving to the hight of your principle throw the nations the body of Christendom which was once an uniform and more lately a triforme may in time become that which I judge also it must become for some small season before the end viz. a monstrous multiform and at last an omniform beast indeed But now as to the question whether these two for I must scarce speak of these severally but very succinctly and as it were together are of right and according to the mind and word of Christ to continue to the end in proof hereof viz. that they are I shall refer the Ranter and the rest if any other besides him do deny it but to two Scriptures which prove each of these respectively and remove some few more of such exceptions as are made against the present practise of both these two and the other two parts of Christs outward worship and service I have already spoke to and so put a period to this discourse The first is 1 Cor. 11. 26. for as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup ye shew or shew ye for the word may be read imperatively as well as indicatively the Lords death till he come in which words t is so clearly supposed that the ordinance of the supper is not according to Christs will to cease till the next appearing of Christ that it were to suppose a man to be void of sense and reason to undertake to make it more evident to him by framing any formall argument from the place The Second is Heb. 10. 25. not forsaking the assembling of our selves together as the manner of some is but exhorting one another while it s called to day and so much the more by how much you see the day approaching where it is also most clear and undeniable that t is the mind of Christ that the Saints should keep together in one body in assemblies and fellowships one with another and that his sheep should not live in such a stragling state and conditon such single fellowship between God and themselves onely as is now pleaded for by many that fall off from following or frequenting any societies at all and forsake such truly constituted Churches as they were once added to which argues apparently that as we say of sheep when they keep not with the flock but are found squotting up and down here and there by themselves alone and aloof from their fellows that some ill disease and deadly distemper is growing upon them but that they should keep together in flocks every sheep following the footsteps of the flock which name of flock is that by which Christ often denominates his sheep as Luke 12. 32. Act. 20. 28. 1 Pet. 5. 2. to shew that he expects to find them in flocks and fellowships at his coming Ranterist Till he come is no other then till his coming into men by his spirit or in such full measures and manifestations of his spirit into mens hearts that they may be able to live up with him in spirit so as no more to need such lower helps from outward administrations such carnal ordinances such visible representations of Christ to the bodily eyes such legal rites and meer bodily exercises as baptism and fellowship together in breaking of bread are These things were used indeed and ordained as milk for babes in that meer nonage and infancy of the Church when Christ was known as a child as it were but now we are to know Christ as a man grown in us risen up in us and to have fellowship with him more immediately and intimately in spirit and not in such external and meer fleshly formes we are to live higher then on such low weak empty elements and beggarly rudiments as these which were used and imposed for a time to resemble Christ to us from without but must be left when once Christ the substance that was set forth by those shadows is come into us Christ is now in the Saints the hope of glory Col. 1. 27. So Heb. 6. 1. 2. leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ let us go on to perfection not laying again c. you see we must mind higher matters leaving these which were as a dark glasse or shadowy dispensation through which the Church once did see Christ and knew him after the flesh but now face to face 1 Cor. 13. 12. and henceforth know we him so no more 2 Cor. 5. 16. when I was a child saies Paul I spake as a child and did as a child and thought as a child but when I became a man I put away childââ¦h things 1 Cor. 13. 11. every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousnesse for he is a babe but strong meat belongeth to them that are full of growth who have their senses exercised to discern between good and evil Heb. 5. 14. that which is perfect is now come and therefore what is imperfect and in part only as ordinances are must be done away and as for gathering of congregations peoples assembling together in the Church bodies to preach pray break bread to build up one anoin the faith search the Scripture c. t was a way of God for mens edification till Christ the morning star shined to which men did well to take heed as unto a light that shined in a dark place but now the day dawnes and the day starre arises in mens hearts yea the day breaks and the shadowes flie away and Christ comes as a swift Roe and young heart upon the mountains of Bether so that now we are to exercise our selves rather unto Godlinesse for all bodily exercises as baptism breaking bread and Church order c. profit little besides t was said there should be a falling away from all those forms of worship and the way of ordinances which was in the primitive times 2 Thess. 2. 3. and a treading down of the holy City and Temple Rev. 11. 1. 2. as to the form
view of the very vulgar if you should so express it for he that hath but half an ââ¦ie may see that as there is no more faith to be seen so the Scripture declares no more faith to be in believers infants than in the infants of unbelievers or if you will needs have the Minor in such general and indefinite terms yet at least ââ¦ant ãâã a fair Conclusion concerning those particular infants you dispute about ââ¦less than that can amount to so much as ingeââ¦uty and then it must run thus viz. Those that believe and have the holy spirit and so right to the Kingdom of heaven ãâã to be baptized But the Scripture doth in general declare little children to be such as believe hââ¦e thâ⦠spirit and right to the Kingdome Ergâ⦠the infants of Believers and these infants onely are to be baptiââ¦ed But then you cannot so well shrowd your shuffling from any observant eie it being equally absurd to argue to universals from meer particulars and to some pââ¦ulars only from universals or to these individuals from indefinite declarations and verily take your Minor term little children which you so frequently Syllogize by indiscriminatim not expressing what little children or else indefiââ¦tely and more restrictively for some only not naming which it s equally ridiculous to argue thus viz. The Scripture gives good report of little infants in general Therefore believers infants only have faith and the holy spirit and thereby right to baptism and not any other infants Or thus The Scripture speaks well of little infants indefinitely i. e. of some at least though not all and we knââ¦w nââ¦t which as having faith the spirit and right to baptism Therefore undoubtedly these little infants whom we baptize are well spoken of in that kind and must be baptized As ââ¦is to argue thus The Scripture declares that John Baptist had the holy spirit Eego all the infants of believing parents must be supposed to have it in infancy and may thereupon be baptized Yet these are but as it were the several streins which you dispute in which put all together into a bag and shuffle as much as you will that which comes out first wil be a sensless non sequitur do what you can But you offer concerning this that particular infant viz. a believers of whom I denied that if it were brought unto you together with a heathens the spirit could more appear to you to be in it than in the other ââ¦ou offer I say to make it appear that that infant should appear to have the holy spirit above the other for that was indeed the business I then put you to prove and this you do as well as those may be said to do who by mending make their mater worse than t was before whilest there is not a tittle to be found in your Argument which doth not as fully prove the holy spirit to be in all infants as in any at all on this wise it runs Disputation Da That which to doubt of is breach of Christian charity doth sufficiently appear ââ¦i But to doubâ⦠these little children haue the holy Ghost is a breach of Christian charity i. Ergo that these little children have the Holy Ghost doth sufficiently appear The Minor is proved thus To doubt that these little children are such as the Scripture in generall hath declared them to be and that they have right to the kingdome of heaven c. is a breach of Christian charity whose rule is Praesumere unumquenque bonum nisi constet de malo the Apostle saying 1 Cor. 13. 3. 5. it thinketh no evil charity believeth all things especially since it cannot appear that those have by any actuall sin bard themselves or deserved to be exempted from the general state of litle infants declared in Scriptures Ergo To doubt that they have the Holy Ghost is a breach of Christian charity Disproof Besides the salsity of both the premises there 's no more at all concluded from them concerning any one infant then might if they were true indeed be as truly concluded from them concerning all First O the rottenness and infirmitie of the Major it is most manifestly fals for there are many things which to doubt of may be a breach of Christian charity which yet do not at present sufficiently appear To doubt that this or that particular infant will hereafter live holily and imbrace the Gospel may be a breach of Christian Charity whose rule is ever to hope the best till it sees the contrary and yet that this or that particular infant will live holily and imbrace the Gospel when he comes to age doth not yet so sufficiently appear but that as more plainly as things appear with you in infancie then at age by particular profession it may more sufficiently appear when they are grown up yea till then it appeareth not at all The Minor also is false for to doubt that this or that infant hath at present the holy spirit is no breach of Christian charity at all sith what hopes soever we may have of them as to the future yet at present there is no evidence that they have it nor yet any promise at all that it shall be given to them in infancy nor at years neither till they believe and obey the Gospel and as there is no promise of it to them in infancie so in meer infancy there is no such use of it to them as t is promised to be of unto believers neither doth it either quicken inlighten convince convert comfort or any other way officiate as a seal of redemption and remission of sins to such as have no sins as yet to be remitted Secondly if both these premises were as true as you suppose them yet would it follow no more from them nor from all you say toward the proof of either of them that believers infants have the holy spirit then it would that unbel evers infants have it in the evincing of which I shall only transcribe your Syllogism and proof of the Minor and instead of your term these little children write little children of infidels and so leave you and all the world to judge whether your own Argument doth not as clearly conclude unbelievers infants to have the holy spirit as the infants of believers and so consequently that all have it if any at all as well as some That which to doubt of is a breach of Christian charity doth sufficiently appear But to doubt that little children of infidels have the holy Ghost is a breach of christian charity Ergo that little children of infidels have the holy Ghost doth sufficiently appear The Minor is thus proved To doubt that little children of infidels are such as ââ¦he Scripture in generall hath declared them to be and that they have right to the kingdome of heaven c. is a breach of Christian Charity whose rule is presumere unumquemque bonum nisi constet de malo The Apostle saying in 1 Cor. 13.
lands they had sinned and p. 182. out of Pontan Catolog Through Germany Alsatia and Swedland many 1000s of this sect who defiled their first baptism i. e. their no baptism by a second a true one were baptized the third time with their owâ⦠blood i. e. miserably tortured as some have bin in England also both old and new yea massacred and murdered by fire and fagot for this and other resistance of the Romish stream by racking headings hangings pinching with hot pincers stabbings and such like wayes whereby the self-preserving common-wealth of Clergy men that they might testifie their cause by the Neronean cruelty of it to be of Christ who in the 9th chapter of just no where charges all his ministers to impower all Christian magistrates to imprison spoil torment hang banish burn drown whip fine flea and destroy all such as in foro hominum Synodicantium non Dei deny his name have restored those that have to their offence been overtaken with the fault of unfeigned faith and true obedience in the spirit of meekness in all ages of their reign So that if either fear or fire or blood or water were sufficient there hath hitherto wanted none of all these to suffocate the disputers to lay the itch and quench the heat of disputes against infant baptism but as the hast of these times wherein God begins to find the magistrates othor work viz. to curb the Christian cruelty of that whore that hath thus rid them into rigor against the Saints doth forbid the the ministers to be so throughly provided with them as heretofore so modesty doth to use those knocking arguments now in these times of Orthodozism where in both the Clergy and their bloody tenet of persecution for cause of conscience are discovered dayly in their colours How little then the Authorities of fathers and Churches in case we grant them to come in thereunto can contribute to your assistance is apparent and now that those modern authors you promise your Reader such through furniture from viz. Calvin Ursin and Featley upon this subject and also such others as though you name them not here yet have improved themselves more singularly on that single subject then any of these have done as little help you if they be well heeded I come now in the fourth place to discover And first as for your worthy Dr. Featley he is so worthily defeated and disarmed of all his Artillery by Mr. Denn that it were but to attempt the stripping of a naked and encountring of a wounded man to meddle much more with his arguments which are all sufficiently secured and disabled from doing much mischief to the true baptism onely for his high charges of the Anabaptists as he calls them as a bloudy illiterate lascivious lying sacrilegious sââ¦ct whether they may not more easily be made good against the Clergy in general then against the generallity of them he calls so may possibly be examined hereafter And as for Calvin and Ursin t is true they are both against us in the maine but in some things so slatly against you in the mean that you have as little cause to brag of their assistance of you as the Kirk of Scotland had to blesse themselves in the help of their King and his party who though they were all against England yet were so eager against each other that they rather weakned each others forces for thus do you Ashford arguers for infanr-baptism and those two Champions you seem to crack of as propugnators with you of the same who are such strenuous impugnators of their opinions asseverations and principles about the point as to debillitââ¦te and raze them down as impious and impedimental imbecillities for they cry out as I have shewed more at large above Christus non adââ¦mit salutem ââ¦is quibus adimitur baptismus quantum damni invexerit dogma illud c. Christ doth not deny salvation to them to whom baptism is denied what mischiââ¦f that opinion brings that baptism is necessary to salvation few consider and the opinion that they are damned who are not baptized makes as if the grace of God were lesse to us then to the Iews c. and there seems no small injury to be done to the covenant of God not to rest in this principle that infants are not excluded from the kingdom of heaven who depart out of this life without baptism and more of this sort so that instead of being strengthned in your last arguments at least wherein you assert that denying baptism to little infants destroyes the very hope of their salvation which is as much as to say Baptismum esse de necessitate salutis and perditos ââ¦sse omnes quibus aqua tingi non contingit c. that baptism of infants is so necessary to their salvation that parents can have no hope of their salvation if it be denied thââ¦m and that inââ¦ury is done to the Covenant of God and that the Goââ¦pel is worse then the law if infants be not bapââ¦ized instead I say of being strengthned by these mââ¦ns testimonies you turn us off to contrary wise you are rather spoiled and stark ãâã of a moity of that argumentative furniture whereby you strive to stiffen your selves and others against the truth even of no lesse then one or two of those three principal pillars wherewith you under pin your false practise and fortifie it from falling flat unto the ground As for the other men that together with your selves are up in armes in this age for infant-baptism so odiously are some of them at odds with you and among themselves as also some of you are with them and among your selves that it s well ââ¦igh enough to render a wise man mad at least a doubting man more distracted then resolved to hear read and see the wonderful jars that are among modern Divines as touching the various opinions ends grounds and principles upon which they plead and practise in this point of infant-baptism For not to spââ¦ak here of the jarrs which the baptism of persons in infancy occasions necessarily between the preachers assertions of baptisms nature use offices ends and the peoples practicals and infants capacities not one of which in infancy appears to the preachers to have any of those things which they say baptism signs seals and is used for viz. regeneration real union with Christ by faith and incorporation into him ãâã of his spirit and confirmation of their faith by it c. nor one of many when they grow up to years neither the most of them whom they so incorporate into Christ and signifie to the world by baptism that they are without doubt so accepââ¦ed and eternally beloved of Christ proving wicked and rejected of him as much as those who remain unbaptized till they are at age of which jars Mr. Blackwood speaks plainly p. 17. 18. 19. of his storm to which as little or nothing to the purpose as Mr. Blake replies p. 41 42. yet he is
overwhelmed or covered is the title of the Psalm and this is with the waters of affliction Psal. 124. 4. so 142. 3. -143. 4. so see Psa. 69. 2. 16. where there is complaints of sinking as it were over head and ears in deep mire and in deep waters where the flouds overflow and prayer for deliverance from those swallowings up by them in token among other things of which continual dying in the world as well as to it and universal passing under the waters of affliction and overwhelming therewith here in this life we do baptize i. e. sink persons over head and ears as well as raise them again alive in token of their resurrection from all troubles at the last daie therefore o how much of that precious signification and representation that is in true baptism is lost in your sprinkling and dribling dipping the face only which some use In respect also of which plungings and overwhelmings with sufferings their sufferings are Metaphorically stiled a baptism Mat. 20. 22. which Metaphor is very familiar in Scripture which compares the calamities and miseries the Saints suffer in this mortal life gurgitibus aquarum quibus veluti merguntur to overflowing streames of water wherein they are almost drownd and therefore said to be baptized As for the baptism with the spirit he that shall say it is not such a powring out as seasons the whole man soul and body and every faculty of one and member of the other which if it be it may well be called a baptism where in part atleast all parts are purged but of spiritualizing of some parts of the man onely suppose his face and head not his he art hands and feet also but leaving other parts of him carnal and unsanctified is not yet so well seasoned as he should be with understanding in the Grace of the Gospel All this therefore speaks plainly to our purpose and so it is evident still that the primitive Saints were totally dipped by the bare denomination of baptized which in that particular is spoken of them Secondly it appears yet much more plainly by the subject so denominated in Scripture and said to be baptized which is their whole persons for t is said they were baptized i. e. men and women and not their faces or their hands or their feet onely for if any member onely had been baptized it could not be said properly but onely figuratively and improperly and we are to take things in the most proper sense they will well bear that men and women were baptized or that their bodies were washed with water as in baptism they are said to be Heb. 10. 22. ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã when a denomination is made of any whole subject to be so or so that is not wholly and totally so that denomination is commonly made saltem ex majori from the Major part of the subjects being so atleast and then too it is but by the figure Synechdoche whereby we must understand that by that whole some part onely is meant but a denomination of a subject Ex minori parte onely from some small part thereof being so is a thing seldome or never used and scarce cleared alwayes from absurdity when it is by Synechdoche it self for he that should denominate his horse white and commonly call and distinguish him from all his other horses by the name of his white horse onely from a starre he hath in his forehead when all the rest of his body is black would be counted as bruitish as the horse himself specially if he should conceive himself speaking properly enough when he speaks so yet little otherwise then thus do you speak and think you speak properly enough too whilst you commonly call them i. e those persons baptized that never had more then a little baptism I cannot call it neither but meer Rantism on their faces from which though we are foold together with you by a custome of speech to afford persons that denomination of sprinkled at least yet to say the truth t is more then may be well challenged from us if we should stand upon it and plead for propriety to the utmost or for denomination but ex majori which reason would back us in if we should so little of that little subject i. e. the infant whose face onely you sprinkle is sprinkled by you when all is done but we let that passe Neverthelesse know this that totall baptizing is the onely true baptizing and a subject not baptized totally may not be said to be baptized properly but onely figuratively and Synechdochecally and surely the spirit speaks not all along by Senechdoche and t is as improper almost if not altogether to say that man is baptized whose fingers face hands or feet onely have toucht the water as t is to say the swan is black because his feet are so or the black-moor white because his teeth are so expresse not dentes et pedes and then Ethiops albus and Cygnus niger are two monstrous creatures indeed and baptizatus merè rantizatus is no other then rara avis in terris nigroque simillimâ⦠Cygno We may not therefore without abuse to our selves and them conceive them that wrote the hystories of the new Testament that we might know the certainty of those things which were at first done Luke 1. 14. and to this very end too that we might do thereafter to speak so improperly all along as to declare and denominate those to us to be baptized i. e. in true English washt plunged in water submersi dipt under water who if it were then as you say or at least as you do now were onely wetted with a few drops or if dipt whose noses foreheads or faces onely felt the water the wisdome of the spirit in them would rather have used the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã as he ever doth when he would have us conceive no more then sprinkling as Heb. 9. or else some more moderate phrase suitable to such a petty padling as face dripping is had that been the onely way of those times then the word baptize or else have exprest that particular or member of the body which onely was baptized if he would not have been understood as speaking of the whole for that 's the usuall way wherein the spirit speaks when he speaks of the dipping of some members onely as Luke 16. 24. when he speaks of the dipping of a member onely he expresses the member so dipt and the particuler subject so denominated he saies not send Lazarus that he may be dipt or that he may dip himself or that he may dip his body in water but that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and coole my tongue so Mat. 26. 23. ââ¦e that dippeth his hand with me in the dish he denominates not the man dipt from the dipping of so smal a member as the hand or face or feet or what ever member of the body it was that you imagine was then baptized for
it doth not alwayes signifie into but sometimes unto and why may it not in this place be thus read viz. they went down both of them unto the water both Philip and the Eunuch Baptist. No it cannot for they came unto the water before and so it s expressely spoken in the text ver 36. where its said and as they went on their way they came unto a certain water t is probable some foord or brook that they were to pass through and the Eunuch said see here is water what hindereth me to be baptized if they were come unto the water already as the word saies they were they could not be said properly except they had gone from it first to come unto the water again after they were come unto it therefore the next motion was into it without question yea the very Dr. himself with whom we now deal confesses no lesse then this that Christ and the Eunuch were baptized in the river and that such baptism of men hath been used if then they were used to be baptized in the water they went down first certainly into it not unto it onely for then they could not be well said to be baptized in it As therefore to that other quirk whereby the Dr. seeks to evade all baptizing in water and pleads for a baptism with water onely viz. that the praeposition ãâã which commonly is put after the verb ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies not in but with and is so translated and this is one of Mr. Cooks Crotchets too p. 12. of his book the Drs own grant quite cashieres it while he saies that Iohn and Philip baptized Christ and the Eunuch in the river for though I deny not but that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã may be and sometimes is truly enough translated with especially in Rev. 19. 21. the place quoted by Dr. Featley and Mr. Cook who both strive to enervate A. Rs argumentation from that praeposition which is used Mat. 3. 7. Mark 1. 8. where Iohn saies I indeed baptize you ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã i. e. in water saith A. R. with water ââ¦saith the Dr. and Mr. Cook yet if it be granted as it is by the Dr to be in the River then it cannot be denied but that it is in water however and so the Dr. thwarts himself in that Neiââ¦her is there such inconsistency in my conceit between baptizing in water and with water as that either this or that should be held exclusively of the other for they rather necessarily stand both together yet so as that the advantage stands still by it on our hand for whoever baptizes at all yea he that baptizeth in water baptizeth with water also and likewise he that will baptize wiââ¦h water must necessarily baptize in water too i. e. obruere over whelm or plunge persons over head and ears therein or else if we go to the truest signification of the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã in reality he baptizeth not at all Let it be rendred therefore baptize in water or with water which you will it s all of a price to us sith the one of these includes the other And whereas the Dr. and Mr. Cook both make such a matter of the words that follow viz. He shall baptize you with the holy spirit and fire the Dr. pleading that the Apostles were baptized with fire not dipt in to it and Mr. Cook that one may as well say Christ baptized in the holy spirit and in fire or put the party into the holy spirit and fire as that John baptized in wââ¦ter the praeposition ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã being there also I answer we may as well say so indeed for t is a truth as well as the other they that are baptized with the spirit and fire are also baptized in the spirit and in fire and put into the spirit and into fire i. e. wholly into a holy flame of zeal for God and the Gospel for that 's the baptism with fire that is there mainly spoken of and not as the Dr. divines that outward appearance of cloven tongues onely like as of fire that sat upon them in the assembly Act. 2. 3. for that was but a special accidentall visible token of Gods presence extraordinarily appearing among tââ¦ose particular persons at that time baptizing them inwardly with the other which is no more necessarily incident to all persons that are baptized with fire and to all those unto whom that baptism with fire is promised which are indeed all the Saints that repent and believe the Gospel as well as those that were met on the day of Pentecost as we see Mat. 3. 11. where Iohn promises the baptism with fire as well as with the spirit to all penitents most of which never had that vision of cloven tongues which appearance of cloven tongues I say is no more incident to nor to be expected by all that are baptized with fire then the appearance of the spirit descending in shape of a dove and lighting upon Christ at the time when he was baptized or filled with the spirit which was much vvhat such another special casual and visible token of Gods presence as the other is incident to or to be expected by all those that are baptized i. e. filled vvith the holy spirit and albeit this phrase in the spirit may seem to found so non-sensically to Mr Cook out of our mouthes that are a people of no account vvith him yet I hope it shall seem congruous enough out of the mouth of the holy spirit and the holy Apostles themselves for they use it more then once or twice in the holy Scripture and me thinks he should not be unlesse he be willingly ignorant of it for not onely doth Iohn say twice viz. Rev. 1. 10. 17. 3. of himself in this manner viz. I was in the spirit and he carried me away in the spirit but likewise Paul saies plainly to all Saints Gal. 5. 6. walk in the spirit and to himself and all Saints v. 25. if we live in the spirit let us walk in the spirit and testifies of the also Rom. 8. 9. that they are not in the flesh but in the spirit if the spirit of God dwell in them where by in the flesh he means all over alltogether or totally fleshly drenched drowned in flesh plunged over head and ears as it were in flesh filth and corruption as the world is that lies in wickednesse so that there is nothing but flesh to be seen upon them as he is that is buried in water whom that Element hath wholly covered and by being in the spirit no other then that which is the baptism with the spirit i. e. being indued with the spirit wholly sanctified in every part though but in part with the spirit all over seasoned washed clensed by the spirit for thus he is that is baptized with the spirit i. e. he is in the spirit as well as the spirit in him More then this yet though the word
head and all under for a time answerable to Christs three daies burial which cannot be without danger yea certainty of drowning 2. If it should be granted that a representation and resemblance of Christs death burial and resurrection is set before us in baptism and so of our death to sin and rising again to holinesse yet I demand why this may not as well be by infusion of water as dipping can you give me an example of so many killed and buried by immersion or dipping into the water as I can give of them that have been put to death and buried by infusion of water I am sure a whole world of men and other creatures those few that were in the Ark only excepted were buried in the universal deluge at once by infusion not by dipping so that infusion or sprinkling may as well clearly signifie death and burial as dipping and to the preservation of Noââ¦h and those that were with him in the Ark on which waters were poured from drowning the Apostle compares baptism as its Antitype Thus far Mr. Cook p. 16 17. And then again p. 19 20. 21. he undertakes further viz. to argue back again upon us at large and to prove that if there must needs be a resemblance and representation in baptism of the things that are signified therby then it may be as well nay must be rather by washing pouring sprinkling then by dipping and putting under the water sprinkling and infusion being as if not more agreeable to the nature and institution of baptism then dipping or immersion for as the word used i. e. ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies washing so the thing represented sigââ¦yed and sealed saith he in the wonted implicit phrase in baptism is a washing ãâã Cor. 6. 11. ye are wasted c. the washing of Regeneration 2 Tit. 5. having your bodies washed with pure water Heb. 10. 22. t is a cleansing and purging 1 John 1. 7. blood of Christ clenseth us from all our sinnes Heb. 9. 14. blood of Christ shall purge your conscience which things viz. washing clonsing purging are done as well by infusion of water saith he as dipping and though it were granted saith he that in those hot countreys they commonly washt by going down into the water and being dipt therein that will no more inforce a necessity on us of observing the same in baptism now then the examples of Christ and the Apostles gesture in the supper ties us to the same which was leaning and partly lying but it may be objected saith he that sprinkling a little water doth not so fitly represent the washing of sins away as dipping or plunging sith here the whole body is washed there the face or head onely I answer first saith he the Scripture no where requires washing of the whole body in baptism Secondly with as good reason one may plead thus that t is most convenient that at the supper every communicant should receive his belly full of bread and wine and take as long as his stomack and head will hold to signifie the full refreshment of the soul with the body and blood of Christ but who would endure saith he such reasoning These outward elements of water bread and wine are for spiritual use and to signifie spiritual things so that if there be the truth of things the quantity is not to be respected further then is sufficient for its end namely to represent the spiritual grace and that it be neither so little as not clearly to represent it nor so much as to take off the heart from the spiritual to the corporal thing yea the spirituall grace and visible act of God upon the soul signified and represented by the outward act of baptism viz. The application of Christs blood and donation of the spirit is exprest in Scripture by the name of powring sprââ¦kling and that probably if not certainly with allusion to the administration of baptism Isa. 44. 3. Joel 2. 28. I will powre out my spirit upon all flesh Ezech. 36. 26. He spââ¦inkle clean water upon you and you shall be clean this clean water questionlesse is the blood and spirit of Christ represented in the water of baptism so in the new testamet Act. 2. Heb. 10. 22. 1 Pet. 1. 2. Heb. 9. 13. and 14. verses compared together and Heb. 12. 24. Now saith he let any one without prejudice consider these Scriptures whether at least some of them speak not in allusion to baptism and whether baptism be not a lively resemblance and representation of the things here spoken of and withall let him consider whether the thing exhibited in this sacrament be ever so fully set forth by dipping and then I leave him to iudge whether sprinkling be not as if not more agreeable to the nature of this sacrament as dipping or immersion In this manner Mr. Cook delivers his conceptions in his to A. R. we will onely see what his parallel saith who argues as Mr. Cook doth epitomizing as it were the labors of Mr. Cook unto his own turn against C. B. wee l first fully receive his charge also and then fully return what in right reason remaines to be returned to both If by baptism saith he we are planted into the likenesse of Christs death and also made partakes of his resurrection will it follow therefore that there must be some ceremony in the application of the water to resemble it if you may take this liberty of argument give me leave saith he to attempt the like and with as good reason to conclude that baptism must be no other then sprinkling that there may be proportion between it and that sprinkling of blood and water that did foreshadow it or baptism must be onely by powring of water there being a lively representation between that and pouring out of the holy spirit or that baptism must be by washing with water only there being a lively proportion between that and washing away of sins by Christs blood you see saith he what you will gain from these disputes from Analogy and proportion To this purpose Mr. Blake p. 6. as if he had stopt all our mouthes by this at once for ever yet I hope he shall see that he hath left us room enough yet to breath in and by which to breath out some reply Now to give the more plain quick cleer and condign check to these two palpable controulers not to say contramââ¦lers of the present piecious and apparent Truth reducing Mr. Blakes sharp and snap-short Syllogisticalls unto that long circumferaneous collation of Mr. Cook out of which for ouhgt I find he fetch it and in the answering of which Mr. Blake is answered as well as he I most earnestly intreat both those two and all other opposites to that one and onely true way of baptizing we plead for viz. of total dipping seriously to advise what is granted and denyed what is asserted and argued and by what weak Mediums and on what crazy grounds those things are that are
the other yet coââ¦es this sixâ⦠of the Rom. 3. and 4. to prove the Analogy that is between the sign and the thing signifyed in baptism in his 24 question in page 668. quae est analogia conventenââ¦a sigâ⦠et rei signatae in Baptismo optima c. saith he What is that Analogy and Agreement which is between the sign and the thing signifyed in baptism Most apâ⦠forasmuch as in the same Manner as the water washes the body and clenses it from bodily impurities so the blood of Christ by its merits washes away our sins and spiritual impurities and his spirit sanctifyes us Moreover that immersion into water or aspersion doth most clearly denote Rantismon the sprinkling of the blood of Christ in order to remission of Sins and imputation of righteousnesse but the abode Quantumvis Momentanea quantula cunque saith Tilenus though never so small so that both these confute Mr Cooks fancy of a necessity of 3 daies abode under water if we will have Christs burial represented lively denotes the death burial of our corruption by vertue of the death burial of Christ that is the mortification of the old man but the rising out of the water doth most analogically as it were object unto our eyes ââ¦he resurrection of the new man or our vivisication and newnesse of life and also our resurrection at the last day See how this man saving that he shuffles in aspeââ¦sion and immersion as nothing differing doth own immersion into water abode under it rising out of it as the most admirable way of analogy to signifie and resemble what evââ¦r was to be resembled in baptism again in his 53 question p. 692. he quotes Rom. 6. 4. saying with allusion to that Scripture that Predicatione sacramentali we are said in baptism to die to be buried to be raised with Christ and that baptism confirmes our faith in these things because it doth pingere mortem c. plainly paint out the death burial and resurrection of Christ and therein is documentum c. a certain lesson of our renovation and resurrection Now the reason of all such sacramentall locutioâ⦠whereby the things signified are said to be done in the outward sign is saith Paraeus analogia signi et reâ⦠signatae tale enim quiddam est res significata in suo genere quale quiddam est signum in suo genere c. The likenesse that is between the outward sign and the thing signified for such as the thing signified is in its kind just such a thing the sign is in its kind for as the water washes away the filth of the flesh so Christs blood our sinnes and in such a manner as the sign is outwardly dispensed so inwardly the thing signified as the minister acts without so God within c. As therefore God within by the power of Christs death and resurrection mortifies buries to sin and raises us to righteousnesse so must not the administrator without semblably bury the person in water in baptism unto death and raise him again unto life or in token of his resurrection to a new life if not where is then the analogie and if no analogie why are we said sacramentally in baptism to be buried and raised sith the cause of all such sacramental locution is because the sacraments are as Austin saies pictures of the things signified in them or is aspersion an action as answerable to a burial and resurrection and painting it out as lively as submersion and emersion do hic murus ahaeneus esto This I know as sorry a shifâ⦠as it is must be your most inmost shelter when all is done for it can never be with any colour of reason nor is it by any reasonable men that I know save Mr. Cook and Mr. Blake denied but that baptism must ãâã according to the word yea that word Rom. 6 ââ¦ol 2. bear analogy to and the image of the thing signified yea and that very thing of all the rest which are represented therein viz. a death burial and resurrection by being under water and brought out of it again though by all that sprinkle t is moâ⦠heedlessely thought and therefore as senselessely taught that rantism i. e. aspersion sets forth those to the life as much as baptism i. e. immersion or overwhelming Among the rest that write of baptism with any allusion to those Scriptures we are yet in hand with what learned Tilenus saith is worth your animadversion I confesse the man though in his judgement he seem clear for our manner of baptizing by immersion submersion and emersion as that which was the onely primitive action and institution yet is so far benighted by the mist and black vail of implicit faith which hath covered all Christendom as to suppose that aspersion may now serve the turn and that for sundry reasons some of which are apparently faââ¦se and never a one of them worth a ââ¦raw which I le repeat and answer as I go for saith he Ritus in baptismo est triplex immersio in aquam ãâã sub aquâ et emersio ex aquâ quam vis autem immersio usââ¦atior olim fuerit presertim in Judea c. The outward ceremony to be used in baptism is threefold dipping into the water abode under the water and rising out of the water but howbeit this immersion was the usual way in former times especially in Judea and other warmer Countries rather then aspersion where note that he grants and who does ââ¦ot but Mr. Cook Mr. Baxter and Mr. Blake that having once denied it do strenuously resist it that the primitive way in Iudea and those Regions was totall dipping yet saith he the circumstance pertaines not to the substance of baptism which is false for I have proved that to be no baptism that is but sprinkling Secondly and sith the analogy of the Sacrament may be held out no lesse in aspersion then immersion which is as false and fond a fanââ¦asm as the other for sprinkling hath no more likenesse in it to a death a burial and a resurrection which though Mr. Cook and Mr. Blake deny it yet Tilenus himself abundantly pleads as I shall shew and that ex instituto from these Scriptures Rom. 6. Col. 2. ought to be represented in baptism then it hath likenesse to immersion submersion and emersion and that 's not so much as is between an apple and a nut Thirdly and sith in legall purifications sufficiebaââ¦t ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã sprinklings did suffice which if they did it was because these sprinklings with blood of the sacrafices which were as well on the mercy seat as on the people in token of onenesse or atonement between God and them were instituted directly and solely to point out the spiritual sprinkling of Christs blood on the mercy seat in heaven and on us here on earth in token of atonement which is not the thing onely mainly originally or immediately signified neither so as that it onely is to
that John cast or plunged Christ into the water and took him out of the water but it is only implied that Christ went down unto the water and came up again from it O how egregiously how shamefully doth this man forget and utter himself as if his senses were sodden into Trapizuntius his temper I would therfore ask him one or two questions viz. First whether ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã doth at all signifie to douse over head or under water or to plunge into water yea or no if not but I suppose he will not deny it so to do though he denies it to signifie onely plunging then I would have him to go to school again to the Lexicons which will teach him that it mainly signifies mergo immergo submergo and if lavo a bluo it is such an abluââ¦ion as is made immergendo but if it doth signifie to plunge dip or douse under water or overwhelm at all and I dare say he and every one else shall find it for all lavo quod fit immergendo to signifie a swilling in water altogether then I advise him to be think himself for I think he was asleep when he wrote this passage that there is at least some little hint that Iohn plunged Christ into the water when it s said Christ was baptized alias plunged dipt of Iohn into Iordan or washt in Iordan sith that pleases himself unless he put a difference between the active and the passive and will not yield it to be all one that Iohn baptized Christ and Christ was baptized of John but though it be said Christ was baptized i. e. plunged of Iohn into Iordan overwhelmed in Iordan and that he came out of the water which is a shrewd sign that Iohn did not keep him there yet this is not plain and significant enough for him it seems unlesse he may have the framing of the spirits speech another way that is no whit plainer then the other neither viz. that Iohn cast or plunged Christ into the water and took him out of the water unlesse it may be said just so all that is said which yet is the same with that he would have to be said implies no more then that Christ went down unto the water and and came up again from it without being baptized so belike how A. Râ⦠opinion that Iohn doused Christ under water which is also mine and the very plainest expression the original can be read in is confuted by those texts Mat. 3. 16. Mark 1. 9. 10. I can no more conceive then I can conceive that this expression viz. Philip and the Eunuch went down both into the water and he baptized him is a confutation of him that supposes the Eunuch to be baptized at all ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã are Mr. Cooks marginals wherby he would have us learn t is like from the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that their ascension was but from the water but I muse why he would not set down the words of the other Scripture Act. the 8. 39. which expounds this and where t is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã which ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is in latin ex and englished most naturally out of The second thing more observable in Mr. Blakes businesse runs thus First saith he howsoever one or two examples serve not your purpose but a general concurren ce of all examples See how Mr. Bls. heart misgives him and well nigh wavers within whether he had not best yield us these two examples for all his tugging for them before into our cause and therefore now falls for fear these two will side against him to serve himself against them another way i. e. by denying that the teââ¦mony of the spirit in these two examples is of any validity to us without a concurrence of all examples To which I say had Mr. Blake but one half inch of an example in the new testament of baby baptism how much he would make of it we may see by his cunning counterfeit examples for that thing out of scriptures that in truth are not onely far from exemplifying such a thing as the housholds he makes use of are but also clear examples to the contrary as the non-baptizing of those very infants that were brought to Christ and the non-baptizing of those very infants with their parents Act. the 2. to whose parents and their children to on the same termes of repentance when at years the promise is there made both which Scriptures he wrests into his turne yea verily and had he but one true single example of any one infant baptized in all that word we should lay down to him and never open our mouthes more against infant baptism yet if these two examples do prove for us it seemes they shall not be heeded whilst against them unlesse there be a general concurrence of all examples Wherefore secondly I tell him of a truth that though me thinks the single example of the Lord Iesus might content him and of the Eunuch for can he shew a better example then these yet there 's as general a concurrence of all examples in this particular as there is of the example of any one thing that is exemplified in the Scriptures all Ierusalem all Iudea and the Region about Iordan were baptized i. e. dipt of Iohn in Iordan confessing their sins Christ dipt of Iohn into Iordan the Eunuch going into the water and there baptized baptizing in Aenon because much water and indeed the very word baptize makes them all examples of our practise while it signifies obruo submergo Secondly saies he we have examples giving full evidence of a different practise and nothing can be concluded for you from these examples of yours Mr. Bls. examples it seems for his different practise must conclude for him but our examples though never so clear must conclude nothing for us ipse dixit Mr. Bl. hath forbidden them so to do and therefore we must sign ne plus ulââ¦ra here and urge our examples no more wherefore I le cease Onely secondly I hope he will give me leave to ask him what different practise it is he meanes of which he hath examples giving full evidence against ours and if it be either baptism of infants oâ⦠Rantism of infants or powring water on infants or washing infants any other way or dispensig Christs ordinance of baptism to men or women in any other way then in the way of dipping or washing by dipping which baptizo signifies I le promise him faithfully that upon his giving us any one example that gives full evidence of it or any other kind of full evidence of it besides that of example any of which he is far from giving in any thing that was ever pen'd by him yet I shall yield and become his disciple and follow him as far as I find him following Christ in that or any thing else and that for ever till then he must excuse me if in love to his soul I seriously beseech him to
FOr as much as I have been several times sollicited by several persons both by word of mouth and otherwiseâ⦠to give out unto them the grounds ends and arguments in writing of my continuance in the practise of water baptism and other ordinances of Christ as laying on of hands prayer breaking of bread church fââ¦llowship c. according as the Churches of Christ in the primitive ages of the Gospel did and for that I find it an easelesse and well nigh an endlesse businesse to write the same things in private letters about one particular subject to every of those particular persons that may successively desire it I have therefore thought good being called to the presse by sundry challenges of the Priesthood and more specially by not only the publication of that abusive pamphlet concerning the Ashford-disputation for infant-baptism but also their professed expectation that I should give some answer or give the cause to insert here this ensuing account of my own reasons for the right of our remaining in the use of ordinances till the return of Christ and animadversions of what little reason the Ranter hath to run from them and redeem himself from that bondage which he deems to be in the observation of them before the time appointed much more to run beyond the bounds of modesty and all good manners also as not all but many if not most of those do first or last who despise any of the ord nances of the Lord Jesus and herein as I shall be plain using no other form method and order then what the Lord gives into me as I write so I must be brief the foregoing part of this volume having risen already unawares to a far greater magnitude then was meant to the whole when I first cast the bulk of it in my mind and there remaining also something yet to speak and I know not well how much to the Priests concerning themselves in way of return to the last piece of that pedobaptistical pamphlet which was pu forth by who knowes or rather by who knows not whom in order to the plainer disquisition of the truth in this question viz. whether the ordinances of Christ that were in use of old are of right to be practised still as there are foâ⦠services then in use the necessary use of which is now denied viz. baptism in water laying on of hands breaking of bread ââ¦d church-fellowship so I shall addresse my self to prove the practise of these four severally to stand even de jure till the second coming of Christ which is yet to come And because baptism in water though most strenuously denyed by many to be so much as lawfull to be either dispensed or submitted to and by many even of those that have submitted to it to be necessary or any other then a matter of indifferency is yet the first in order to be practised and that without or before which we are not once to meddle with the other I therfore propound it as the first in order to be proved and in order to the proof of at least the lawfulnesse thereof against such as say its siââ¦ful for this will be included in the other I shall by the help of God prove a necessity of it against such as judge it needlesse or superfluous and by several Scriptures shew it to be such a service the present performance of which is so far from being sinful that it is no lesse then sin and rebellion against Christ himself to leave it unperformed The Scripture which I shall most directly make use of to this purpose and lay as the very basis and foundation of this businesse and make as a certain cardinal ãâã from whence to argue and whether to reduce all the rest which I shall more collaterally handle is Mat. 28. 18. 16. 20. All power is given c. in which place these things chiefly are observable as subservient to the proof of the point in hand First we find Christ pleading that absolute power which was given him by the father to be the Soveraign Lord and Supream lawgiver to the whole world thorowout all nations and generations of it from thenceforth even to the end in these words viz. All power is given unto mâ⦠both in heaven and in earth i. e I am he to whom this prerogative is granted to give out to all men what laws and rules they shall be guided and governd by what wayes they must walk in in order to that eternal salvation which as a Priest I have purchased them to by my own blood if ever they mean to attain it I am that Prophet which the Lord hath raised up unto all people now instead of Moses who was the faithful giver out of Gods will mind or Testament to Israel of old whose voice all must now hearken to in all things what ever I say unto them and whoever harkneth noâ⦠to me shall be cut off from among the people behold God hath given me for a wiââ¦nesse to the people a leader and commander unto the people Secondly After he had thus shewed his authority and commission from God to be the only Lawgiver whereby to summon the sons of men to so much the stricter attention to him he next begins to act according thereunto to act like him self to make out his mind to his disciples concerning them and all men most expressely and plainly about this matter of waterbaptism and to give order to them both when and to whom both in what time and to what subjects they should dispense it and likewise both how and for how long he would have the nations as by command from himself commissionating his disciples so to teach them to practise the same dispensation of water baptism in the two following verses Going out therefore teach all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father Son and holy spirit teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you and lo I am with you alwaies even to the end of the world Where note first in general three things First That he gives order to his disciples to teach the nations and baptize them in water in his name ver 19. going out teach all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father son and holy spirit Secondly that whatever order is given out by Christ to his disciples concerning this businesse of water baptism as to the order of its administration and the term of its continuance the very same and no other doth Christen join his disciples to give out to the disciples that should be successively in all nations to be observed as his will concerning them v. 20. teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you Thirdly that what ever he gives out as his will concerning both them and the disciples in the nations that they should make he gives out as his standing will and Testament to them and their standing duty to him in all ages of the world as well as
were then and there converted to be baptized in water but also assert it to be beyond the power of the persons themselves or any other to forbid it to be dispensed to them or to ãâã them a dispensation to forbear it for when he queries who can he means no man can forbid water why these should not be baptized for an Interrogation affirmative concludes negatively whereupon nemine prohibente he commanded them and what he commanded them was no lesse then their duty and the positive will of God concerning them for it s said to Cornelius v. 6. that Peter should tell him what he ought to do and also no lesse then what he was commissionated from Christ to impose upon them or else Peter deluded them to whom he spake for v. 39. he calls it the word of God sent to Israel and v. 33. they expected to hear not what he should please but what was commanded him of God he commanded them I say nemine contradicente in the Lords name to be baptized which Peter had no power to have done had it been by the Lord himself left a d libitum unto them yea had it been a thing so needlesse of such liberty and such no-necessity as many make it now adaies I would by Peters leave had I been there and been one of those that were so flatly commanded have interposed and forbid their baptism or at least my own unlesse my flesh had had more mind to it then it had when I used it and have pleaded as our Genteeâ⦠spiritualists do against us in this wise against Peter viz. you are much mistaken Peter in this matter you go about to urge it as an absolute duty and matter of necessity for us to be baptized in water but alas it s no such matter t is but an external dispensation that may be done indeed if any be not satisfyed without it but else may full as well be let alone we have the most substantiall baptism already even that of the spirit in which case the other is but meer superfluââ¦ty to be used afterward you cannot make it such an absolute command from God to us as you seem to do and therefore whereas you ask who can forbid even I can forbid why I should not be baptized as by positive precept from Christ seeing I have received the holy spââ¦it as well as you Thus verily might one have cavilled against Peters command then as the Raââ¦ter cavils against Peters command now which is not out of date nor hath lost any of ââ¦s validity sure with lying so long unpractised if baptism in water were such an indifferent thing as t is now made by the new Spirituallists who little consider but I assure them wise men will weigh it well though they do not how little their Logick and Peters are like one another whereby it may be gathered what contrary spirits he and they speak by for whereas he reasons thus viz. these men have received the spirit and have the most substantial baptism already as well as those that are baptized in water therefore who can forbid water why or give any good reason to the contrary why these should not be baptized and accordingly commanded them so to be They contrarywiââ¦e reason thus Viz. These men have the spirit the most substantial baptism already as well as those that are baptized in water Therefore who can command it as necessary or give any sound reason why these should be baptized in water and accordingly forbid them so to be But whether it be right in the sight of God to obey them foolishly forbidding it as needlesse at best but indifferency or obey God by the mouth of Peter commanding it universally to all men as their duty judge ye T is clear therefore out of all these places that water baptism is so far from being sinfull that t is more then lawfull more then indifferent yea a matter of duty and necessity and such as it would become meâ⦠to submit to as well as Christ who needed it not as we do if there wââ¦re no other end nor use of it then to fulfill all the righteousnesse of his law the least of whose commandements whoever shall break and teach men so i. e. that they need not keep them the same shall be least in the kingdom of heaven but who so shall do and teach the same shall be great in the kingdom of heaven and to whom he that is faithful though but in a little is faithful in much and he that is unfaithful in but a little is unfaithful in too much specially if that little be left us in way of command in his word as his positive will concerning us and noâ⦠as a matter of such indifferency as that it may without sin on either side be done or not dore which we please for such things onely and indeed are indifferent of which we may by the word say as Paul saies of meats and marriage viz. one believeth he may eat all things another who is weak eateth herbs one man esteemeth one day above another another man esteemeth every day alike let every man be fully perswaded in his own mind so seek not a wife yet if thou marry thou hast not sinned but so we cannot say nor do the Apostles speak concerning baptism viz. one man believeth that having the spirit he may but needs not be baptized another who is weak must needs be baptized let every one do as they see good or are satisfied in this case if they be baptized they have not sinned and if they never be baptized they have not sinned c. nay both Christ and they speak here in way of peremptory determination of all persons to one point for whereas if baptism were a matter thus left to our minds Christ must have said to his disciples go teach all nations every creature baptizing as many of those you make disciples onely as judge it needful as have a mind to it not teaching them to observe that outward rite any further then they please and Ananias to Paul and Peter to those he preacht to Act. 2. Act. 10. must have said repent and believe remission of sins and call on the name of the Lord and if any of you be so mindeed you may be baptized in water in token of Christs death burial and resurrection but those that seem to themselves to be as well without it may forbear we have no power either to forbid it or force them to it but they say clean otherwise viz. Go teach all Nations baptizing them teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I command you and now why ãâã arise and be baptized ãâã away thy sins c. repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Iesus c. who can forbid water why these i. e. all these should not be baptized c. all which if it do not import and expresse water baptism to be every ones duty and not
it for want of provision of administrators but that you and such as you are yea and that though some are sent to baptize have such a Supersedeas from being baptized as you pretend to be vouchsafed you by Christ Jesus because you have been loââ¦g of it and been bred up in the Christian Religion is such a strange piece of businesse as I know not in any wise what to make of who in forohominum ecclesiae at least take baptism to be the visible badge that so distinguishes between those that are of the Christian Religion and other people that who so shall say he is of the Christian religion and yet never was nor will be baptized must excuse me if according to the tenor of Christs Testa ment I own him not as yet to be a Christian. What you call the Christian Religion in which you say you were bred up I know not if you mean the doctrines of faith repentance and good manners alone as yet and abstract from baptism this whether it be a great while or but a little while since you began to put it in practise the matter is much at one for degrees as to the length or shortnesse of the time since we were converted do not vary the nature of the case this I say is so far from exempting that t is the onely thing ingaging you to baptism and howbeit you say there is neither as I am sure there is not for baptizing infants yet you cannot possibly but see that there is both president and precept for the baptizing of all believers and of all in any Nations that are discipled so that if you have been converted not lately but long ago and remained till now unbaptized you have so much the more need to hasten to it and instead of being held excused from now doing it at all because you did it not when first you should to be exââ¦uscitated in the words of Ananias to Paul saying and now why tarriest thou arise and be baptized and wash away thy sins calling on the name of the Lord. But if by the Christian Religion which you say you were bred up in you mean either that Christian Religion of the Rantizer that teaches men to change the ordinances of Christ that of baptism specially as to its form and subject and to make void his command through his tradition of a new baptism to all or that Christian Religion of the Ranter that so rebells against that law of Christ that he will give way to have now no water baptism at all these two Religions as Christian as you count and call them are both but Anti-christian with me Ranterist You make such a deal of do about water baptism as so needful that there may be no Church-fellowship held without it but for ought I see yâ⦠t is a matter oâ⦠no such weight but that we may serve God as acceptably to the full without it for in Christ Iesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but faith which worketh by love Gal. 5. 9. circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing but the keeping the commandaments of God 1 Cor. 7. 19. Baptist. T is true that when Pauâ⦠spake this which was when there was an abolition of circumcision so far as was consistent with the Jewes ability to bear it and when it was now de jure to grow out of date then circumcision was nothing and uncircumcision nothing so that t was altogether needlesse to be circumcised but as nothing as it is now yet so something was it once when that testament it was the sign of stood that every soul of whom it was then required that was not circumcised was to be cut off from having fellowship with that Church and people and as nothing as this baptism or no baptism is with you now yet no lesse then this at least must we say of the unbaptized that every soul that shall refuse to be baptized is to have no fellowship with Christs Church and people Acts 2. 41. 42. Secondly as nothing as circumcision and uncircumcision baptism or no baptism are with you yet faith which worketh by love is something as Paul himself also doth seem to hint and the keeping of the commandements of God which love to the Lord Jesus he that saies he can expresse without keeping his commandements among which baptism in water is not the leaâ⦠and without counting those commands of his not too grievous to submit to makes either Christ a lyar or elle himself Ioh. 14. 23. 1 Iohn 2. 4. 5. 1 Iohn 5. 2. 3. Thus farre concerning water baptism to which in the primitive times there were and in all times also where in it is or shall be truly dispenst and sincerely submitted to there assuredly are or will be two other baptismâ⦠concomitant viz. First a baptism with sufferings Secondly a baptism with the holy spirit to support under those sufferings in order to the being baptized with the last of which baptisms there was then an ordinance or administration of Christ viz. prayer and laying on of hands which was practised toward all believers after baptism in water which as it was kept on foot from the Apostles daies and downward among the Churches of Christ in after ages and is as to the substance of the service kept on with far lesse corruption and alteration then that which yet cleaves to their baptism among all but the Presbyterian part of the national priesthood and people so that it is of right to be used in order to the self same end and in the self same manner now as then it was because the present use and practise thereof is so openly not to say obstinately denied not onely by the Ranter who rases the whole foundation and the Presbyrerian and Independent Rantizer who rase down that or at least do not raise it but also by several societies of persons baptized who to the great grief of such congregations as own the whole truth and are built upon the whole foundation or beginning doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles do yet ignorantly withstand it and some even of these bitterly band against it I shall the Lord assisting in all possible meeknesse brevity and plainnesse make good unto them and that in this one single long-winded syllogism onely least the presse which now presses on apace after me and is at the very heels of me all along at my penning of this whole businesse called Anti-ranterism should overtake me and stand still for want of such supply as it expects hourly from me least also I out run too much as I have almost done already the bounds prefixed to this interposed Treatise the Minor proposition of which argument being proved and cleared from those clouds of objection wherewith some strive to darken it will both evince and evidence the continuance of that service also in its right use to this day so sufficiently that howbeit much more might be spoken yet no more shall at this
practising Heb. 6. 2. and howbeit the whole form of the doctrine he there delivered is not set down as none of the doctrine that Philip preacht at Samaria is nor of that Paul preacht at Philippi Act. 16. 14. nor at Corinth Act. 18. 8. yet is it not by sundry passages as evident that he taught that principle of laying on of hands among all the rest as it is and how evident that is is shewed above that they in those other places preached baptism shall we think that Peter taught the principles of the doctrine of Christ all which he was to lay as one foundation among them by the halves did he build them upon one part of the foundation and not on the other part did he constitute them partly upon it and partly beside it did he teach them all the rest of the principles every of which its said Heb. 5. 12. they had been taught viz. faith repentance baptism resurrection and judgement and did he leave out that one onely of laying on of hands specially since it s said that with many other words he exhorted that people who are said there also to continue in the Apostles doctrine what man that devotes himself to the comparing of Scripture with Scripture can imagine it and if not why not be satisfied that it was preacht by some at least of Christs Apostles to all baptized believers A third Scripture I direct the inquirers unto is Act. 8. 5. 12. 14. 15. 16. 17. whence first its evident from the Apostles administring and the Samaritans submission to it that the doctrine in the purport and tendency of it was first declared unlesse we shall judge the Saints at Samaria were such idiots as to act by implicit faith as men were not to do but by comparison of what they said with the Scriptures under the ministry of the Apostles themselves Act. 17. 22. and to yield blind obedience to they knew not what the Apostles also justifying them in it which if they did then you that professe your selves to be yet ignorant in that service and that you know not the meaning of it may submit to it as safely though as senslessely as they from the hands of such as do which yet when all is done I am sure you may not but Secondly more evident yet if you weigh some passages of that text it self the words whereof are on this wise viz. then went Philip down unto Samaria and preached Christ to them v. 5. and when they believed the things spoken by Philip pertaining to the Kingdom of God they were baptized both men and women when they at Ierusalem heard that Samaria haâ⦠recââ¦ved the word of God they sent unto them Peter and John who when they were come prayed for them that they might receive the holy spirit for as yet he was fallen upon none of them onely they were baptized in the name of the Lord Iesus then laid they their hands on them and they received the holy spirit It s said that Philip preached Christ and spoke of the things pertaining to the the Kingdome of God and that they received the word of God which they did not surely so much as to believe what was to be done till he had preached it now can any rationall man think that he preached Christ and the things pertaining to his kingdome and the word of God and not preach so much as all the principles of the oracles of God not so much as all the first Rudiments or whole beginning word of Christ but left out imposition of hands onely among all the rest as none of the word of Christ nor of the things pertaining to his kingdome as not to be preacht no not in that juncture wherein immediately after it was to be and accordingly was so universally submitted to by them and dispenst unto them or if you say they received not that word of laying on of hands from Philip but from Peter and Iohn I answer t is true practically from the hands of Peter and Iohn dispensing it but by faith so as to believe it to be a practicable doctrine that was their duty to own from the mouth of Philip dispensing the doctrine of it or suppose that Philip spake nothing of it till Peter and Iohn came which is non supponendum yet is it likely that the Apostles that were sent to them from Ierusalem though nothing is said of that they said that therefore they said nothing to them at all yea will right reason ever receive this for truth that the Apostles were sent to Samaria upon the account of some service whether solely that of prayer and laying on of hands it matters not so long as that was one part of it at least and yet neither acquaint them whether before acquainted with it or no to what end and purpose they came and what was the end and purport of that service they onely or mainly came for he that can receive this let him receive it for my part I professe I cannot A fourth place from whence it is easily gathered that the doctrine of laying on of hands in order to their receiving the holy spirit was wont to be preached to all baptized believers is Act. 19. 1 2. 3. where Paul speaking to the whole company of disciples that he found at Ephesus the number wherof were then but about twelve among whom the doctrine of laying on of hands in order to the receiving the holy spirit had not been preached at the time of their baptism seems to reprove and blame the neglect of it enquiring whether they had not received the holy spirit supposing surely at least that the promise of it had been to them and prayer made for them in the usual way with laying on of hands that they might receive it but marveiling much that they being baptized believers had not been informed about these matters nor had so much as heard of the holy spirit have you received the holy pirit saies he no nor so much as heard of it say they no unto what then were you baptized saies he if at least you have not so much as heard of it as who should say who baptized you I wonder and did not so much as instruct you about the spirit nor laying on their hands pray for you that you might receive the spirit this plainly shewes that by right they should all about the time of their baptism in water have heard of the holy spirit and in what way it was to have been expected by them even that of laying on of hands none of all which they having so much as heard of as yet Paul therefore after some words of fuller information to them and such other passages as fell out thereupon laid his hands on them verse 6. in order to their receiving the holy spirit These Scriptures what they are to others I know not are to me a cleer and safe conduct into the belief of this truth that the doctrine of laying on of hands with
seal to him in this special sense i. e. as a seal of the righteousness of that eminent faith which he had that he might be i. e. to that very end and purpose as to ratifie him in that royal title The father of all that believe to this purpose I then spake shewing withall that in the same sense in which the father is said to seal the sonne Iohn 6. 27. to be the giver of that meat that endures to eternall life ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã him hath the father sealed i. e. authorized to that business honoured with that office and as Pharoah honoured Ioseph with the sole Dispensation of all the Corn and Government of his Kingdome and as Kings under the Broad seal do seal men to i. e. honour them with and settle them in great Places Trusts and Titles c. in such a sense is God in that place said to give Circumcision to Abraham whereby to seal him up and settle him for ever in that glorious title viz. the father of all that believe in which sense Circumcision though a sign of some things in common to him with his posterity was never given to any one of Abrahams posterity at all this as it is clearly held forth in that place so was so clearly held forth to you from that place of your own naming at that very time that as I wondered you could be ignorant of it then so I much more admire that you are not ashamed to bewray such dissembling in the recording of it as you do and such wretched ignorance of it still besides I know not whether I instanc'd then in any other but I am sure as shy as you seem to be of it there were divers more promises made and priviledges made over to Abraham under the great Seal Circumcision which were neither made nor given much less confirmed by Circumcision as a seal thereof to all his posterity viz. that his seed should inherit Canaan this though it was made and made good to Abraham and that seed of his to whom it was promised yet not to the seed of all his seed for many of his posterity as Ishmael who was circumcised and his children by Keturah also and their whole race had none of all this seal'd to them by Circumcision Again that Christ should come out of his loyns that in his seed all Nations should be blessed these were made to Abraham and were as the rest also great Priviledges to the honour of which he was sealed yet though 't was signified to all his seed by Circumcision that Christ should come of him after the flesh all of them had not that priviledge by promise that Christ should come of them after the flesh by all which it undeniably appears that the same Covenant of Circumcision in every of those respects in which Circumcision was given him as a seal of it was not given to all the Iews and their children and that fore-named place speaks of Circumcision onely in reference to Abrahams person and in that sense and respect in which it was given to him only as a Seal of his faith i. e. that strong faith he acted and gave glory to God by Rom. 4. 20. for which God also gave that great glory and dignity to him viz. the father-hood of the faithfull All which notwithstanding and much to the same effect that was uttered then to shew that Circumcision had more ends and relations to Abrahams Person then to the Persons of his seed yea and though your own paper which lastly I appeal to doth testifie that I I multiplied words that is to say spake much about other ends of Circumcision to Abraham then to his seed yet you both be-lie me and give the lie to your selves so far as to say I was extreamly foundered which to say and yet to say in the very same line that I multiplied words about other ends of Circumcision the very point your selves had urg'd me to speak to if it be not at once to say and unsââ¦y then verily I know not what is for these two are contradictory to each other but perhaps you think to salve all with this that being call'd to speak punctually to that end viz. whether Circumcision were a seal of the righteousness of faith to Abrahams posterity at all or not or if not to shew it I answered nothing to that particular that carried any sense or reason in it but really Sirs I said no less to that very end but rather much more then I have said a little above which whether it have any sense or reason in 't or no yet was it both sensless and reasonless in you however to leave it wholly out and you had dealt far more ingenuously and judiciously in your own Account and in every rationall mans also had you set down what I answered and so put your Reader into a capacity of discerning whether it were to the purpose yea or no but that its like you were very loath to do least as nothing as it was to your purpose it should have been more serviceable then you desire it to be to ours As for that ingagement whereby how wisely a fool may see you bound your selves to become Anabaptists in case I made discovery of what I did abundantly discover I freely dis-engage you from that double performance and shall accept much more of your single submission to that ordinance it being no matter of rejoicing to to me to see any man translated from A-no-baptist to be an Anabaptist for that is from one extream to another Report Next you relate p. 5. that I said I did not deny but that little children might have the holy Ghost and these texts of Scripture viz. Mar. 10. 14. Mat. 19. 14. Luke 18. 16 2 Cor. 13. 5. did seem to intimate as much but that it could not be made appear that they had it to the making of them subjects of baptism Reply To this which is another ãâã falsity and connterseit resemblance I reply thus first that ãâã children might have the holy spirit if God please extraordinarily to infuse it I might then possibly not deny nor dare I yet deny but that possibly they may but it 's more then God hath manifested if they have to either us or you nor will this grant either prove the propriety of your Position who down-rightly declare they have it or warrant your baptizing them thereupon so long as still 't is unapparent to you that they have it for first à posse ad esse non valet consequentia it follows not because it may be therefore 't is yet such Country-clearing of things is seen now and then among you Countrey Clergy-men that if from may-be to must-be may not pass for good reason there must be no more given at all witness the yery last Argument us'd by the first opponent at this Ashsord Disputation whereby to prove infants to have the spirit who having urg'd the example of Iohn Baptist whose
example is also hinted in your Review p. 16. of your Pamphlet just before to this effect viz. Iohn had the holy spirit from the womb therefore children have it and being answered to that thus viz. Ex puris negativis et particularibus nihil sequitur universale claps in this consequence to close up his discourse with viz. It doth not appear to you that children have not the spirit as much as to say they may for ought you know have the holy spirit therefore they have it To whom 't was repli'd that it would not follow that I was at Canterbury such a day because it did not appear to him that I was not and this as I remember though your Account doth very freely forget all this but I hope you will remember to be asham'd on 't was the very period of that mans Disputation with me saving what he added after in his recapitulatory moderation and after that in other emergent conferences with me and others to whose non-sequiturs as I have in faithfulness set down what I returned then so pace vestrâ I say thus much more now viz. that if I should go about to prove from the Possibility of things to be so or so or from their non-appearance to be not so though not yet appearing to be so that therefore they are so viz. more worlds then one or another world of men in the moon or as he from the particular case of Iohn Baptist to other infants so I should syllogize from the particular and extraordinary case of Balaams Ass to other creatures of that kind viz. Balaams Ass by a special power of God upon him did speak and reprove the madââ¦ess of the Prophet therefore very Asses can speak plain enough to reprove the madness of the Priests though I have learn'd Christ better then to record him as such a one for the like deduction yet I know who have so well learn'd the Featlaean language that in their Account I should have been an Ass for my labor Secondly and this I told you then too but your Account had no mind to mention what makes against you Tum dââ¦mum i. e. proprie et quoà d nos dicuntur res fieri cum incipiunt patefieri then things as to us are when they appear and not before and to talk de non entibus et non apparentibus is one as frivolous as the other yet such lazy learning and lowzy logick is at Rome with the infatuated Pope and such of his Creatures as trouble themselves so much about Tyth that they have no time to study Truth nor understand either sense or reason that whilst wise men indeed whose wisdome is not as theirs is already turn'd into foolishnese do argue from the Appearings of things to be to their being from the evidence that they are to their existence they magisterially impose things to be received as truth because Ipse Dixit and both assert them to be and make men believe they appear plain enough so to be when their say so shews them though no inquisitive sincere self-denying Christian can in the word find either how or where of but a very little better stamp is your way of arguing here who being hous'd by custom under a cloudy confidence that insants have the holy spirit will needs have it appear whether it doth or no but for my part it appears not yet to me yea I reply Secondly to this part of your Report that I did indeed then say as you have here truly related that it could not be made appear that Infants have the holy spirit to the making of them subjects of baptism yea I testifie the same still that it cannot notwithstanding all your undertakings which of what little force they are to such a purpose I shall try more at large when I handle your Account over again not as an Account but as your Argumentation for Infants having the holy spirit and so right to baptism Nevertheless Thirdly that I acknowledged any such thing as this in the least that the Scriptures above named did seem so much as to intimate such a matter as that infants might have the holy spirit as it had been most contradictory to that which here you say I said immediately after it and is most contrary to my Judgement to this present so I deny it disclaim it and testifie again it as another of your abominable abuses of your selves my self and the world into which you have feigned forth this Account and as an opinion that neither then or ever since nor everbefore since I found the way of truth hath had the least entertainment within my bosom And so I pass on to your other juggles among which Nigro Carbone notandum est this would not be let slip without a Selah in that some few lines below this you relate thus Report That my Answer was that in Scripture children were indefinitely taken but concerning this or that particular child no proof could be made Reply Which thing I confess I said yet take notice I must how you let slip your memories being willfully weak as I find them very often to be something more of my then speech which had you not declined to set down would have shewed a little more plainly and yet its prety plain as t is but hardly quite so plain as the nose on a mans face how you strike quite besides the iron stear to a wrong point and in your following undertaking upon that my Answer stickle clearly to another purpose then that proposed by me for my speech was not concernng this or that particular child only but of this or that particular child above another viz. proof could not be made of this child in its infancy suppose a believers more than of a Heathens if one of these and one of those be lookt on together whereupon also I then added but you have absented it in your Account that if two Infants viz. a believers and an unbelievers as yet unknown which is which should be presented to you whereof but one secundum to o Sacerdos may be baptized It would put you very shrewdly to it to disceâ⦠of your selves which of the two is the believers Infant by any more manifestation of the spirit in it than in the other yea I now tell you over again that such a presentment would fumble and puzzle both the Priest and his whole Parish to find the Spirit more in one infant then in all but you have omitted all this least it should do you too much right and too much lay open the rottenness of your Principles and yet you have set down enough to shew to any clear capacitie how you syllogiz'd besides the business I ingaged you in my speech to speak to as well as meerly bawbled in the very business you found your selves yea how odly did you shuffle over the thing you undertook to make Appear shewing not an inch more of ground to prove it in one or two or three little Infants
a Theam which Scripture whence onely they must fetch all their proofs saies just nothing of at all This makes the Disputers the Divines to come abroad a begging in print among the vulgar as you here do saying cover pass by bewayling the weakness of their Arguments their defects in disputing their presumption in entring the lists their non-preparation for the disputation because it s not the true Gospel they disputed for a very stripling may make a Gyant give back if he have hold on the hilt of his sword and the other thrust hard against the blade 't is hard for thee O Saul to kick against the pricks a learned lawyer may be at loss in a lame suit Asinus ad lyram may play his part better and make sweeter musick then the most accurate musitian that hath nothing to beat upon but a board it may well put any but the meer Sophister to his shifts to prove the moons made of green cheese and so 't will any save the meer self-seeker that is set to serve it out of a sight that he can serve himself of it and therefore is resolv'd to make any Argument serve turn even libet ergo licet rather then leave it to prove Infant-baptism much more Infant-rantism to be a good cause and yet the more 's the pitty this is the cause you have to make good and have been so bold as to stand up for which though your wishes are here that it may not suffer wrong through your defects yet mine are much rather that you may not suffer your selves to be wrong'd any more or to be wrong'd for ever through its defects for howbeit it flatters you into an opinion of its ability to be maintain'd by you by its appearing ability to maintain you yet you 'l find ith'end that by its fair flourishes it hath flusht you into more zeal then furnisht you with ability to maintain it when it shall have brought you to your choice of one of these two ex quibus minimum est eligengendum viz. either of Repentance from it and all other your Parochiall dead works tithes and other traditions that depend upon it upon a sight and acknowledgement that you have been mistaken about these as well as other Romish Remnants that you have seen cause through the Parliaments eyes to renounce since that long since Lutheran reformation which after longer standing out will be so much the harder Chapter for you Clergy men to run throw or else which is worse then nought of perseverance in your evil waies and dead works against light to prevent the other which last the Lord prevent from befalling any of you if it be his will Pre. Who would not have presumed to have entered the lists c. Post. It had been no presumption in you had you been true Ministers of Christ and the cause you stood up in Christs cause indeed for grant it to be presumption in Uzzah to meddle in the publique service of the Temple and in Uzzah to put forth his hand to uphold the Ark and consequently for so you argue not we for men to meddle so as to minister to the Gospel publiquely in your Churches that are not in holy orders yet it is none vos Apello for the Priests or ordained Ministers of Christ to stand up any where in defence of Christs truth where it s traduced but rather duty which in speciall they stand bound to in that therefore you accounting your selves Christs Ministers do grant it to be presumption in you to put forth so publiquely when you saw it tottering you do no less then give the cause you stood up in to be none of his as indeed it was not but your own and that was it only which made it presumption and very high presumption in you too in that you durst enter the lists against the Lord Iesus in in his own ordinance and that with such weak Arguments such flags as slam'd like swords but alas such as could not bear the brunt when it came to blows here how much less will they in that battel of the great day of God Almighty which is now marching space upon you 'T is true therefore as you here confess you have been presumptuous and presumption is one of the most desperate sins that can be against Christ yet for all that in his name and as an Embassador from him thoââ¦gh otherwise an unworthy and ââ¦ver a contemptible creature in your eyes as though himself did beseech you by me I am bold to beg of you that you would not despair but come in and be reconciled to him presuming no more to stand up against him with such weak weapons as before least he tear you in pieces fall upon you and grind you to powder but sit down and humble your selves that you have stood so long in the way of Sinners so that they could not come to Christ through your Blurres lay down your arms and yield your selves prisoners to him stoop to that golden Scepter he yet holds out unto you own him as your King Priest and Prophet list no more against him but list your selves under him for he is gracious and will yet recââ¦ive you and baptize you with his spirit if you turn at his reproof and repent and be baptized in water in his name for remission of sins Pro. 1. 23. Act. 2. 38. become little children in such a sense as you should be that you may be baptized and then be baptized in truth and in token for your memory hath lost your traditionary token sprinkling that hereafter you will not be ashamed to confess the faith of Christ crucified but manfully fight under his banner against sin the world and the devill and continue Christs faithful souldiers to your lives end How happy had it been for you if you had took quarter from Christ before this time for he would have given it and forgiven all your enmity against him in his truth but you are stiff-blades and your words have been stout against him you Clergy men are Lords you will not come neer but I beseech you become Lord beggars at the throne of grace as Brightman said truly the Bishopâ⦠were for earthly honor at the thrones of Kings and Princes that you may have more of that grace and holiness to worship God with reverence according to his own will which God gives to all humble Suppliants then had you less learning and living then you have and more disgrace in this world then ever any Synods of you had reverence or Arch-Bishops grace or Popes holiness you would never find occasion to bewail your losses or repent of your change or reject the councel of God against your selves out of his mouth who is a serious Sollicitor botâ⦠from God to you that you would be and to God for you that you may be in the acknowledgement of his truth no less then happy for ever Pre. Where there was so great expectation c. Post. There was great
I say viz. we he or you are most cruel and desperate and do most justly deserve the censure which you Priests put upon us p. 15. of your pamphlet of damning infants dying contrary to evident testimony of Scriptures and of damning innumerable innocents such as infants of infidels are whose right to the Kingdome of heaven our Saviour declared I propound it to be considered by your selves and all other men at leasure at present seeing this Argument of yours makes also more against then for you whose plea is for some infants against other if your Minor in it viz. that denial of baptism to infants destroyes all hope of their salvation were true as it is not and speaks for a necessity of baptizing all infants and not a few onely I 'le Syllogize it back upon you in much what your own terms and so pass hence to the other That opinion which destroyes all hopes of the salvation of many dying infants to one in the world yea in the very Christian world too is a most desperate ungodly uncharitable opinion But the opinion of you Priests who deny all hopes of salvation to those to whom baptism is deni'd and yet deny it doctrinally your selves to all unbelievers infants which are many to one in the Christian world and dispute for its dispensation to believers infants onely is such as destroyes all hope of the salvation of many dying infants to one as well in the Christian world as elsewhere Ergo the opinion of you Priests is a most cruel desperate ungodly uncharitable opinion Another fine fancie whereby you would fain juggle men into a belief that believers infants and these onely are to be baptized runs thus else say you the Gospel Covenant is worse then that under the law forasmuch as then litle infants were circumcised Now Sirs when I come to meddle with this Argument ore again I shall shew you plainly the imbecillity of it to prove the baptism of any infants at all and the meliority of the Gospel-Covenant above that of the law though infants be not now baptized as Circumcised then at present I am to shew how if it would prove any thing it would prove the right of baptism to unbelievers infants to whom you deny it as well as to believers infants whose baptism onely you seem to plead by it I say suppositively that this is to make the Gospel-Covenant worse then that of the law to deny baptism to infants now sith they then admitted infants to Circumcision then the denial of it to believers infants which is your own opinion makes it worse then it was under the law as well as the denial of it to infants of believers for under the law the infants of unbelievers which were many to one believer among the Iews Is. 53. 1. were both de jure and de facto circumcised as well as those of the believing Iews and so by your own rule ought the one to be baptized now as well as the other Again by the denial of baptism to the infants of unbelievers not onely a moity but the most of Christendome as in which are by far more unbelievers infants then others are cut off at once from baptism and membership I conclude therefore thus If thaâ⦠opinion which denies baptism to little children makes the Gospel-covenant worse then that under the law then the opinion of those Priests who deny baptism to all unbelievers infants whereby not a moity onely but most of the Christian world in which the most are unbelievers are cut off from being members of the Church makes the Gospel-Covenant worse then the law But though not veraciter yet secundum te O Presbitââ¦r that opinion which denies baptism to little children whereby a moity of the Christian world is so cut off makes the Gospel-Covenant worse then that under the law Ergo thy opinion which denieth baptism to all unbelievers infants whereby more then a moity of infants is so cut off makes it worse under the Gospel then under the law Another curious conceit whereby you undertake to clear the right of baptizing the infants of believing parents above others is the being and plain yea more plain appearing of the holy spirit to be in these children then in others or then in men whom we baptize that make profession which plain and sufficient appearance so you stile it p. 5 of the spirits being in these children is made say you many waies First by these infants faith Secondly by these infants holiness Thirdly by those Eulogies that are given to these children in Scriptures not inferiour to those of the best Saints Fourthly by that Scripture in special 2 Cor. 13. know you not that the Spirit that Christ you should have said is in you except ye be reprobates lastly and mainly by these childrens non-appearing not to have the spirit by these childrens not appearing to be evil by these infants not appearing by any actuall sin to have barr'd themselves or deserved to be exempted from the general state of little infants declared in Scripture by all which on pain and guilt of the breach of Christian charity whose rule is praesumere unumquenque bonum nisi constet de malo we are bound to believe that these infants of believing parents not of others have evidently enough the holy spirit Now Sirs the Lord help you to your eye-sight if it be his will for I le be bold to say these Seers are as blind as a beetle what ever they seem to themselves to see who by any thing at all that is here brought do discern the holy spirit to be in any infants but this which is to the present purpose may be more safely asserted that all this proves it not one jot more to be in the infants of believers then it proves it to be in unbelievers infants to whom you deny baptism as well as we in plea pretence and prate at least but not altogether in practise for verily these have as much promise of the spirit as the other those parents Acts 2. being yet unbelievers while Peter spake to them saying the promise is to you and your children yea these have as much capacity for the spirit as much manifestation of the spirit as much capacity to believe as much holyness as much Eulogie in Scripture for Christ commends not the infants of some parents above the infants of others but indefinitly the whole age of infancy alike as little appearance yet of being reprobates and so consequently as much appearance that Christ is in them as in the other as little appearance of evill of actual sin whereby to bar themselves or deserve exemption from the generall state of little children declared in Scripture as is in the infants of believers all which shall plainly appear out of hand and much of it out of your own handy work in my handling of your first Argument in particular which now I am return'd to again I shall begin with and so pass through it
to all the rest with which I must deal once over again as they ly in order in your Relation and Review which first argument of yours is laid down in this form viz. Disputation No man may forbid water to those that have received the holy Ghost Acts 10. 47. But little children have the holy Ghost Disproof In which Syllogism of yours how be it I then did and do still deny your Minor as the main matter that is amiss the falsity of which I shall discover yet there is much fault to be found with your Major in that you repeat the words of Peter but lamely and by the halves out of that Scripture whence you quote it which you adulterate and abuse unless you had inserted the whole sentence the chief clause of which viz as well as we which is most needfull to be exprest to the true proof of any ones right to baptism therfrom you whether more forgetfully or fearfully least the falsity of your Minor should be the more discried by it I say not do yet leave out alltogether In the absence of which clause the falsity of your Minor lies undiscerned which upon the putting in thereof would appear if it be possible for it so to do more palpably false then now it doth specially to every common capacity whereupon very probably you left it out for if your Major had been thus viz. no man may forbid water to those that have received the holy spirit as Peter and other adult Disciples had i. e. visibly and apparently unto others by the acts fruits and effects of it as the words as well as we do import your Minor then must have ran thus viz. but little children have the holy spirit as well as Peter and those adult Disciples Act. 10. 47. i. e. visibly undoubtedly apparently to others and then it had been more apparently false in the eyes of all for verily how perspicuous soever it is to you Clergy men who for your own ends seemingly see what you see not as well as sometimes see not what you see and to your implicit criditors that will seem to see that you see whether it be to be seen or no yet to such as are resolved to see with their own eies and not yours it is so far from being so visible and apparent that infants have the holy spirit as t was that Peter and the rest had received it that it is a thing invisible to you and more then ever did or yet doth or ever will appear to any but the blind and the blind leaders of the blind while the world stands by all you have here stitcht up together to make it appear by the inefficacy of all which to any such purpose as you use it for having thus hinted the crafty quoting and cunning coining of your Major besides the sence of the Scripture you fetch it out on I shall God willing make sufficiently to appear in my Examination of your Minor the proof of which I now come to consider As therefore to your Minor which is this viz. little children have the holy Ghost I lay two evils to the charge of it first a faultering in the terms secondly a falsity in the thing testified in it First it s delivered in tam dubiis terminis such a dubious and indefinite form of speech viz. little children not at all expressing what children nor believers children distinctly from others but all alike which muddling expression of the subject of whom you praedicate this that they have the holy spirit is made well nigh every where else throughout your book and possibly on purpose to shelter that absurdity from being too apparent which unless you dream'd out this Disputation a more determinate delivery of your selves all along in these terms viz. infants of believers you foresaw would light upon it Nevertheless as indefinitely and implicitly as you set down your subject you cannot hide the nakedness thereof let your meaning be what it will for you must take it in some or other of these senses viz. all little children have the spirit or unbelievers little ones onely have the spirit or believers little ones have the spirit or some children have the spirit but we cannot tell which nor whether these more then those or those more then these the spirit being neither bound to all the children of believing parents nor barred from any of the children of infidels you cannot understand it of unbelievers children only nor yet of all children nor yet of unbelievers and believers children promiscuonsly so as to say some of these and some of those but in particular it cannot certainly be presumed which though he that reads your eighteenth page where you confess there can be no conclusion made which have it and which not can hardly tell how to take you handsomely in a better sense for then all men will say fie upon it how miserably do these Logicians labor all along besides their question they propound the baptism of believers infants only but proceed to prove the baptism of all children or of unbelievers children onely or at least of unbelievers children equally with the other they plead to have none but believers infants baptized yet affirm the holy spirit the supposed being of which in these infants is the main ground on which they would have these only baptized to be in all infants at least in other infants for ought they know as well as these yea even in those infants even Infidels infants whom yet they would not have baptiz'd so partial and cruel are they to these though the denial of baptism to poor infants in their own opinion destroies all hope of their salvation but if you take it for little infants of believers only concerning which only the question was stated then every wise man will wound you as much on the other hand and say thus how miserably do these men fumble about their business both proving and practising more then themselves believe to be the truth they assert infants of believers only have the holy spirit and undertake to prove it in contradistinction to other infants yet produce nothing more towards the proof of it then what tends if it do tend indeed to such a purpose to prove it to be in all infants as well as those how egregiously do these Priests gull and cheat their people they profess the holy spirit to be in no infants save those onely that are born of believing parents and that these onely are thereupon to be baptized and yet practise another thing under the name of baptism to unbelievers infants in their parishes whom they truly judge not to have the spirit in common with those whom as blindly they judge to have it i. e. not the seed of true believers only but the seed of true and apparent unbelievers also The second fault I charge upon your Minor Proposition is an utter falseness in the matter affirm'd in 't for take the term little children for what little ones
manifest to the world nor to any of those in it that do not and other such like precious performances in all which he officiates peculiarly towards the Saints onely that submit to him not wicked resisters of him to which Saints or true Disciples of the Lord Jesus he was promised to be given under the Gospel in a fuller measure then in former daies and sent to be their comforter whilst to such as entertain him not but a bare convincer in which respect he is call'd the spirit of promise as being promised in this sense to all those that obey Christ that believe repent and are baptized into his name for remission of sins and ask the father for him and to be set as by office to minister in way of succor to the mournful spouse in the bridegrooms absence to help poor soules that give up themselves to be lead by him and accordingly was is and ever shall be given to those that do not grieve resist and quench him and that are found observing all things that ever Christ commanded non-observation of which disingages Christ of his promise so that it failes not though he be not with men that name themselves his Church for ages and generations together In which senses he is not at all in infants in their infancy neither doth he at all guid or provoke them how far forth soever he may guard and protect them till they come to such capacity as to have good or evil fasten'd on them by perswasion nor doth he any of the aforenamed good offices for infants in whom there 's yet no need they should be done nor doth he delight ordinarily to be where either he must be idle as he must in infants of one two or three daies old or unless he work miraculously imployed altogether to no purpose As to that of Iohn concerning whom 't was promised he should be filled with the holy spirit from the womb besides the singularness and extraordinariness of the case which renders it unfit for you to argue from who deny that such examples are to be drawn in as an ordinary rule to judge by and confess that ex particulari non est Syllogizari I add moreover that there 's no necessity for such an immediate acceptation of that word from the womb as to make the sense of it thus viz. in the very moment of his birth for it may well be taken as elswhere the same phrase must be viz so soon as ever he should be capable to receive it and be assisted and guided by it which might be in his tender years but was not I believe in such meer non-age as you wot off thus the wicked are said Psal. 58. 3. ab alinare se ab utero to estrange themselves from God from the womb to go astray as soon as they be born speaking lies stopping their ears not hark-ring to the voice of the Charmer which terms do all denote actuall sinne by which your selves confess infants cannot bar themselves p. 5. or deserve exemption it must therefore be understood thus viz. so soon as ever they are capable to do this or that to take the right away or the wrong or to know and act either good or evil I assert therefore once again that the spirit in this second sense is not in infants in their infancy nor know I in what sense they can be said to have him as to have right thereby to baptism unless you can assign me some more senses out of Scripture which if you can do I shall tell you what to say to them and as I cannot find they have the holy spirit in them so neither find I any promise of the holy spirit in such non-age as you wot of if by the spirit you mean the spirit of promise as you must if you plead a right to baptism there from and if you should refer me to Act. 2. I find there no more made to any then to all indeed it s said the promise is to you and your children but I advise you to consider first that t is not said to you and your infants neither are children and infants all one in signification the one expressing the age or rather non-age the other the Relation to the parents of whom they are born all infants are children of some parents or other but all children are not infants Infants are at least such younglings as cannot speak but children may be children in respect of their parents though the parents be eighty years old and the children sixty so that the promise of the spiriâ⦠might be to them and their children too i. e. their posterity as well as to the Gentiles that were yet far off in both time and place and their posterity to all succeeding generations and be made good too on the same terms upon which and the same time in which it s made good to the parents themselves viz. the terms of faith and the time of their believing and yet all this while not be made to them and their infants as in their infancy moreover it appears most evidently that these parents were yet in unbelief and bare inquiry after what they should do having acted neither faith nor repentance as yet when Peter said thus to them repent and be baptized and ye shall receive the holy spirit for the promise is to you and your children therefore it may seem rather to be to unbeleevers children by that place then unto belieuers children but in very deed t is to all men and their children throughout the world as they and their children should believe repent receive the word gladly come to God at his call and that in all ages and places to the worlds end and as children of unbelievers have as much promise of the holy spirit so as much manifestation of it as the other and that is just none at all But say you these appear to have it first by their faith i. e. as other mens infants do not by their faith Sirs this is no demonstrative Argument I am sure that they have the Spirit for demonstratio est ex notioribus conclusione but this is Ignotum per ignotius or at least per aeque ignotum for now you have much more ado by something else hoc aliquid nihil est to demonstrate to us that they have faith then before you had to demonstrate them to have the spirit yea this will puzzle you the more by how much the last error is worse than the first and more confuted in other places by your selves however we will consider your Argument and supposing still that you speak of the right subject viz. infants of believing parents we will cast this your Enthusiasm into this Enthememe Disputation Little children of believing parents have faith Ergo little children of believing parents have the holy spirit Disproof First I deny your Consequence secondly your Antecedent as both stark false and that is as much as can well be false in an
Enthememe First I shall be bold to tell you Sirs that your Argumentation from present faith to a present having the holy Spirit is most invalid and unconsonant to the Scripture for if by the holy Spirit you mean as you must else it serves not your turn at all to the proof of baptism the spirit in that special sense viz. the holy spirit of promise the consequence from faith to the having of it will not universally hold true for as much as faith not only must be in time before it unless God be better than his word and that he may be when he pleases and so he was Act. 10 44. where the spirit by Anticipation was given out before obedience at least in baptism which yet by promise cannot be expected till after it Ast. 2. 38. I say not only must be before it but also may be a pretty while without it this will be counted the mad mans mad Divinity with you I doubt not but I le clear it to the Dimmest Divine of you all yea see if the whole body of the Testament of Christ doth not tell you plainly that as faith must be before it in an ordinary way before we have warrant to expect it so it may for some while be without it and therefore cannot prove the holy spirit to be alwaies where it is for the spirit of promise is given after faith if given according to the promise and so long after it too now and then as is enough to make it undeniably appear that the having of faith is no proof of ones present having the holy spirit among sundry others let those Scriptures be seriously searcht into Ephes. 1. 13. In whom after ye believed ye were sealed with the holy spirit of promise Act. 19. 2. have ye received the holy spirit since ye believed they answered no also Act. 8. 12. when they believed c. they were baptized c. but verse 16. the holy spirit was fallen upon none of them only they were baptized Act. 5. 32. The holy spirit which God hath given to them that obey him yea the gift of the spirit though Gods ordinary way so limits not himself but that he may give it extraordinarily before Act. 10. yet is it neither promised nor as by promise to be expected but upon obedience in faith repentance turning to God baptism and prayer Pro. 1. 23. Act. 2. 38. Luke 11. 15. Iohn 7. 38. 39. the places are so plain to the purpose that I 'le not disparage your judgement so much as like a fresh man to stand to frame formal Syllogisms to you out of them to conclude then as to your Consequence had you argued from the holy spirit in the special sence in which you take it to faith it might have past for me without correction but sith you began at the wrong end of your business I beseech you take it for a warning Sirs and begin again Secondly I deny your Antecedent which if your Consequence were never so true is most false for infants of believers have not faith if they have unbelievers infants for ought you make appear to the contrary have as much and so though that grieve and go against you and cannot be owned so kindly by you in opinion as it is in practise must de jure be baptized i. e. humano for Divino neither may as well as they but in truth as it will not appear by what you here bring to evince it by that faith is in either so I trust it will appear by what shall be said in disproof of your proofs that faith can possibly be in neither Disputation You prove infants of believing parents to have faith two waies as you say first by express texts of Scripture secondly Arguments of consequence Your express Scripture is Mat. 18. 6. Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã in the third verse say you they are called ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã whence upon my confession and concession that in ver 2. and 4. is meant one in respect of age because it is said there he called to him a little child and who so humbleth himself as this little child you therfore argue that little ones in respect of age are meant in that 6 verse also Disproof Sirs let me ask you two questions first are you sure these are infants indeed Secondly are you sure they were infants of believers of whom Christ saies whoever offends one of these little ones that believe in me for my part if there were any probability that he spake of little ones literally taken at all as I know none there is yet I am sure there is none that they were the little ones of believers he then spake of in contradistinction to the infants of unbelievers for t is not specified either one way or other and is most probable that the child he occasionally called to him might be some unbelievers child or other the number of believers where e're he came being few and not comparable to them that believed not but what e're that child was yet this is much more then probable that by the term these little ones in v. 6. he means not infants but his Disciples whom having first perswaded them to become such as that little one or as little children in such things as are generally found in them viz. plainness of spirit humbleness innocency freedome from malice in which respects David saies Psal. 131. 2. my soul is as a weaned child from that Analogy that was and ought to be between little ones and them he here bespeaks as it was very ordinary for him to do under the title of these little ones besides the plurall number he speaks in implies he spake of such of whom there was a plurallity then present for saith he these little ones pointing as it were to more then one but there was but one little one then in the midst of them of whom when Christ speaks he speaks in the singular saying this little child as to the term ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã which is used in the third verse whence you argue that they were children in age spoken of by our Savior by which you seem much to strenghthen your selves in your Dabling of Infants foreheads I must tell you that of the two you more marre than make your matter by so much as mentioning of it in this case for first ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã though by some philosophicall or poeticall license it may possibly be used to signify Infantem some youngling of three or four years old as though beginning to prattle can scarcely speak plain yet cannot so much as poetically much less properly signifie Infantissimum such a one day old infant as you talk of nor such a six dayes old suckling as you sprinkle but properly it expresses at least one capable of erudition and howbeit it hath not its derivation from ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã as setting the cart before
outward Ordinances and institutions and from thenceforth i. e. from the several periods of their presence with them establish them in a more compleat posture then before and each Church severally in its own proper order Moses then was the Mediator of the Old Testament established upon Earthly promises and so gave precepts accordingly but Christ the Mediator of the new which is called a better Testament established upon better promises Heb. 8. 6. and so gives his precepts not by the mouth of Moses but as he pleases Besides all this though the Covenant of Circumcision made with that fleshly holy seed began before Moses yet whether that denomination of a holy seed a holy Nation and people did begin so high as Abraham or before such time as Moses and Aaron had according to Gods command to them ceremonially sanctified by the bloud of sprinkling and dedicated both the Book of the Covenant and all the people and all the vessells of the Ministery and all other things pertaining to that Tabernacle for both that holy people and all their ceremonially holy things whereby you need not be ignorant unless you will that the holiness of that seed and their sanctuary was the same and began and were to end both together were first consecrated didicated purified sanctified all at one time under Moses Heb. 9. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. c. whether I say the holiness of the seed began so high as Abraham is a thing so out af doubt to me that I dare say that as the holy land was not relatively holy till they came into it so the holy seed as well as the other holy things of that Covenant were not ceremonially consecrated nor form ally sanctified nor vouchsafed that title of a holy seed though vertually they were a choise seed before till a little before they were to enter it and howbeit I challenge no man yet I intreat any man in the world to shew me if he can where they were denominated and distinguished from all other people as unclean by that term of a holy people till God intituled them so by Moses Exod 22. 31. ye shall be holy men unto me neither shall ye eat any flesh that is torn of beasts ye shall cast it to doggs which place compared with Levit. 22. 8. 9. Deut. 7. 6. chap. 14. 2. chap. 26. 19. doth so plainly shew these two things First That the holiness there spoken of began but thenceforth Secondly that it was but a certain ceremonial distinction and a holinese opposite to that kind of defilement which might be contracted by eating of unclean beasts and so fully ceased in Christ that I even blush to read Mr. Blake and have been ashamed in my mind to hear some Independents also bring those Scriptures wherein God called Israel a holy people to himself to prove that an inchurched believers meer fleshly seed is now by nature holy in the same sense Now then let us hear the conclusion of this whole matter of the things that have been spoken this is the summe viz. that there are three kinds of holiness of which when you say children of believing parents have holiness and consequenrly the spirit you undoubtedly mean one viz. Matrimonial Ceremonial Moral The Middlemost of which because your fellow laborers against the Gospel intend that chiefly in their books I have treated on last and most largely and I now say three things of it in special First That it is a Holinesse which once was but now is not in being Secondly That it is a Holiness which of it self when it was in being as it was at the beginning of the Gospel before Christ crucified could not without faith and moral holiness interest the persons in whom it was seated in any of these three things viz. Gospel Promises Gospel Priviledges or Gospel Ordinances 1. Not the premises for they were made to Abraham in Christ and his spiritual seed not his own fleshly seed upon such terms as bare birth of his body or such holiness and righteousness as was under the Law intituling to Canaan Rom. 4. 13. 14. Gal. 3. 16. 29. 2. Not the priviledges viz. Gospel immunities and Church-membership for those that could plead they were under the typical freedomes of the old house or Church under the Law as Abrahams seed only were are denyed by Christ to be that holy seed that should stand in the Gospel house that was now to be built or share in that spiritual freedome which the sonne gives which is the only freedome indeed unlesse they did Abrahams works Iohn 8. 32. to the 40 ta 3. Nor yet the Ordinances no not so much as Baptism the initiating ordinance it self for when that old holy seed remaining yet under their relative and denominative holiness unabolished did plead it as to baptism they were put back by Iohn and not permitted barely upon that account upon which they stood in the old house without faith unless they now believed and amended their lives whose repulse of them when they came to his baptism was this viz. begin not to say we have Abraham to our Father c. Mat. 3. 7 8 9. Luke 3. 7. 8. Thirdly suppose baptism were entailed so to that holinesse and a meer fleshly seed of believers or of believing Abraham himself as truly as t is true it is not yet how grossely were you overseen Gentlemen in undertaking to prove the holy spirit by it to be in infants for that 's the probandum the very thing which by the holinesse of infants you went about to make good for the minor of your first fylogism which was this but little children have the holy spirit being denied was proved say you first by their faith secondly by their holinesse thirdly by those Eulogies given them in Scripture if then by holinesse you mean this kind of holiness I mean ceremonial which once was in the Iews by nature you have a wet ââ¦le by the tail then indeed for ask but Mr. Blake and he 'le tell you that that holinesse was in thousands who yet had not the holy spirit yea in truth all the Iews had that holinesse of whom not a Tenth even then when they had it were either in infancy or at years morally sanctified or indued with the holy spirit and as I have said these three things in special concerning that one kind of holinesse so I have three things in general to say in short concerning al these three sorts of holinesse viz. First one of them was in infants of old and now is not but is vanisht and when it was it proved not the spirit viz. ceremonial Secondly another is but nothing to your purpose I mean the proof of the spirit though it be in most infants viz. matrimonial Thirdly the other is not yet come for ought yet appears to infants viz. morall which if it did appear to be in them positive qualitativè as an inherent quality not negative onely so as to be without sin or absolutely innocent for
absolute innocency hath no need of baptism then I should say something more to you but you see it doth not therefore though you said nothing then as I wish since I had suffered you to do from infants holinesse to the proof of their having the spirit and right to baptism yet I have searcht but cannot possibly find what holinesse you could possibly have proved it by I have been the larger here though you gave me but a bare hint by the nomination onely of infants holinesse first because here lies indeed the very principal knot and basis of this controversie which you erring in are consequently erroneous in all your wayes for Error minimus in principio fit major in medio Maximus in fine And as for all other arguments pro and con they are but as Auxilliarie hereunto Secondly because I am willing also sith you call so much for it to give out my own grounds for the truth by the way as I go along in disproving of your false ones that you may either yield to them if found or answer and disprove them if unsound and rotten in the residue I shall be so much the briefer The next argument whereby you undertake to prove infants of believing parents to have the holy spirit is drawn from those Eulogies given them in Scripture not inferior to those of the best Saints from whence you thus argue Disputation Those who are invited to come to Christ Mark 10. 14. Mat. 19. 14. Luk. 18 16. ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã verse 15. babes such as are new come from the womb blessed by Christ declared to have right to the kingdome of heaven set forth for examples of innocency not to be offended guarded from heaven by Angels c. have the holy Ghost But such are little children Disproof You say they have Eulogies i. e. good language and commendations given to them not inferiour to those of the best Saints Nay Sirs they are superiour in some sense to the best of Saints for the best here have sin but these have yet none Christ taking away Adams sin and they adding none of their own and yet it will not follow that they are to be baptized for they have yet no need of it muchlesse that they have the holy spirit which is the thing you would prove by it As for these particular Eulogies which you instance in if the most special among them do clearly prove the subject thereby denominated to have that holy spirit that entitles to baptism then I le agree that mine are but if it do not then I hope you will agree to it that your wits are little better then sodden In order to the fuller finding out of the full weight of each Eulogy to such a purpose I le consider some of them asunder that being the best way and not as you Babilonicae brevitatis gratiâ have wrapt and swadled them all up together into one Syllogism and if you think it too tedious so to do I would have you to know my pains in writing will be Tantamount to your patience in reading The first Eulogy which you say Scripture gives to little children is their invitation to come to Christ from whence your Argument in form must runne thus Babist Those who are invited to come to Christ have the holy spirit and are thereupon to be baptized But little infants of believing parents are invited to come to Christ Ergo they have the holy spirit and are to be baptized Baptist. To which I retort stating onely another Minor in room of yours as the subject to answer to your middle term and then judge your selves how false your foundation i. e. your Major is and consequently your building or conclusion Thus Those that are invited to come to Christ have the holy spirit and are thereupon to be baptized But all men and women in the world are invited to come to Christ Mark 16. 15. Mat. 22. 9. 2 Cor. 5. 19. 20. 21. Isa. 55. 1. Mar. 11. 28. Rev. 22. 17 Ergo all men and women in the world have the the holy spirit and are therevpon to be baptized I need say no more to wise men The 2 Eulogy given from Scripture to little children is this viz. they are blessed by Christ whence your argument must run thus Babist Those that are blessed by Christ have the holy spirit and so present right to baptism But little children of believing parents are blessed by Christ Ergo they have the holy spirit and present right to baptism Baptist. I answer first by denying your Major which is not universally true for persons may be blessed by Christ and yet not have the holy spirit for better understanding of which let it be considered that persons may be blest various wayes from which yet to their having the holy spirit there 's no consequence viz. outwardly and inwardly temporally and spiritually with blessings of the body and of the soul of this life and that to come first with outward temporal bodily blessings abstract from the other they may be and often are blessed when yet at present at least for so they must have as to your present purpose they have not the holy spirit who possibly also never have it in all their lives I mean in that sense from which Peter argues thus to their baptism Act. 10. for that some of you say when you can make advantage on 't another way was the spirit in the extraordinary gifts of it onely as tongues prophecy utterance c. by which sense how ever your infancy is clear cut off from all capacity of having it and so you are confuted by your own party in the very corner stone of this your babish building but I le give you the advantage of your own personal Tenet let it be what it will save only that forenamed common sense of the spirit wherein I have told you t is in all men who yet are not therefore to be baptized I say again both men and women and children may be blessed by Christ outwardly only as with health peace plenty fruitful seasons Mat. 5. 45. God is good to all and sends sun and rain i. e. all temporal blessings on the good and evil just and unjust The blessings of bodily protections as to be guarded with Angells from heaven from dangers and mischiefs which is another of the Eulogies you here instance in which to save your selves and me some labor I le take in hear it being but a temporal blessing from which it follows not that such as are blessed with it must consequently have the holy spirit also bodily salvation from and sanation of diseases distempers by Christ who is a Saviour of the body these blessings of the body the barn the basket and the store health and external happinesse persons may be and often are blessed with from God who fills their bellies with hid treasure so that they prosper and are not plagued when yet they are wicked in their lives and far from
t is most certain that they had been not onely spectators of Iohns Baptism but dispensers of baptism themselves also long enough before this time to have been instructed in the true subject of it for the bringing of those infants was after Iohn was beheaded but Christ by his disciples had baptized in Iudea before Iohn was in prison and whilest Iohn was yet himself baptizing in Eââ¦on yea and had made and baptized more disciples than Iohn Besides the ground of their rebuke of those that came with little children was no doubt their care and loathness to have Christ too much prest in which case they sometimes rebuked others when they throngd upon him so fast for healing that they had no leasure so much as to eat bread Secondly that they came not now under Imposition of hands in that sense the Dr treats on is most evident First by the Dr own quotations of Mr Calvins and Mr Cottons readings concerning the practise of the first times for so far are they from clearing such a thing as he alledges them for that they clear the clean contrary the subjects of that imposition of hands they speak of being only professors of the faith and not infants yea how doth D Holmes belabor himself to prove it that those to whom the primitive Churches dispensed Imposition of hands were persons grown to years more then doth his cause good and more then any wise man puts him to by the denial of it but those that were brought to Christ for it here spoken of none other then very infants in their nonage Secondly in that this ordinance of laying on of hands was not likely yet in use and being in this prae-primitive-period wherein Christ laid his hands on these infants the ends in order whereunto it was enjoined and practised when it was being such as in this juncture not only infants but also the very disciples themselves were uncapable of viz. as the Doctors own quotations truly shew perfect and full fruition of confirmation in Church state Gospel Church liberties Church-fellowships in all Church ordinances viz. the Supper and suppications and also the receiving of the holy spirit none of all which were yet given to any in such wise as afterwards they were no not to the Disciples till either just before as the Supper or else after Christ was crucified for howbeit matter for the Gospel Church and fellowship was fitting preparing and gathering in by preaching and baptizing even from Iohn who began the Gospel two or three years before that and the Gospel Church was as it were in a certain Chaos or Congories of matter not yet digested into its perfect form somewhile before the Jews Church was ended in Christ death yet it came not to have its own formall constitution in point of visible order posture fellowship government officers discipline endowments with the spirit whereby they might be built up an habitation of God and ordinance of laying on of hands in prayer specially relating thereunto till after Christ crucified and ascended the holy spirit being not yet come because Jesus not yet glorified Thirdly they came not for this but for another kind of Imposition of hands which is otherwise called touching which who ever had from him were in case of diseases made whole They came surely for that laying on of hands which Dr Holmes himself speaks of p. 57. out of Hophman viz. a laying on in order to healing for which healing by a touch of him many men women and children came or else were brought to Christ while others that were well came to hear him Mark 5. 27. 28. 29. 30. Luke 6. 17. 18. 19. Mat. 14. 13. 14. 34. 35. 36. This Imposition of hands therefore that these infants had was not that which persons when past infancy only had in the Churches after and for Dr Holmes to say the Apostles and ancient Churches confirmed persons by prayer and laying on of hands when they were past infancy and not in it therefore surely Christ to the same intent and purpose laid hands on these in infancy is equally absurd as to argue thus viz. the Apostles and primitive times practised baptism to men and women onely confessing sin and professing faith therefore it is most fitting and likely now to be the will of Christ that persons should be sprinkled in their non-age so brittle are all the bottoms you yet build on but to proceed Disputation Know ye not that the spirit of God is in you except ye be reprobates and they dare not say that little children are all reprobates Also Review page 16. They are not Reprobates Therefore Christ is in them Disproof Nor do we say that little children are all reprobates nor durst you say that any of them are reprobates if meer blindness did not embolden you thereunto for the truth is consider them yet living in the capacity of infants and so though in foro Dei in esse intentionali conditionali i. e. with God who calleth things that yet are not as though they were and foresees both what they will do and what he accordingly will do with them hereafter they are already known to be either of one sort or the other yet in foro hominum and in esse actuali i. e. actually and in the sight of men they are finally neither reprobated nor elected till they finally receive Christ or reject him yea I wish you were all but as sure to be saved as it is sure that none are quoad nos rejected or devoted in the word which is the coppy of Gods decree to eternal damnation but upon account of their own actual transgression and as t is sure that none at all of them that dy in infancy and no more of those that live to years also are damned but such as finally put salvation away from them and so judge themselves most worthy of the other for though of Iacob and Esau they being yet unborn neither having done any good or evil it was foretold by God who foresaw what good and evil they would do in time and what he thereupon would do unto them that the Elder should serve the younger yet this was foretold of and fulfilled in their posterity and not their persons for though Edom served Israel yet Esau in person served not Iacob but Iacob rather bowed before him and as for that viz. Iacob have I loved Esau have I hated which you wot was spoken of them as from the womb you shall find if you look again that it was not spoken of their persons but their posterity nor yet secondly of those without respect to Edoms wickedness above the other much less thirdly before Iacob and Esau was born and had acted good or evil but so long after Iacob and Esau were born and had done good and evil that they were also ere that time when this was spoken Mal. 1. many years since dead and rotten but this would lead me into another controversie of as large extent and
consequence as this in hand and therfore I will wave it here yet not so as to decline the discourse of it with you upon occasion any more then of the other well then that they are not all Reprobates it is asserted by you and us too but what is this at all to your purpose For First is there no Medium between being a reprobate and a present having the holy spirit there were twelve Disciples at Ephesus which had not so much as heard of the holy spirit so far were they from having it yet yet dare you say they were all reprobates there were many men and women that believed the things spoken by Philip pertaining to the Kingdome upon which the holy spirit had not yet fallen were they all reprobates because they had not yet received it or those thousands Peter promised the holy spirit to were they all reprobates because they yet had it not when he spake to them yea millions of men ly yet in wickedness and so far from having that at present they rather scoff at the holy spirite yet dare you not say they are all reprobates for some of them may turn at Christs reproof for ought you know therefore what consequence is there from not being reprobates to a present possession of the holy spirit Secondly do you know so precisely which infants are Elect and which Reprobate as to take upon you to distinguish them by baptism or are all infants of unbelievers reprobate so that you may accordingly denominate them for such by whole sale as you do Do not the infants of unbelievers very often prove believers and so elect and precious and as ordinarily believers infants when they come to years I mean prove reprobates were not Asa the son of wicked Abia and Iosias ofâ⦠wicked Ammon elected both when Ishmael and Esau the sons of Abraham and Isaac themselves were in Scripture secundum tâ⦠o Accountant p. 13. both branded for reprobates Lastly to the plain perverture of the words of the the text you quote to your own ends instead of Iesus Christ between whose and the spirits being in men there is no small difference for Christ may be in us by faith I mean we may be in the faith when yet he is not in us by his spirit I mean before the spirit is yet given witness all the disciples that believed and were baptized with water some while before Christ gave them the holy spirit Act. 8. Act. 19. instead of Christ I say you insert the spirit of God you also wholly pervert the sence of the Apostle in that place 2 Cor. 13. 5. who speaks it not to infants nor of them neither but of persons that could both know and prove and examine their own selves of all which infants were uncapable by your own confession he wrote it of them to whom he wrote it and so indeed though you are slow of heart to consider it the whole Gospel was written viz. de adult is adultorum officiis of grown persons whether parents or children and their duties but not for the use of infants in infancie at all In the next place upon occasion of my denial that it can be made appear that infants have the holy spirit to the making of them subjects of baptism you argue it on thus Disputation The report of Scripture concerning them and the necessary consequences of the former Arguments do make it more plainly appear to any one that will not deny Scripture and reason then the Profession of any particular person who perhaps may be an hypocrite as Symon Magus can make it appear of himself Gods testimony being to be preferred before mans ' Disproof Here is one of the most prodigious pieces of absurditie and contradiction of your selves as you speak in other places that was ever discerned to pass from men that cried out so loud as you do for libertie to reason logically since the art of Logick was found out In that you here call the consequences of all your former Arguââ¦ents necessary consequences which is as much as to say such as conclude the thing in hand i. e. that infants have the holy spirit necessarily universally and infallibly for that and no other were you so well skilled in Logick as you would seem to be is a necessary consequence which proves the matter concluded certainly so to be yea certo it à esse nec alitèr sââ¦abere posse a necessary consequence is when there is tam necessarius nexus indissolubilis dependentiâ⦠c. such infallible dependence between the subject and the praedicate that the conclusion must be universally and perpetually true whereas your conclusion which is this viz. That little Children have the holy spirit as it followes not so much as probably nor possibly from all that you have here premised toward the proof on it witness all the Disproof made of your Disputation hitherto so much less doth it follow from them necessarily to be true for then it must bâ⦠at least truly denominated de omni i. e. universally true concerning all little children that they have the bospirit de omni being the very lowest degree of necessity but this for shame you cannot say that all little children of every sort have holy spirit no nor yet so much as all of that sort of whom you so peculiarly assert it viz. the little children of believers among whom when they are at years there are as many destitute of the holy spirit as are indued with it And in further evidence hereof that it follows not necessarily from any thing you have said that those little infants you sprinkle have the holy spirit I appeal from your selves to your very selves for howbeit you here affirm as also p. 16. ââ¦ch necessity in the consequences whence you conclude that infants of believers have faiâ⦠and the holy spirit yet to the utter confutation of your selves herein you elsewhere confesse that at the best your proof can be no more then probable viz. p. 18. where you write concerning the infants of Christian parents having faith and the spirit as if notwithstanding all that was said before to prove the certainty of it you could not now tell well what to say to it for as in p. 16. you acknowledged that all infants have it not so these are your own words p. 18. viz. the spirit is not bound to work it in all the children of Christian parents nor barr'd from working it in any of the children of infidels so that no judgemââ¦t of science can be passed till the acts themselves be seen and examined for a poââ¦ori onely and yet by the way be it known unto you that every necessary consequence demonstrates a priori the discovery of habits it made that unlesse iâ⦠could be certainly presumed what children have the habit what have not for tââ¦w ââ¦ing of the spirit is not known to us he is not bound nor yet bard thââ¦re ââ¦a conclusion made In which words
see how plainly you acknowledge that no conclusion can be made of it that infants of Christians have the habit of faith i. e. it is a thing that doth not necessarily follow and cannot appear in infancy at all nor be certainly presumed whether they have or have it not till they come to years and be seen to act so that then it may be known by your own confession and yet in this place I am now in hand with you say no more nor lesse but in effect the clean contrary as also p. 16. where you seem to wonder almost and fault the difficulty in mens understandings that there are at all any doubts in them abouâ⦠their having it avouching that the Scriptures by necessary consequences confirme the thing viz. that they have it That the report of Scripture concerning littâ⦠children and the necessary consequences of the former arguments do make it appear yea plainly yea more plainly then the profession of any particular persâ⦠at years can make it appear of himself O Earth Earth hear the reasonlesse round abouts of these Logicians they tell us in one place that it is to be concluded by no lesse then necessary consequences that believers infants for of such onely they assert it have faith and the holy spirit by and by to go round again they tell us that it cannot be certainly presumed what children have it what have not that the working of the spirit is not known to us he is not bound to work it in all the children of Christian parents nor barr'd from working it in any of the children of In fidels so that there can be no conclusion made in one place they tell us that no judgement of science concerning these or those infants having the holy spirit and faith can be passed in their infancy till the acts themselves be seen and examined i. e. till they come to years and shew forth some fruits and it appear ãâã some acts and professions of it for a posteriore onely the discovery or habits is made but elsewhere to go round again they tell us that it doth more plainly appear concerning believers infants in their infancy that they have faith and the holy spirit to any one that will not deny Scripture and reason then the profession of any particular person at years admitted to baptism can make it appear of himself as if it could not half so well appear a posteriore when we are at years and capable to profess and act faith and shew forth the fruits of the spirit whether we have faith and the spirit yea or nâ⦠as it may do a priori i. e. in infancy before any act of faith or fruit of the spirit can be discovered seen or examined Moreover to animadvert this present passage of yours yet a little further wheras you say here that the report of Scripture concerning little infants which is Gods testimony and to be preferred before mans doth more plainly prove it that infants have faith and the holy spirit then any particular mans testimony doth prove it concerning himself I answer first by denying that God in Scripture gives any such testimony at all concerning little infants litterally taken that they have faith and the holy spirit Secondly if that phrase Mat. 18. 6. viz. these little ones which believe in me could have any such construction as of little infants litterally yet I deny that he speaks of them any otherwise then by a Prosopeiâ as I said before Thirdly if it were to be proved as it never can be that he speaks there of infants and not figuratively neither but plainly and properly yet t is most plain that he speaks but indifinitely not particularly of one infant more then another oâ⦠of Christians infants more then of infidels so as that you can thereupon take on you as you daily do to distinguish which have the spirit which have not and accordingly to admit these to baptism and debar those yea you your selves do ore and ore express it p. 5. 6. that what the Scripture declares Infants to be it declares them so to be in generall specially while any particulars of them have not yet barrd themselves by actual sin or deserv'd to be exempted from what the Scripture hath in general declared them to be so that all this that you have brought thus far hath not the weight of a feather to warrant your good opinion of one infant above another and your practise of baptism to this or that particular infant suppose a believers rather then an unbelievers It would be no plain but a muddy totter'd confus'd implicit shufling kind of argumentation for me if I were to give account why I baptize this or that particular man or woman and not others to argue thus indifinitly as you do all along viz. No man may forbid them to be baptized that believe and have the spirit But the Scripture declares that men and women may believe and have the spirit Ergo men and women must be baptized If I should I say go on thus in generals onely not making it appear that ther 's any faith at all in these individuals whom I baptize more then in others I should take him for little better then a fool who should take me for a wise man in so arguing yet so and no otherwise do you argue whilst when we put you to prove that those infants whom you baptize have title to it in contradistinction to heathens infants whose right to baptism you deny you give us your account in these indeterminate terms viz. Those that have faith and the holy spirit may be baptized But the Scripture testifies that little children have faith c. Ergo little children may be baptized I say what a bald way of arguing is this wherein you conclude no more concerning the particular infants whose right to baptism we put you to plead while you shut out other then concerning those very infants also whom you so shut out This is just as silly as if you being put to prove your own particular salvation before Iudas's should do it thus viz. Such as believe shall be saved But men believe Ergo men shall be saved Without making any proof of your own faith in particular whose salvation you would so prove above his whereas you should of right argue onward from the Major thus viz. We believe and Iud as did not Ergo we shall be saved and not he And so had you dealt down rightly and plaid above board in your Disputation sith believers infants in particular is the subject in hand between us you should have spoken plainly thus viz. All and only those infants that believe are to be baptized But all the infants of believing parents and those infants onely believe Ergo all and onely those infants are to be baptized But you know of your own selves this would be too broad a discoverie the Minoâ⦠being so appââ¦rently false that ' you cannot hide your haking by it from the
to believe therefore we passe no other judgement then that of charity onely on them to be the subjects of baptism herein you grossely mistake our grounds of baptizing for though that of charity onely is the judgement whereby we judge them to be believers yet that is not the onely judgement whereby we judge them to be the subjects of baptism but as to that we go upon a judgement of certainty and infaellibility also for though it be not infallible to us that every one that professes to believe doth as truly believe as he professes yet this is infallible to us concerning him that professes viz. both that he professes and also that professing to believe with all his heart so that we in charity may judge him so to do whether he lie or no he is by the rule of the word quoad noâ⦠a warrantable undoubted and as no infant is infallible subject of baptism for the word requires us to baptize such as after our preaching the faith to them do truly professe to believe whether they believe as truly as they profest or no for that indeed is not so infallible to us but it warrants us not to baptize any infants who can neither believe nor professe Moreover sith you say let us pass the same judgement upon little infants as you do of whom in generall say you the Scripture gives so good a report and against whom in particular no exception can be raised and so the controversie shall be at an end I tell you we do passe not the same but a far surer judgement then that of charity upon infants dying in infancy and have an hundred fold moreclear and more tender opinion of them then your selves whilst we have from the word well grounded hopes and assurance that no dying infant is damned but you with over pleading the bare outward priviledges of some most ignorantly damn 20 dying infants to one But as to your judgement of charity concerning infants believing and being thereby inrighted to baptism or that same judgement of charity which we act toward professors of faith you may dream as long as you will on such erroneous Enthusiasm but those that are awake to righteousnesse and resolved to sin no more by popish superstition know well enough that infants though nere the worse for want out yet cannot believe in Christ of whom they are not capable to hear much less can they professe so to do and thereby give that good ground which right charity must have whereupon to build her faith of this i. e to believe that they do believe and believing are certainly to be baptized so that we have charity well grounded concerning infants and such as comparatively to which your tender mercy to millions of them is meer cruelty and yet the controversie is not ended nor is likely to come to an end in such a way Give me leave therefore a little to play upon you here with your own weapons and to call for an answer from you to your own queres and so it may be in a fair way towards an end in time whereas then you plead the baptism of believers infants and no others upon such a sufficient appearance that they have faith and the holy spirit I ask First how do these make it appear that they have faith and the holy spirit since they cannot do it by profession Secondly how far forth do they make it appear to you infallibly or but probably your selves say not infallibly for the spirit is not bound to all the children of Christian parents nor barrd from any of the children of infidels Thirdly what judgement do you passe upon believers infants to be the subjects of baptism rather then other infants that of charity or that of certainty that of certainty you disclaim p. 18. in these words no judgement of science can be passed till the Acts of faith themselves be seen and examined and in these also viz. unlesse it could be certainly presumed what children have the habit what have not for the working of the spirit is not known to us he is not bound nor barrd there can be no conclusion made That of charity then is the onely judgement you passe on these and whereby you judge believers infants and no other to have faith the spirit and right to baptismâ⦠which charity teacheth us praesumere c. to believe and hope all things hope the best concerning all till ye see the worst especially since little children of believers have not by any actuall sin barrd themselves or deserved to be exempted from the generall state of little children declared in Scriptures Well then to close up all let me but desire you to passe the same judgement of charity on all little infants as you do on some even upon the little ones of unbelievers Infidels Turks and Pagans whilst infants of whom in general and indiscrimmatim the Scripture gives a good report not commending believers infants above them and against whom in particular no exception can be raised more then against the other saving that one fault of theirs onely that they were not born of believings parents which I hope you have so much charity as to pardon Hope I say as well of the infants of unbelieving parents that they have faith and the holy spirit specially since it cannot appear that these have by any actual sin barred themselves or deserved any more then the other to be exempted from the general state of little infants declared in Scripture and then the controversie between you and me which is whether little children born of believing parents only may be lawfully baptized is like to be at an end for then certainly you will either agree to it that all infants in the world even of infidels Turks and Pagans there being in the judgement of Charlty as undeserving damnation as others may be and are dying in infancy though this with you is as heinous a thing as to say the Divels may be saved p. 7. in as much possibility to be saved and so at least in as much right as the others to be baptized or else that no infants at all it being not possible to be presumed certainly which have the spirit and which not and charity judging a like of all till it see a difference are at all to be baptized both which being the very truth I am content for my part to agree with you therein with all my heart To which Dilemma I am well enough assured you can answer nothing in the least measure satisfactory as the most judicious readers if you Ministers inquire of them will undoubtedly affirm also and so I proceed to your other Arguments Dispuration That opinion which makes the Covenant of the Gospell worser then that under the Law contrary to the Apostle in Heb. 8. 6. is a wicked and false opinion But the opinion of the Anabaptists which denieth baptism to little children whereby a moity of the Christian world is cut off at once
baptism of new born babes can possibly be found any where in the word this birth if it could be in any infant at all at least cannot appear to be in one living infant above another for either they dy before actual transgression hath barr'd them and then though our hopes are the same of them all yet are they past signing by baptism or else they live and are seen to believe or not believe and so as they do or not do they must without distinction or respect to naturall descent be signed or not signed alike Baptism therefore though a sign in its nature use and office to believing men and women yet is never so much as a sign to that person to whom it s dispensed in infancy But as for your signing it with the name of a seal I should wonder much more at your ignorance had not such a wonderful thing as ignorance been threatned to those wise men that teach Gods fear after mens precepts Isay 29. in that you make both your sacraments to be seals for so runs your ordinary difinition concerning them viz in oculis incurrentia signa et sigilla considering how clear the Scripture is against you for verily though you receive that denomination of a seal together with all your vain conversion and worship by tradition from your fathers yet you never learn'd it from our fathers in the word wherein shew me if you can from the beginning to the end save in Rom. 4. 11. where in anosense sense viz. not to strengthen a weak faith but to honor great faith circumcision was set as Gods broad seal to confirm Abraham in his fatherhood any one of the four which you call Gods seals viz. either circumcision or the passeover baptism or the supper is call'd a seal by God himself Babist The formal term of a sign is no more to be found in Scripture to be given either to baptism or the supper then the term of a seal yet you grant it to be properly called a sign and so why may it not be called a seal though it be not so called in Scripture Baptist. Though the expresse denomination of a sign be not given in Scripture to either baptism or supper yet no lesse is sounded forth in sense and signification but the other term of seal as to these things is not consonant to the rule of faith for verily as no other is exprest so no more then one seal of the Gospel Covenant is so much as implied or hinted at in holy writ and that one seal is no other then the holy spirit by which those that believe are said to be sealed Eph. 1. 13. Eph. 4. 30. and howbeit God preacheth the Gospel to us outwardly by words oaths signes and visible resemblances viz. baptism and the supper and this in the ministration of men who may minister to us all these and set them close to our ears and to our eyes yet when he preaches it to us inwardly so fully and firmly as by seal he preaches it himself alone and though by a baptism yet a better baptism then that of water that is the holy spirit which though the sign may be set first to profest believers that are not so indeed secondly and this very visibly and openly to the view of others thirdly by men like our selves yet first is never set to any but believers in truth secondly and that secretly and indiscernably to any but themselves that are seald thirdly by none but God himself who onely sets that baptism close to the conscience within which baptism no man under heaven can administer what we set i. e. the sign may very easily be to a blank our ministration being liable to mistake but what Christ sets i. e. the seal that makes us most sure from himself that cannot possibly be misplaced for where and whensoever the spirit of God within is sent to bear witnesse and cry Abba i. e. father there and then God is a father indeed your own selves say that where the seal is that soul is sure at that time a real heir and from that time forth say you also for ever and so say I if that soul continue for ever cleaving to the Lord not quenching resisting or so grieving that holy spirit as to cause it to depart for ever for if so ther 's another tale told you from several Scriptures 1 Chron. 28. 9. Heb. 6. 4. 5. Heb. 10 29. But if it be so as you say that Gods seal seals up none but such as are both true heirs by faith at present and must necessarily abide so for ever then first here 's an Argument ad hominem how ever i. e. an evidence to you out of your own mouthes that your baptism is none of Gods seal sith it is set by you not onely to 1000s that after it fall from him but indeed to 1000s that never knew him their father nor never will I again therefore once more for all that I may not trouble my self with them when I meet them in other places protest against these your expressions of circumcision and baptism by the name of seals Gods seales of the Gospel Covenant c. first as none of mine wheresoever you are found fathering them on me as p. 6. 7. 14. Secondly as none of Gods expressions though I know not how many times ore viz. p. 4. 6. 7. 8. 13. 14. you aver the ordinances to be Gods seals and father that very phrase on God himself who as he useth not such a phrase when he speaks of those foolish things as the world counts them 2 Cor. 1. which he chuses as his outward witnesses shews signs and love tokens from himself to us so he useth no such tools indeed as these Instrumental signes are when he ministreth himself for these he appoints men to minister in these are the instruments of the foolish sheapherds Zach. 11. 15. even the outward instruments which God hath chosen for the under sheapheards to act by he uses none of these I say as his own seal and inward witnesse for that 's no lesse then the holy spirit which whattypes shews and signes of the Gospel Covenant soever there have bin outwardly both before and since the Gospel begun hath bin is and ever shall be the onely earnest that God hath given the only witnesse that him self hath us'd the onely seal that he hath set in any age whether before the law or under the law or under the Gospel Psal. 51. 11. 12. Eph. 1. 13. 4. 30. 2 Cor. 5. 5. Rom. 8. 15. 23. So having removed the rubbish of rude expression with which your last argument was clouded and not a little over loaded as you delivered it I come now to consider it nakedly as it lies substantially enough compriz'd in these expressions viz. Under the law circumcision was by Gods appointment dispensed to little infants Ergo under the Gospel baptism must be to infants also or else the Gospel Covenant is worse to the
relation to this case yet I do believe that whole housholds might sometimes be baptized then as well as now they are from whence yet it will not follow that infants were baptized yea whole thousands were baââ¦d sometimes in one day and yet no infants among them and that all thââ¦ââ¦sholds you so often instance in either had no infants in them or if they had yet none baptized however is evident enough to those that are not blind if ââ¦ll ââ¦e particular instances be examined As for the Iaylor the Apostles who never used to preach to infants spake to him the word of God and to all that were in his house the effect of whose preaching was not onely his rejoicing and belief but the belief of all his house also as well as the baptism of all his house together with him Act. 16. 32. 33. 34. And as for Crispus whose houshold is not reported to be baptized though no doubt they were so it s said that all his houshold believed in the Lord as well as he Acts 18. 8. and as for such as were baptized with Cornelius which were more then they of his own houshold that none of them were infants t is evident forasmuch as they were all both ready and capable to hear and the holy spirit fell on them all in hearing the word so that it was evident to Peter and as many as came with him that they imbraced the glad tidings of the Gospel upon the account of whose gladly receiving the word onely and that apparently Peter saies who can forbid water why these may not be baptized ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord Act. 10. 44 to 48. And as for Stephanus's houshold as they are said 1 Cor. 1. 16. to have been baptized so are they all said to have addicted themselves to minister to the Saints which are actions exclusive of Infants 1 Cor. 16. 15. besides if housholds must needs be taken as comprising infants then that phrase salute the houshold of Onesiphorus 2 Tim. 4. 19. must be taken so to and wââ¦at absurdity were it to tell Cradle-bed-Infants that Paul the prisoner remembred his respects unto them as for that of Lydia as its likely enough she then had none so no man knowes whether ever she had any husband at all if she had she might have no children if she had children she might be an antient widow whose children were grown up to believe wiââ¦h her and besides that those of her houshold whether children or servants or both that were baptized with her were not infants but adult disciples is evident both by that compellation viz. the brethren a denomination never given to them and mostly because they were such as the Apostles did actually comfort as we never find they did any infanââ¦s in their infancy Act. 16. 14. 40. By all which by that time you have laid it to heart so little ground will be left you from all these instances for the baptizing of infants that it may without crouding be well written within the inside of a cherry-stone And now whereas Mr. Marshal more downrightly then rightly denies that children did eat the passeover which most undoubtedly they did I demand of him why if housholds be a term so conclusive of infants when its said housholds were baptized the same word doth not as much conclude children when its said housholds did eat the passeover Babist Mr. Marshal himself gives you good reason for that p. 40. of his Sermon the Argument saith he from the term houshold is not so strong to prove that infants did eat the passeover as it is to prove they may be baptized because no other Scripture shews that the passeover doth belong to children but we have other plain Scripture proving that baptism belongs to infants as well as grown men Baptist. I remember indeed that Mr. Marshall speaks thus yea more and more absurdly then thus doth he speak p. 219. in his reply to Mr. Tombos viz. that we shall never find so good evidence out of the housholds eating the passeover Exod. 12. thereby to prove that women did eat the passeover as this proves that the ââ¦nfants of the house were baptized but I must tell him first that what influence other Sciptures give toward the proof of either one or the other makes these never the stronger simply and in themselves so but that their particular strength and weaknesse stands the same but Secondly how dares Mr. Marshall say there 's no other Scipture save that is not that one particular sentence wherein the word houshold is exprest as eating the paschal lamb enough specially when the next verse or the latter part of the same verse viz. Exod. 12. 4. saies plainly that it was to be taken and eaten according to the number of souls in the house and by every one according to his eating and if the family were too little to eat it they should join families together are not children exprest undeniably here are they not among the number of souls capable to eat every one pro suo modulo according to the measure of his eating and digestion and doth not this evince as much for women And whereas for the exemption of women not as holding these did not eat it but to secure himself the more from that deadly wound which he is aware will light upon him if he grant that children did eat the passeover viz. our arguing upon him from thence to their right to the supper acccording to his own arguing from infants circumcision to their baptism he brings this reason viz. because according to us they were not circumcised and no uncircumcised person might eat the passeover I have to or three things to say to it First that phrase no uncircumcised person shall eat it must either necessarily be understood concerning those uncircumcised ones onely who were both capable of circumcision and of whom circumcision was required or else Secondly it must be understood that the females were accounted as vertually circumcised in the males Thirdly that very phrase that excludes all and onely such uncircumcised ones from the passeover as were capable of circumcision and of whom it was required serves us against you thus far however as to include and enright all them to the passeover that were circumcised and so if women did not as none need doubt but that they did yet all circumcised males and consââ¦quently male children as soon at least as they were capable to eat were under a right to eat the passeover and so as to prove you who deny them the supper to be ingaged in the guilt of diminishing Gods grace and robbing poor infants of their right as well as we if your own arguments be true viz. that to deny such dispensations to infants under the Gospel the answerable ones to which were dispensed to them under the law is to lessen the grace of God in the Gospel Covenant and make it straiâ⦠then
as ignorantly as your selves own your practise though they disown and overturn one or two of the prime pillars and grounds you practice from that the third viz. Dr. Featley is killed as dead as a door-nayle by Mr. Den and that your selves and the other sticklers that still stand up in your cause are so miserably imbroiled in civil wars divisions diversities of design to bring about the same thing contradictions clashings Ayes and Noes among your selves that you can never make an handsome head against the truth till your matters hang more harmoniously together so that nought remaines in which you can hope unlesse your self excusing quarter crying Epistle to the Reader which is also answered can stead you but your forlorn hope of these three following Arguments which are more then half laid sprawling already and that tottered troop and ragged Regiment of Scufflers against Reason and that Scare-crow that comes up in the Rear of the Review and that Patheticall summons of all the Pastors to come in and succour you and oppose the growth of Anabaptism by preaching what they can against those Hereticks the Anabaptists but disputing no more with them because the effects of disputing with them are dangerous All which by then I have dispatch a little more dispute with whether I shall be more weary of writing or you of reading this as I know not well so it matters not much I shall its lââ¦ke give over then however First then to the first of your three Arguments that ensue Review The First is taken from the universall practise of the Church of God which the Adversaries would not hear of at the Disputation The grounds of it are expresse texts of Scripture Mat. 28. 20. Lo I am with you alway to the end of the world Iohn 14. 16. The Comforter shall abide with you for ever ver 17. The spirit of truth ver 26. Who shall teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance which I have told you Iohn 16. 13. He will lead you into all truth The Argument is this To hold that Christs promise is not true is damnable blasphemy But to hold that the universall Church hath erred in so necessary a matter as baptism and that for so many hundred years is to hold that Christs promise is not true his promise of being with his Church of guiding it by the spirit into all truth Ergo To hold the Universall Church hath so erred is damnable blasphemy If the Anabaptists object That the Church of Rome useth this Argument for her traditions The Answer is That those traditions which she pleads for were neither universal nor doctrinal as this of baptism and therefore the exception against her was just and those errors which she defends by that were denyed to be of the universall Church But the Anabaptists can never prove that this practise hath not been universall or dare not say that this matter is not doctrinal Re-Review This Argument is so far from having any substance and weight in it toward the demonstration of the truth of infant-baptism that it is not so much as a Topicall syllo gism but meerly Sophisticall so that any that are never so little learned in Logick may discern it to be the fallacy called ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Ignoratio Elenchi in which is proved aliud a quaesito i. e. quite another thing then that which is by us denyed in which Illud infertur ut contradictorium negato quod revera non contradicit it doth not at all conclude the point in question for that you are to prove is not that it is damnable blasphemy to hold that the universal Church hath erred in baptism but that to deny infant-baptism is damnable blasphemy toward the direct and legitimate illustration of which bold charge wherewith you assault us viz. that our denyall of infant-baptism is damnable blasphemy you ought of right to have made this pro-Syllogism viz. To hold the universall Church hath erred in so necessary a matter as baptism is damnable blasphemy But to deny the lawfulness of infant-baptism is to hold that the universall Church hath erred in that matter of baptism Ergo To deny infant-baptism is damnable blasphemy The Major of which pro-syllogism we do not put you to the trouble of proving neither do we hold any such thing that the universall Church hath erred in baptism any more then you for the primitive Church did not erre in it though you do yet how do you belabour your selves here to prove what we deny not But the Minor of that pro-syllogism which we do deny as being indeed iâ⦠it self most peccant and apparently false for to hold infant-baptism to be an Error is not to conclude the universal Church to have erred for the universall Church hath not held it the prove of this you evade and most serpentinely slide away from never medling with it at all unto a business you might as well have spared your pains in and fall a Syllogizing upon us in the self same sophisticall way as Rome doth for her Popes Supremacy and all other her traditions for thus say they indeed when they summon us back again to their fopperies sub paena damnabilis blasphemiae viz. To hold Christ promise is not true is damnable blasphemy But to hold that the universall Church hath erred is to hold Christs promise not true Ergo to hold the universal Church hath erred is damnable blasphemy So for the Popes Supremacy thus That which is above all the members hath Supreme authority over them all But the head of the Church is above all the members Ergo the head of the Church hath Supreme authority over all Which Syllogisms are both fallacious per ignorationem Elenchi for in this last theââ¦es concluded what is not questioned for the question is not whether the head of the Church have supremacy over all or no for none denies but that it hath but whether the Pope be at all that head that is it which we deny and they take perforce for granted from us before we have yielded it or themselves proved it and so proceed to have more mischief by it so again in the first the question is not whether the universal Church hath erred or no but whether Rome be that universal Church or no that cannot erre or whether those traditions she practises among which infant baptism is said to be one by Cardinal Bellarmine and is taken by Mr. Rogers to be the most reverent have bin universally practised or no which we deny that they were for the first Gospel Church knew none of them and so they are not universall which Romish Sillygisms the best Logicians among the Protestants are so far from answering so formally as you strive to do to the first of them in this place that they rather explode them as Silly and Sophisticall and so must I do yours which is not onely Istius-modi but in terminis the very same with the first of theirs
Therefore good Sirs fall back a litttle and begin again and make a prosyllogism or two if you please before this Syllogism takes its turn and do not beat the air and let flie such hot bullets as accusations of damnable blasphemy before you have any adversary appearing against you for verily you first falsely suppose us your opposites in that wherein we agree with you and bestir your selves to fight us in such a fierce fashion as if you would fright us out of our cause before you come neer us and set your selves to prove that which whoever doth yet I for my part do not deny for verily t is the minor and not the major in the Prosyllogism which we quarrel with and as for this Syllogism of yours I honour it not so farre as to own it neverthelesse if it be lawful to make a formal answer to an unlawful argument and least you take it ill and think much on 't if I sleight it so as to give no other reply then that above I le make bold to answer it now it s brought by you for infant-baptism as you do when the same is brought by Rome for other traditions viz. that this tradition you plead for is not universally practised therefore taking your words in a true sense and in their largest latitude though I dare not be so damable in my doctrine as you viz. to bring every one under blame of damable blasphemy who holds a possibility of error to befall the universal Church i. e. the whole state of Christs Church which is but imperfect here on Earth yet can I not say nor do I that in esse actuali the universal Church hath erred in the practise of this point of baptism so as that she hath been totally diserted by the spirit of God and that Christ hath not made good his promise to her any more then your selves yea really if you use the word universal Church in its due and proper extent viz. in respect of both time and place and in the like latitude in which Dr. Featley from whom you borrowed this argument and some of the ââ¦est and might as well have sent us to him for it as troubled your selves to hold it out here in a new harnesse uses the word universal Church as expressing All the assemblies of Christians in the world that ever were from the Apostles dayes to this present which he stiles the formal Church this universal Church cannot be impeached with error in the point of infant-baptism for it hath not universally owned it neither was it in use from the beginning there have bin some ages and places wherein the Churches practised baptism so agreeably to Christs will that you shall never be shent by him as failing in that point if you do it no otherwise then it was done then and there viz. the dayes and places wherein the primitive Churches dispenst it for they were all so wholly strangers to your infant baptism that not so much as the sound of such a thing was ever heard among them and howbeit Dr. Featle tells us a tale p. 16. out of Origen on the Romans whose originall is lost and into which work of his on the Romans t is shrewdly suspected by the learned that Russinus and the Romans have Sophisticated such a sentence that the Church had infant-baptism from the Apostles and thence very goodly grounds A positive argument of very great moment saith he that may convince the conscience of any ingenuous Christian viz. that the Apostles in their dayes began to baptize infants and the whole Catholique Christian Church in all places and ages even from the Apostles dayes hath admitted the children of Christian parents to holy baptism therefore t is no error Yet I must tell you that Origens bare word and single say so if it were his own is no warrant whereupon all men may safely muchlesse must necessarily believe it was so but the word of the New Testament of which the Apostles mostly were the Pen-men is warrant enough to us to believe that it was not so were the word onely silent about it how much more whilest it hath so much against it that we may say t is exclusive of it Howbeit therefore you say that infant baptism hath been universall it is sufficient proof of its non universallity in that you can never prove that it hath been universall and we have proved that in the Apostles dayes it was not so that in the first Century t was not so nor in the second for ought any man living can possibly shew how ere it began to creep in about the third and howbeit it hath been never so universally and erroneously practised from the fourth or fifth Centuries till now yet neither will it follow that the universall Church hath practised it nor that the universal Church hath erred in it nor that Christs promise Mat. 28. 20. Ioh. 16. 13 14. 16. 17. 29. concerning the spirits abode and guidance is not true for that 's not more made then made good to those that perform the condition and terms on which it was made viz. the observation of what he commanded in which case the spirit is ever present and ever was and shall be with those few that keep the truth as for the most when they began to dote on mens teachings and traditions and to fashion themselves more at a venture after the words of the wise and prudent then after the word of God it self and to Idolize the dictates of Synods and Ghostly fathers so as blindly to subject themselves to their sentences as their onely Oracles then Terras Astrâ⦠reliquit Christ who did ingage to lead them by his spirit who would be led by it was dis-ingaged and true enough in his promises though he left the world to lie in darknesse and to be filled with their own wayes and with the fruits of their own inventions Moreover t was not the Church in the capacity of a Church in respect of outward form and order but his disciples to whom that promise was made to whom also it was performed and made good in all ages according and in such measure as they kept close to him for in the time of the treading down of the Temple and holy City and the true worship and worshippers and of all that visible fabrick and Church posture which stood in the primitive times and even in the grossest darknesse God gave power to his two witnesses i. e. by his word and spirit in the hearts and mouths of his Saints impowered them to prophesie and testifie to the truth against the traditions of Rome and against infant baptism as well as other of her superstitions and heresies how else could Bernard have said as he doth Serm. 65. super cant of some that opposed the corruptions of his time They laugh at us because we baptize infantââ¦s because we pray for the dead and require the prayers of Saints yet even to those Martyrs that did witnesse to
us with his teeth we shall be constrained to lend him one or two blowes more toward the dispatching of him out of the way and then we shall be ready to meet with the force that follows Review And indeed they do conclude the whole Church of God to have erred most fearfully in one of the most necessary points of religion as if she had been totally deserted by the spirit of God and Christ had not made good his promise Re-Review First I observe that when ever it seems best to serve your turn so to do you stile baptism so necessary a matter one of the most necessary points of Religion abouâ⦠the administration of which to erre is most fearfully to erre litââ¦le lââ¦sse then downright damnable otherwhile again as when you would modifie mens spirits towards your proceeding in infant baptism from proceeding so eagerly against that practise in case it should prove to be the error and ours the truth then you speak as diminutively of it as may be as if it were a matter which it matters not so much whether it be done your way or ours in childhood or at years by dipping or sprinkling so it be done an error which is not worth so much ado and striving to rââ¦prove and rectifie as the Anabaptists make of such indifferency that t is not fit sith t is now the custome that the peace of the Church should be disturbed about it as if this truth of the Church though troden down must not have an hand lent it to help it up again for fear of displeasing and awaking the Church from her swââ¦et sleep of superstitious security till she pleases not so fundamental a defection which hand soever it lies but that it may be left ad libitum dispensed ad placitum so that such as will have their infants sprinkled may and such as will not or cannot be satisfied that is the true baptism may chuse and be baptized themselves if they please or not at all if they please and yet not be disowned so far one by another but that they may notwithstanding different judgements in so fiddling a thing as that is fall together but it will be by the ears sure at last into one fellowship and I know not how much such prety prate doth passe from your partie sometimes to lull us in as it were to wink at small faults and to make no noise about such a petty matter if infants baptism should be as many Priests know it is e. g. Dr. Gouge yet know it not no more then a meer Tradition of men At Pater ut gnati sic nos debemus amici Si quod sit vitium non fastidire What a deal of Patheticall Popisticall perswasion to this purpose as to pacify peoples spirits towards your errors in small points passes from you p. 26 27. of your paper viz. to avoid a querulous conscience misliking finding fault complaining taking offence at every thing where there is no cause streining at agnat giving over the company of the flock of more goats then sheep for every rub alias refusing to reform seperating from the congregation alias the parish church of the Popes congendring for a ceremony alias some small thing which to synodical prudence it hath seemed good to add to the ordinances of Christ as if his wisdome had not made things full and fine enough e. g. the surplice the forced gesture of kneeling before the railes and Altar yoking of sheep and swine together in the Supper and in baptism the crosse the form of slatting two or three drops of water with wet fingers on the face instead of dipping and orewhelming and this too but to an infant instead of a professed believer by which ceremonious quiââ¦ks they brought in not so much alterationem as aââ¦erum and ceremonized the whole substance of what Christ required quite away to endeavour after a true temper of a son of the church humbly to submit to the judgements of others sooner then our own alias to see through the Priests eyes and say we see it not what ever we see to the contrary not to dare to contend with any much lesse Superiors alias Popes Counsels whole Classes of Clergy men for they will bite Mic c. 3. 5. without strong and evident and convincing reason for our assertions which if we have not for our baptism against yours never men had in any controversy since truths resurrection from under the pawes of the Pope and Priesthood to this day not to see things amisse alias go on hoodwinkt with implicit faith if we cannot but see things amisse to hide and cover them specially the nakednesse of our father and shame of our Mother alias the Pope and Clergy out of whose loines and the Catholique Christendome in whose womb almost all error is ingendred least if their spiritual fornications should be rendred too discernable reformation should prove too desirable and that too destroyable to their enjoyments not to let a light matter alias so light aââ¦d vain a thing as the vanity of infant-baptism work dislike in us much lesse departure and divorce not to depart by seperation save in case of a great and unsufferable crime alias some worse and more fearful error then can well be about the dispensation of baptism of which there 's dispair of redresse which was the Protestants case with the Church of Rome and our case also with the Protestant nations in which though we reprove them roundly for it as well as declare against it we see little forwardnesse to forbear their infant-sprinkling which by your leave gentlemen for all your soothing and smoothing and smothering over the thing as no great one if it be one sometimes for your own ends yââ¦t to take you at your own words in this place is little lesse than an unsufferable crime and a business in which to erre is most fearfully to erre in one of the most necessary points of religion and either betokens a totall desertion by the spirit of God or else you shew your selves but ignorant men in speaking so of it and that is the very truth of it indeed for though an error about the subject and essential from of baptism be at no hand to be set so light by as t is by you when you see men resolved to depart from your societies in case of your refusal to reform that double error which in that point remaines yet among you while you Rantize infants yet neither is it to be so mightily magnified and made such a hydeous such a fundamental such a dangerous such a damnable error unlesse persevered in willfully against light or conscience and then a smaller matter then that may prove of sad consequence to any soul is as inconsistent with all possibility of their salvation that in times of ignorance did happen to hold it or puts all such persons under an absolute impossibility of having any thing of the spirit of God in them as meerly by reason of non
nevertheless sith he hath strengthens himself again what he can and comes up recruted and attended with a company of scambling and for the most part very unsound sentences at his heels t wil not be amisse to enter the lists a little with him and these his Auxiliaries First then Sirs whereas you come in again with that crooked consequence viz. infââ¦nts must be baptized under the Gospel because circumcisied under the law we might more pertinently set up a shout at your shameful folly in this particular then set upon the shewing of it any more it is so palpable for verily as is proved sufficiently above these two viz. the Covenant of the law and the Gospel from the Identity of which you infer an Identity in the subject of the ordinances and administrations of both and by way of analogy would evince them both to belong to the same persons I must tell you these are two Testaments or wills of God concerning men in those two different times viz. before Christ and since and these two so specifically distinct that they not onely run upon different strains and require different terms as your selves here confesse the law saying do this and live the Gospell onely believe but also stand upon different promises whereof the Gospels being of the heavenly Canaan are better then the laws which were but of an earthly one and these also pertaining to two different seeds viz. the legal to the natural children of Abraham i. e. Isaac and his posterity by generation the Evangelical to the spiritual seed of Abraham i. e. such as are of Christ by faith and regeneration and they had also different dispensations the one circumcision the other another thing viz. dipping a thing no way like it and different subjects also for those different dispensations so that if men and their ministers were not all turned Momes they could not but must manifestly perceive it the old Testament admitting to circumcision onely males and these onely on the eighth day in case they were in the house so young and all the males in the house whether sons or servants whether born in the house or bought with money of any stranger and all this without respect to either faith or repentance in the persons to whom dispenst or any prae-preaching to them by the person dispensing the new Testament taking in to baptism as no servants upon the masters faith so all persons in the world both males and females upon their own and that upon any day and not the eighth onely wherein after they have been preacht to they professe to repent and believe Mat. 3. Act 2. Act. 8. Act. 18. The proof of which real specifical diversity of these two Covenants is yet farre more evident First because the spirit denominates them so to be in Scripture calling them expressely the two Covenants Gal. 4. 24. and also very osten in plurali the Covenants the covenants of promise Secondly by that contradistinction of speech which the spirit useth when he speaks of them and those oppposite Epithets by which he diversifies them calling one the Law the other the Gospel and the law by the name of the first testament or will of Cod the Gospel the second the law the old testament the Gospel the new the law which bound to circumcision and to the observation of which in all other things circumcision bound its subjects when they came to years not of faith though faith then was too in a few and also from the beginning as to the eternal inheritance but of flesh rather and the time before faith came Gal. 3. 11. 12. 13. also a law of a carnall commandement a faulty and a blameable testament of weak and beggerly rudiments in respect of Christ who is the end of them standing in imperfect and onely flesh-purifying precepts and on meerly terrene inferiour and flesh-pleasing promises as Canaan and Ierusalem here below also the Letter in ink in ãâã of stone the ministration of death and condemnation the Covenant gendering to bondage the hatred the hand writing of ordinances that was against us yet thus farre not against but subservient to the promises as t was the similitude of heavenly things the figure and shadow of the good things to come and a schoolmaster to bring to Christ Eph. 2. 14. Col. 2. 14. The Gospel contrariwise the time of faith Gal. 3. 25. for after faith came c. the power of an endless life Heb. 7. 16. a better Testament standing in lesse painful ordinances more plain and soul purifying precepts and on better and more precious and foul saving promises a Canaan a Ierusalem from above Heb. 8. 6. Also the ministration of the spirit in fleshly tables of the heart of righteousnesse of life liberty love grace reconciliation the very Image and truth it self of which the law was but the shadow Thus you find the Scripture opposing one of these two to the other so farre is it from signifying them to be one and the self same Covenant as you frivolously fain them to be that you may build your infant-infant-baptism thereupon Now whether we shall believe the holy spirit which stiles these two expressely two Covenants or your selves who will have them to be but one judge ye Moreover how two Covenants or testaments can be plurally pointed out and called two and opposed respectively ad se invicem by the names of the first and second the old and new the type and the truth a better and a worse c. yea and contradictorily predicated too as the law and the Gospel are of which it s said the one is of faith i. e. ever for so the Gospel ever was saying believe and live and the ââ¦ust must live by faith the other not of faith i. e. never for the law never was of faith but the man that doth them shall live in them was the teâ⦠thereof and yet all this while be but one and the same Covenant and Testament iâ⦠no lesse then a mystery to me sith t is an undeniable rule among Logicians that oppositio semper subinfert pluralitatem also that contradictio est oppositionum perfectissima pugnacissima et Eternaeââ¦d ââ¦unctionis opposition specially contradiction which is the greatest of oppositions doth suppose a plurality so that t is impossible that one thing should be two contradictory things at once or that contradictories should eodem tempore cadere in idem i. e. be truely spoken both of the same thing at the same time Babist The one is called the first and the old Testament meerly because it went before and is now vanisht away and alienated the other is called the second and the new one meerly because it comes after that and is now in being not because it is really another Testament another Covenant as you contend but two parts rather or periods of one and the same Covenant of grace which was from the beginning of the world Baptist. I confesse that the Gospel Covenant was in the
the works of Abraham i. e. believe not on him that justifyes them as some of you doââ¦e they do but also Secondly that the promise of the Gospel is to believers and their seed These both are abundantly confuted by that quotation of mine which quotes more Scripture then you will ever answer so that I wonder you blush not to shoot out so boldly two such blind and unââ¦ound assertions together the second of which I shall say no more to it being virtually answered by what is more formally spoken to the first also because I have shewed so undeniably above that I know your consciences must yield to it and that from this Act. 2. 39. whence you would wrest a proof to the contrary that the promise if you take it for the profer of the Gospel Grace is to all men in the world every creature and so not to believers and their seed only but to all unbelievers and their seed also in case they shall believe for he conditionats the promise on calling for such these were whom Peter spake to whilst he was yet speaking that very word to them viz. the promise is to you and your children but if you take it for the thing promised which is not Church-membership and participation of baptism as some say whose absurdity therein I have declared but the spirit remission of sins and salvation this is made good also to the believer himself and it is mercie enough to him that it is so I think but not at all to his seed for his sake nor his faiths sake for if it be I testify his children need no faith of their own nay more God never made promise to save any of believing Abrahams natural seed without faith in themselves for Abrahams sake as neerly as he took Abraham to be his friend for even he had sin enough of his own to have ââ¦unck him if the same Mediator that saves any of his seed in that way of faith had not mercifully saved him the same way nor yet for Abrahams ãâã sake for that merited not salvation for them nor was it instrumental but faith only in themselves to any one of his sonnes salvation for every one must bear his own burden if Christ bear it not and the just must live by his faith and not his fathers neither did he ever promise for his faiths sake to give faith to his natural seed as his for then they must all have had it qua sic including dâ⦠omni and being universale summum or God shouldly which he cannot neither could God blame them as he doth for unbelief but himself without whom say you they could not believe who had promised to make them believe and did not though yet he promised to circumcise i. e. by his spirit to sanctify the hearts of his spiritual seed as well as his own i. e. all such as believe and are in the faith with him for the promise being still sure to all the seed which it is made to they all must be blessed with faithful Abraham Now if God who made the old Covenant promise of the earthly Canaan to Abraham and his fleshly seed did not make the Gospel promise to him and his fleshly seed but onely that ãâã of his that believes with him can we think that he made that promise to the Gentile believer and his fleshly seed for his fathers sake unlesse he have faith of his own Babist No we do not say without respect to his own faith but as the believers seed shall believe so it s made to him as well as to his parents Baptist. So it s made to the unbeliever and his seed also viz. as they shall believe as well as to either of the other and by that account you may baptize all the world Again none of the Jews though the natural seed of Abraham and partakers of all the ordinances of the old testament as Abrahams children could be admittted to be baptized upon that same natural relation though they pleaded it never so stisfly Mat. 3 but only on manifestation of amendment besides that 3000 converts should not baptize their children when they were baptized themselves as Abraham by command took all his males and cirmumcised them the self same day with himself argues plainly that both the covenant and the promise as Mr. Marshal saies truly as to the manner of administration was now changed and not continued to parents and children both alike but as they both alike believed And that these were not baptized with their parents I take Mr. Cotton at his word who as I have shewed before confesses it and if he should not stand to his testimonie herein yet these words viz. as many as glady received the word were baptized which exclude infants and were an imperfect relation if he meant not onely them that received the word are so cogent that they cannot but compell him So I have escaped two of your bullets and as for the third viz. that the Gospel which is a better Covenant would be far worse if believers children be not counted in it and have not right to baptism and membership as well as the Iews children and be valued but as Turks and Pagans this is so sick of the same disease of absurdity with the rest that I fear not its doing much execution besides we have lamed it before having told you before and proved it too and now will again that the exclusion of the fleshly seed from this Covenant and administration which was taken into the first doth not lessen or straiten the grace of God under it at all not render this covenant worse then the first contrary to Heb. 8. 6. the place twice quoted by you where it s called a better for the meliority there spoken of of this covenant above that lies not so much in the extension of the grace of it to such subjects as in the meliority of its promises for this is a better covenant still then the other who ere it belongs or belongs not to forasmuch as it makes better promises then the other viz. of a heavenly Canaan and all spiritual blessings in and by Iesus through faith when that promised an earthly Canaan onely and certain temporal blessings therein on performance of those tedious services of the law T is true theirs in this sense and thus farre was a Covenant of great grace too as t was made freely to that people above other nations for he did not so to any people else concerning outward benefits and such statutes and judgements as should on their observation of them not onely continue them therein but as a shadow type and schoolmaster conduct them to this yet greater is the glory of the Gospel covenant which now is so that the other had no glory in respect of this glory that excelleth therefore the grace of God under the covenant to them that are under it is greater also Besides if you speak not onely of the intention but
extension of the grace of God in this Covenant and in the administration of it too it goes beyond the other for not only is the Gospel a clearer promulgation of the eternal covenant then that typical covenant was whereby the glory of it may be seen more plainly and with open face then when it was seen onely in the type as a thing to come for we preach Christum exhibitum Christ crucified a sacrifice already offered and baptize and break bread in token hereof but they and that in much dimnesse too Christum exhibendum a Messiah to come he was veiled though seen through the veil in the old but revealed in this new dispensation but also it is of larger extent in respect of the subject to which it belongs for the revelation of it by preaching and real proferring of the grate of it in the name of God who is not willing that any should perish and fail of his grace unlesse they will is to all people in the world the old administration of circumcision and other pertinances of that covenant which was the type of this was limitted and narrowed into a little corner the land of Israel the people of the Iews yea more the very new covenant administration that we are now under as preaching baptizing c. while the old covenant did continue as it did for two or three year after the beginning of this by Iohn till Christ crucified was streitned exceedingly above what it is among us for saith Christ then go not into any way of the Gentiles but now since Christ crucified its extended freely to every nation and every person in it of capacity of years to receive it and till then dying before they shall never be damned for rejecting it without any exception as they believe for go saith he into all the world c. Mark 16 Mat. 28. then circumcision was limitted to males among the Iews but Christ and baptism is to Jew and Gentile male and female wââ¦thout difference as they believe so that the grace israther lengthned in the administration of baptism by taking in the females that were not circumcised then straitned by the denial of it to infants in their infancy onely for even those also may be baptized too if they will when they come to years the grace of the new covenant therefore is even thus as well as otherwise better then the old in respect of the extent of it and its administration also to more subjects for the Jews onely were the subjects of that grace and heirs by promise of the earth ly Canaan but all the world are heirs of heaven by promise according as they repent and believe the Gospel Besides if you think that ever God took the whole body of that nation Israel that belonged all to the typical salvation of the old covenant into the covenant of everlasting salvation by Cââ¦rist in relation to their fathers faith without their own and thence conclude that the whole body of believers seed must be by faith of their parents admitted into that same Covenant of the Gospel this is a meer Chimaera of your own brain for no such grace of God as this though some priests of the Iews dreamed of it as well as you for which they were pretty well curried by Christ and Iohn Mat. 3. Iohn 8. ever was now is or ever shall be As for our valuing believers infants as Turks and Pagans I tell you we raââ¦e them higher then your selves for we set them not so low as Turks and Pagans that are at years and wicked for they though not without many possibilities of life by Christ yet dying impaenitents will be demned as well as many of you that abuse more light nor yet so low as the infants of Turks and Pagans for though they dying in infancy are by your own doctrine all alike i. e. none deserving exemption by actual sin from salvation yet living these have in likelihoood more advantages for life then those of Pagans but you though you set by a few more then the rest in your account and yet in some partes of your Account too you make them equal yet no lesse then 20 to one are valued little higher then the Divels for your speech p. 7. supposes that the divels may be saved as soon as the dying infants of Turks and Pagans Review If they object children cannot be taught nor made to understand the sacraments no more could they at circumcision If further that they shed tears at their baptism as unwilling to receive it so they did at circumcision If they say they were semen carnis and had right by the promise so these are semen fidei the promise is unto them If they say the seal is often voided by their infidelity afterwards because many baptized so young become reprobates so it was among the Iewes witnesse Ishmael and Esau and those of whom the Apostle saith that they entered not in through unbelief Re-Review Here you drive on four deep and against a fourfold assault make a four fold repulse pelting us amain but with pellets of brown paper To the ââ¦irst I reply no more need they be taught at circumcision but the baptized are commandââ¦d to be taught first untill they believe Mat. 28. 19 20. Mark 16. 15. 16. and also immediately after which is so plain that though here you answer by denying all possibility of childrens being taught before circumcision yet else where viz. p. 10. and 18. you fence this off with such prety contrary quiddy stuff as this viz. that as to baptism infants have a teaching a hearing and a learning for the spirit say you opens their ears quo magiââ¦ro quam cito discitur quod docet he doth it in them and in adultis too or else for all their hearing they l not believe but that we shal have more to say to when we come to it To the second that as unwilling as infants were to receive circumcision and as tedious as it was to them or servants either that received it yââ¦t by express command if they were Males in Abrahams house he was to dispense it to them whether they were willing or no but you have no such flat command to disease your little infants ââ¦o far as to dip them in water for so you should if you baptizd them indeed whether they will or no. To the third O wonderful that Abrahams own fleshly seed even by Isaââ¦c himself by bare descent from their bodies unlesse they also believed as Abraham did could become and be counted no more then bare semen carnis the children of Abrahams flââ¦sh have right by promise qua sic of no more then the earthly Canaan For Ishmael though born of Abraham and circumcised also as a male of his house was not heir by promise of so much as that Gen. 17. 19. 20 21. and yet that the fleshly seed of believing Gentiles should become and be accounted no less then Abrahams semen fides the children
of his faith and such high heirs thereby as have right to the heavenly Canaan Abrahams faith it seems doth not priviledge his own natural seed so far as to be his seed in a spiritual relation but the faith of every Gentile priviledges his natural seed so far as to be spiritually the seed of Abraham but Sirs me thinks if any fleshly descent in the world could dignify the seed so descended with the high name of the spiritual seed of Abraham and heirs with him according to the heavenly promise a fleshly descent from Abraham Isaac and Iacob should do it ye teven that meââ¦rly without more makes the seed no more then the na tural seed of Abraham and heirs with him of only the earthly promise Yea Sirs that Abrahams seed is shut out from all ââ¦piritual kindred to their own faithful father Abraham notwithstanding the faith of that their Father unlesse they believe also themselves and yet our seed who are but Gentiles after the flesh are so specially so spiritually a kin to Abraham by the faith of us their fathers without their own is not only to equallize our seed with Abrahams which is the utmost you pretend to but rather to reckon it as a higher race then that of Abrahams a matter which the most capacious brain pan of you all is no way capable clearly to conjecture To the fourth that circumcision was not voided by the Jewes after infidelity for t was not set on supposition they had faith neither was it after voided by their proving Reprobates for it was not set to signify them to be Gods elect they being not so at all as Jewes I mean as to eternal life but only to that earthly life in Canaan for had it been set to have supposed believers onely and elect ones then it must not have been set to Ishmael and Esau for they were not at all known to be but rather foreknown not to be the elected heirs of either Canaan viz. the typical or the true for God who foresaw how in time they would deserve it the one by scoffing the other by ââ¦elling both the birth-right and the blessing had to Abraham Gen. 17. 19 20 21. and to Rebecca Gen. 25. 23. either plainly or figuratively foretold their rejection from both yet both these were circumcised and that neither of them in vain sith being males in the house Gods command was fulfilled in circumcising them as well as otheââ¦s but baptism which is lawful to be set to none buâ⦠taugh persons Mat. 28. professed believers in token of remission of sins Act. 2. is ever voided and abuââ¦ed when dispensed to infants not onely because there is no command for such a thing but also because there is no use of such a thing to such as those for before they are made guilty of commission of sins they neither do can nor need believe remission and when having committed sins they believe them to be rââ¦mitted their infant-baptism being transient and not permanent as circumcision was doth no way become visibly evident to them it self much lââ¦ss can it be a visible evidence to them of the other Review The reââ¦son of these objections against paedobaptism is this because they understand not the nature of baptism it is Gods seal ââ¦e sets it they that receive it are passive in that he appoints it to be set to whomsoever he hath made the promise and with whom he hath entered into covenant A seal of an estate made to infants in their cradles is firm so is God's Now here must be a sealing on the other side for both parties must seal in a Covenant we seal when we believe John 3. 33. The Covenant is sealed on both sides when faith comes God may set to his seal as he did to many of the Iewes and the seed made void to them through unbelief The End of Gods setting it to such as he fore-saw would have no benefit of it is the same with the making of his promises and sending of his Sonne to let them know how he would have received them how sure his mercies should have been unto them but they would not Re-Review The reason of all your Objectations against our way of baptism and pleas for Pââ¦do-Rantism which you practise is this you understand not the nature of baptism it is not Gods seal which he sets which you sillily suppose for that is his spirit only as I shewed you plainly enough above but Gods sign which man seââ¦s which they that receive aright are not altogether passive in but voluntary and very active i. e. confessing their sins calling on the name of the Lord desiring to be baptized professing faith in order thereunto going down inââ¦o the water with the dispenser and there setting their senses and understandings on work upon the sign and things thereby signified submitting their bodies freely to the dispensation Neither doth God appoint it to be set to whomsoever he hath barely made the promise for in the word preached he makes it to every Creature Mark 16. 15. 16. but to such as professedly believe in that promise he hath made and visibly verily for ought we can judge have entered into covenant with him to become obedient such only so far as it is possible for us to know are those with whom he hath entred into Covenant for say you there must be a sealing on the other side and both parties must seal in a Covenant we seal when and not before we believe neither is the Covenant sealed on both sides so that it can be said these two parties are now entertained into covenant each with other till faith come and that is not in infancy but after And this your manner of speech viz. when ââ¦aith comes here implies to be your own opinion as well as ours though else where as p. 3. 4. 8. 9. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. you strenuously contend it yea and to say the truth t is well nigh the whole businese of your book to assert and assay to prove it that faith comes to infants in their infancy and to make it appear to us as well as you can by contradiction that infants do believe Moreover if ever men were troubled with the simples I think you are is baptism Gods seal of an estate i. e. the heavenly inheritance made over to infants in their cradels and is that seal of his firm to i. e so sure that it cannot fail then I wonder how that seal for so you still stile circumcision and baptism is made void and infirm to so many Iews and Christian people as it is for not all yea few of many do obtain that estate at last and that most lose it for all that seal you tell us by their unbelief but I had thought you had been of the mind when you wrote your 4th page that children of Iews and of believing parents did believe all without any exception for asserting it there positively that the Iews children did believe and
one infant then of an another no infants appearing reprobates in infancy and of their right to heaven above all infants all which passages being spoken to above may be reviewed there by any that have a mind to it the utmost intent and drift of this whole Section is to prove infants to be capable of faith which thing if it should be granted for truth yet I wonder how that redounds to infant-baptism since it s neither bare capacity nor actuality of believing but professing to believe that is our warrant to dispense baptism to any subject for iâ⦠will not follow from the having of faith to bapââ¦ism unlesse that faith be professed much lesse will it follow from a capableness to believe or have faith that a person hath it and therefore must be baptized For then first heathen infants are as capable of it as other infants all souls being equall in their Creation therefore they must be baptized also yea Sirs if you give back and let your Argument fall so low now as to say infants are capable of faith and therefore must be baptized before they have or appear to have it then I le warrant every ones right to baptism as well as any ones thus viz. The souls of men and women are capable of faith before they believe and whether ever they do believe or no the spirit of God can work it in them Therefore men and women before they believe or whether they believe or no must be baptized Yea all souls are as capable subjects of faith as well as the souls of believers infants and therefore must be baptized But Sirs though persons be not only capable subjects to believe but such also as for ought you know to the contrââ¦ry do believe and of whom you cannot say they do not yet may you not at all baptize them wââ¦thout some kind of evidence that they do and that 's more then in particular any infant can give for it self and as for that muddy manner you argue it in when you say the Kingdome of heaven consists of infants they are called to come to Christ and Christ received them therefore they must be baptized besides that those indefinit expressions exââ¦end no more to believers infants then unbelievers we may as well argue thus the Kingdome of heaven consists of men men and women have right to it are called to come to Christ received and blessed by him therefore men and women or these men and women whether it be evident of them in perticular or individuo yea or no may be baptized which were absurd non-sense in the abstract yet such are your pleas for those particular infants you sprinkle whilest you deny baptism to heathen infants viz. the testimony of Scripture in gross and infants capablenesse to have the inward baptism and such like on this wise did Dr. Channel at Petworth dispute Ian. 5. 1651. saying If infants are capable of the inward baptism then they may have the out ward But c. And could not prove the consequence or sequel of his Major four times over repeated by himself and as often denyed by his Respondent Review The difficultie in the understanding how fa it hshould be bred in them and after what manner is that which hath bred the doubts about their having it but if we had learned to believe the Scriptures which by necessary consequence confirm the thing we would leave the manner of doing it to him whose work it is the spirit of God who is able to do it we do it in other articles of faith and the resurrection of the body and ask not how it can be done because the Scriptures have delivered it and this of the renovation of soul is no lesse Miracle Re-Review And well may it be difficult to understand how faith should be bred in infants and doubted that they have it not since if we have learned to believe the Scriptures they are so far from confirming such a thing so much as by any possible or probable consequence that by necessary consequence they contradict it while they tell us that there is but one way whereby faith cometh and that such a one as it can never possibly come to infants in viz. hearing the word of God preached not inwardly by the spirit only as you prate below for he speaks not of such a thing there Rom. 10. but outwardly by some visible or audible creaturely ministration as is plain by the words foregoing viz. How shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard how hear without a preacher how preach except they be sent And whereas you tell us the spirit is able to work faith in them therefore we must leave the manner of doing it to him not offering as it were to pry into it Good Sirs spare your labor talk not about the unknown manner of a matter as unknown as the other for the thing it self is not yet clear in the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã neitherdoth the spirits ability to do it prove that it is done any more then it proves there is a 1000 worlds or that all men have faith because these things arepossible ââ¦o be effected by him but the evidence that he doth such a thing which if it be wanting as it is in this case it is but egregious folly to argue it from the other so as to say God can do it therefore though the manner how he doth it is not known to us yet we must not meddle further then to believe it is leaving the manner of doing it to him Moreover Sirs assure your selves of this that in some sort the manner is usually manifested to us in the word as well as the matter of such things as we are there called upon to believe even that miraculous work of the resurrection of the body which is your present instance wherein 1 Cor. 15. 35. to the end the Lord condescendeth at large to explain the manner of it as well as to prove the matter of it before and whereas you say you leave the manner of the doing things when it is nor clear to you to the spirit himself whose the work is in other articles of faith I wonder you are so forgetful as to bear such false witnesse as this against your selves when as in the point of dying infants salvation which for the matter of it is so clear that you cannot deny it though not clear to you in the manner you leave not the manner of it to God himself whose work it is to save them but limit him to the way of Church-membership faith baptism and holinesse c. whereas the word that was not at all for infants instruction declares to men and women what way he will save them in asking in many places of your book how can infants be justified without faith how can Turks and Pagans infants be saved what hopes of our infant salvation without baptism and all this too though there is no fear of their damnation by
witness their circumcision therefore the children of believing parents have now by future experience t was evident to every body that they had it not how else came they to be complained on in general when at years as a body of wicked ones and unbelievers unlesse you will say they lost and fell from their faith as I am sure you dare not and for my part I cannot say they did except I could see more clearly then yet I do see or you can ever make me see that at first they had it As for your further following flim-flam wherein you tell us that we must deny faith to be in the best of Gods children as well as in little children if their sense under the cross and their complaining of it be an Argument to conclude against their faith I give you to understand Sirs that its an ignorant inconsequence and so you will your selves discern it to be by then you have weighed what a difference there is between that voluntary submission which by the power of faith in the Saintsis acted and yielded to the cross and yoak of Christ in either circumcision or baptism or any other difficult duty or dispensation service or suffering they are called to for Christs sake and that forced and not more unpleasant then unwelcome imposition of it that is made when that cross or yoak viz. the affliction or pain of circumcision or baptism is put upon the necks of infants for the one freely choses it when they have the liberty to refuse and decline it if they please and therefore though they have some sense out to the flesh no affliction being joyous but grievous yet are so far from complaining of it that they rather comply with it of their own accord as counting it better then to be without it witnesse Moses who by faith chose rather affliction and repââ¦oach with Christ as deeming these better then the pleasures and treasures of Egypt which were at his choice as well as these but the other i. e. infants are so far from offering themselves to either dutie or difficulty for Christ as by faith esteeming it better so to do then to escape that they rather are solely sensible of the smart so as to gainsay refuse and avoid it what they can but onely that will they nill they men make them bear it and cross them whether they will or no neither can infants by faith choose well-come or delight in either the disease that is by dipping or the sore that seconds circumcision but suffer both full sore against their wills and whereas you say the sense of the cross may conclude against the weaknesse of faith not against the being that clause reasons Reasonlesly against Reason indeed for it hath neither good sense nor reason in it to your own purpose or ours either the best I can make on it for your turn is to suppose it a meer mistake and that 's the least a man so concerned to meddle with it as I am can well say of it for surely Sirs if I read it right you write it wrong and set down your mind in words the sense whereof is just contrary to your meaning for certainly you would or at least should have said Against the strength or greatness of faith and you say Against the weakness of it if this were but lapsus Calami when t was penned yet t was lapsus animi and Error menâ⦠is too to let it passe uncorrected when t was printed but most of all when t was corrected after the for verily among all the printers mistakes which you hint to me in that corrected copy you sent me when you summoned me to answer your Pamphlet there 's no mention of this mistake of the penman who cannot impure this as an oversight of the printer but of the overseers themselves which weakness to conclude with you in your own kind may serve to conclude against the exercise and eminency of your Reason though not against the being of Reason in you at all Review 3 Why are they not after admitted to the supper Because the Apostle expressely requires of every one that comes to examine himself 1 Cor. 11. 28. If any such thing were required of all that are to be baptized they might lawfully be barred from that Re-review Here reason demands of you why after bapââ¦ism you admit not infants to the supper and good reason too for cui signum ei signatum is a pigg of your own sow and I add cui admissio et accessio per et post baptismum cui incorporatio ei continuatio progressio corporis communio fractione panis et precibus Acts 2. 42. cui nativitas ei facult as auctrix nutrix et quare non nutrimentum He that hath the thing signified as infants of believers appear it seems to have to you but not to us more then other infants i. e. indeed not at all must have the sign he that hath membership must have fellowship in things pertaining to the body he that is once born growes and is nourished yea to speak in Mr. Blakes phrase being of the houshold they must have of the food of the houshold the stewards of the mysteries of God must be accountable in case they do deny it why therefore should not infants have the supper Babist In answer to which I tell you that baptism is an initial sacrament of our spiritual birth and entrance onely into the Church of both which infants being capable in token thereof must be baptized so soon as they are born specially of spiritual parents though that be but a fleshly birth neither that hath no more appearance of the spirit or spiritualnesse in it then is in the birth of the children of the most carnall in the world but the supper is a sacrament of our spiritual growth nourishment continuance further establishment c. of which infants being not so capable are consequently not capable of the supper till they come to age and become men of some growth Baptist. As if there is not a growth ensuing every birth even the spiritual as well as the naturall and as if every babe as well spiritually as naturally born doth not continue and desire the sincere milk i. e. to suck and receive nourishment and relief as if Mr. Blake were out and so I suppose he is but not that he supposes himself so to be in saying to the confutation of his fellow helpers as he doth p. 32 that children of believers have such timly knowledge of God as to be sucking in somewhat of him whilst they suck milk from the breast which if it be true then if one sign belong to them the other doth also because the things signified severally in both do belong and they are as capable to eat and to drink as to be dipt and to know the meaning of one as of the other and in order to the one i. e. the supper as capable to examine themselves as to
do while you do that at last cast which had you done at first you had saved your selves a deal of hurt which you have done your selves by circumlocuting so long in way of proving the very Minor proposition of that last Argument which Reason urged against you viz. that Christians children are not more inclined to actions of faith then those of infidels for at last you fall flatly as your safest way to deny that Minor and assert contrarily thereto that children of Christians are more inclined to holy actions then other children which if it be true First how grosly do you contradict that you say in the lines above where you seem to grant that there may be more inclinablenesse in infidels children and promptnesse to holy actions then in Christians Secondly I wonder how you come to be experienced in it for if you Clergie men be all Christians and so you are in your own account your children excepting some that by the breeding you give them grow up to the same stamp of Christianity you print upon them do for all their native holy inclinations not seldome prove the lewdest and rudest of any mens children in a Countrey for not onely through the Priests and Prophets own practise but from their posterity too oft times prophaness goes out into all the world or else the Popes had never filled it with iniquitie as they have done The next objection of Reason is as followes Review 7. Faith comes by hearing Little children cannot hear must lesse understand Ergo they have no faith They might also conclude they have no faculty of understanding neither for that comes by hearing but infants have an hearing the spirit opens their ears he must do it in adultis or for all their hearing they will never believe He is not tyed to means though we are without the outward hearings of the Word he works faith in little children The manner of his working is miraculous as it is in the conversion of every soul enough hath been said to that before nor ought it to be objected if miraculous then not ordinary for the work of the spirit in the conversion of men is both Re-Review Had Reason had the managing representing and writing of this Argument her self she would not have set it down in so weak absurd and silly a manner as Reasonlesse hath done it in in this place Reason never held such a thing yet as is asserted in this Minor viz. that children cannot hear much lesse understand for abstract hearing from understanding and take these two in sensu diviso as you do here and children can hear but in sensu composito they cannot it cannot rationally nor truly be said they cannot so much as hear much lesse understand but they cannot hear so as to understand or they cannot hear understandingly as those must that hear in order to believing and whose faith comes by hearing a hearing t is true infants have for they are not destitute of that sense more then of seeing and the rest Auriculas Asini quis non habet the same hearing that an Asse horse or other bruit beast hath which is only the sound of words without the knowledge of the sense who hath not save he that is deaf but the hearing they have is neither such as Paul speaks of there nor yet that heating you say they have viz. an inward hearing of the voice of Christ and the spirit opening their ears so as to make them learn things as adult ones do that is a meer figment of your own fancies besides if they had such an internal hearing as you dream of what were that to the matter in hand or to the answering the objection that is grounded upon the alledged Scripture which speaks not of an inward but an outward hearing the word of God preached as that by which faith is begotten and without which it cannot come out of which outward way and meanes if persons be brought to believe as usually as by it and so it must needs be if little infants believe by the understanding of certain secret whisperings and teachings within the spirit would not have spoken of it as such an unpossible case as he doth in saying how can they believe on him of whom they have not heard and how hear without a Preacher But say you that is the usual means by which faith is begotten in adult ones but the spirit is not tyed to meanes though we are he works faith in little children without the outward hearing of the word Is it so Sirs that the spirit is not tyed to work by means in little children in the same cases wherein he works by means in men and women I wonder then that you whose opinion this is should be so forgetful as to teach quite contrary to your own tenet for verily of all the men that are I know none that limit the spirit and tie him to means in his dealings with little infants like unto your selves As for us we own this position fully and to a tittle viz. that what God acts at all for infants he acts without meanes as to their salvation but as for your selves you own and disclaim this by turnes according as it seems to serve your own turnes so far as to hold it helpes to hold up your monstrous odd opinion of infants faith which hath no footing at all in Scripture you inwardly entertain it and outwardly proclaim it for undoubted truth but when you find it makes against you then t is no other then a figment of the Anabaptists for when we tell you there is no right to baptism without faith but infants cannot believe because faith comes by hearing understandingly the word preached which infants cannot do then such of you as Rantize infants on such a sottish supposition as their having faith in themselves excuse the matter thus viz. The spirit is not tied to means nor to the outward way of hearing the word so but that though he begets men to faith that way and by that means yet he begets infants to believe without it and such of you as ashamed to assert that the infants themselves have faith do Rantize them on the fathers faith without their own excuse the matter thus viz. The spirit is not bound to admit infants to baptism in that same way wherein he admits men viz. the way of faith but admits infants to have right to it without that outward means of believing But when we tell you faith and baptism are the way wherein and the outward means by which the spirit justifies and saves men and women but without this outward way of faith and baptism he can and doth save dying infants and that the spirit is not tied to the same means of belief and baptism in the justifying and saving infants through Christ by which and which onely he saves men then you plainly disclaim what you proclaimd for truth before viz. the spirit is not tied to means in infants but
works without them in infants though not in men and hold that he doth work by means among them so that there is no hope to be had by parents of the salvation of their infants out of the way of baptism and no justification of them ouâ⦠of the way of belief Thus you tie and unty confine and lose the spirit at your pleasure you give him leave for your own lusts sake either to approve of your baptism of children out of his own declared and onely approved way of faith or if it be needfull as some of you think it is for infants to believe in order to baptism then to beget faith without that outward means of hearing the word but though it is his own good will to justifie and save dying infants by Christ without the outward means of faith and baptism there he is limitted and cannot obtain your good will he must give way to you to baptize infants out of that ordinary way of faith wherein his will is that men shall be baptized but he may not save infants out of the ordinary way of faith and baptism wherein his will is that men by Christ shall be saved no not by any means in the world There 's but a matter of four gross false unsound and absurd assertions in this reasonless reply which I must intreat you to be ashamed of before I leave it The first is that old piece of sing song which is canted ore some three or four times before but would be rather recanted if you were not resolved on perseverance in perverseness wherein you tune it out as if faith in Christ and the faculty of understanding were both so con-naturally and con-necessarily in believers infants and them onely that we may as rationally and safely conclude neither to be in them as not both This blue vain of artificial non-sense keeps its course well nigh throughout this whole discourse of yours against reason so that every foot when reason alledges any thing that 's clearly conclusive against the being of belief in Christ in believers infants as namely their not knowing good and evil their giving no testimony of faith when at years without instruction nor upon instruction neither sometimes so much as the adult children of unbelievers their not having any faith at all for the most part witnesse your successelessenesse in your preachings to your parishes to beget it whereby it is evident that either they never yet had it when rantized or else have lost it if they had their non inclinablenesse to believe caeteris paribus more then other peoples children their uncapablenesse to hear the word with understanding which is the only way and means whereby the word declares faith to be given and to be gotten you answer all along Cuckoo-like in one tone and that 's this viz. That by the same reason we may conclude against the faculty of understanding in them and against their having a reasonable soul as if it were full as clear and altogether as absurd to doubt that these infants have faith which yet your selves confesse you cannot presume what infants have and what hââ¦ve not as to doubt that they have the reasonable soul which is notoriously known to every Novice in very nature to be in all mankind by nature without exception and that so also as essentially to difference them from other creatures The second remaining and remarkable absurdity is this viz. in that you most shamelessely assert that the faculty of understanding comes to persons by the same way and means whereby justifying faith comes and no other i. e. by hearing the word preached for when reason argues against infants believing thus viz. faith comes by hearing the word of God but infants cannot hear so as to understand the word of God preached Ergo not believe you reply thus viz. They might also conclude they have no faculty of understanding neither for that i. e. the faculty of understanding comes by hearing i. e. as faith doth O prodigious piece of priestly prudence did ever any but men minded to manifest their folly to all men utter such a thing that the faculty of understanding comes as faith in Christ viz. by hearing the word of God are not the faculties of the soul of man I say the faculties of it i. e. the facultie of understanding the faculty of the will so inseperable from it so essential to it that a person is neither sooner nor longer a reasonable soul then it hath these I confesse that Plus notitiae or acquisitio ulââ¦erioris intelligentiae increase of knowledge and the obtaining of more and more understanding may come by hearing wherein the faculty of understanding being set on work not onely exercises but improves it self also and comes to act it self on more intelligible objects then before now newly discovered to it but that Ipsa facult as intelligendi or ipse intellect us the very faculty of understanding it self which comes by nature and generation and is as essentially in man as the reasonable soul it self doth come by hearing is such a mess of matter as was never heard of to this hour nor can I conceive what kind of hearing any faculty of the soul can come by sith the understanding and will must both be known to be in persons and they thereby to be both reasonable intelligible and eligible creatures before they can be fit subjects to be spoken to and before intelligible or eligible objects can reasonably seasonably or any other wise then senslessely be propounded to them in preaching neither if at all they had such a monstrous kind of inward teaching from the spirit as you talk of can they have even that teaching before they have the faculty of understanding for that teaching must be at least after they have a being but they are not in being sooner then the faculty of understanding hath a being in them yea in order of time the sense of hearing it self is not in us before it And howbeit the Axiome be true if rightly taken Nil est in intellectu quod non prius fuerit in sensu the understanding apprehends nothing which some sense or other doth not first some way or other apprehend yer still the faculty of understanding whereby we conceive and the will whereby we receive begin to be in us at least as soon as the senses whereby we outwardly perceive i. e. as we our selves begin to be Thirdly other ridiculous silly stuff that with the rest this section is stufft with is this in that you would seem to make the spirits converting and begetting little children to faith to be some strange miraculous and more marvellous piece of businesse then his converting and begetting faith in grown persons because in infants he uses not that ordinary means whereby he converts men without the outward preaching of the word say you he works faith in little children his manner of working i. e. in little children is miraculous and yet when all comes to all
another that God bidds they may have pardon in case they crie him mercy but very little thank from him for their paines neither is he accounted much lesse accepted as doing the ordinance of God that doth not so much the same things that he ordained otherwise but other things then he hath ordained when the Parliament ordained and gave commission to have Canterburies head cut off those Synodians who also themselves waited to have his kingdome would hardly have counted that ordinance performed had the Trustees cut off his little finger only and let him go Nor would the law little lesse then hang that executioner that having strict charge to hang one man lets him escape and in satisfaction falls a whipping of another the case is yours who being commanded to teach persons and then baptize them and to keep the commands of Christ without spot till his appearing do in his absence let go the making and baptizing disciples and in place thereof only rantize and rantize only little infants too in doing which sith ye do not the thing Christ appoints ye had as good do nothing A certain man had two sonnes and he said to them both go work to day in my vineyard one said flatly he would not but afterwards repented him and went the other said he would yet did not but found himself work of his own to do the first did the will of his father so I say that the Rebellious Ranter repenting and being baptized for else indeed heu quam procul how farre is he from it as now he stands whilst he saies plainly he will have no baptism shall enter into the kingdome of God before the responding Rantizer resolving wilfully to persevere in his error under a pretence of willingnesse to obey the truth and refusing to return when he is convinced of it Rantist But the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã which you so much stand upon signifies though not to sprinkle yet not onely to dip and overwhelm in water but also to wash and so t is rendred in the Lexicons where Lavo abluo are set down as at least the remote signification of it and therefore though sprinkling be not dipping yet t is a kind of washing or wetting and so may be called baptizing as well as that and in aliquo sensu in some sense t is one and the same with that for quae conveniunt in aliquo tertio sunt idem dipping and sprinkling meet both in the word washing whch is a secondary signification of the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and so may well enough both be stiled baptizing Baptist. No such matter Sirs no not by any means in the world For First your Rule of two things being the same that agree in a third holds first onely and properly quoad mensuram in matter of measure as two pieces of cloth that square every way both with one ell are the same i. e. in length breadth c. not necessarily any way else Secondly quoad rem it holds in the things themselves in some case and sense i. e. if the ââ¦ight respect be had to that same third thing in which they agree which third is no other then that which stands the genus in reference to them both as Homo et Brutum agree both in the general name of Animal but this serves not your turn here at all where you are to prove sprinkling and baptizing alias dipping to be all one not in general for so many things may meet in one that are as different as things can be for omnia corpora sunt substantia yea all things are one for omnia sunt entia but in special so that the one is in specie the same with the other but this cannot be said of dipping and sprinkling for though they are both wettings with water yet are they not both baptizings for baptizing is not the genus in respect to them i. e. the generall of which dipping and sprinkling are the special dividing members but baptizing it self or dipping for these two are adequate each to other is the member opposite to sprinkling and and specifically different from it under the general word wetting with water so that still these are not the same so as that sprinkling can possibly be called baptizing Secondly if the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã do signifie to wash any other way then by dipping yet that 's not the direct immediate primary signification of it for that is to dip or plung as you see in the Lexicon but at the best it is but indirectly collaterally by the by improperly and remotely that it so signifies and I ask whether when we try any matter by the signification of the word as ââ¦is in the original we shall go to the direct original prime and proper onto the the occasional remote indirect and improper signification to be tried by your practise it seems is built onely upon the indirect improper remote acceptations of the word and therefore is at best onely an uncouth indirect improper and farre fetcht practise Thirdly ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies washing but it is a real total washing onely such a washing as is by dipping plunging and swilling the subject in water and that signification is yet many miles off from sprinkling ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies Lââ¦vo abluo i. e. to rinse to wash away to clense which things are done onely or at least most effectually immergendo by putting things in water and swilling them therein So that still such a washing as baptism is sprinkling is not and so you are never the nearer for all this Yea Fourthly neither do baptizing and sprinkling meet one another so much as in that third word washing so that they may be both properly predicated by it though in that more general word wetting they do for howbeit baptism is truly called a washing Heb. 10. 22. and your bodies washed in pure water yet ne in aliquo sensu can sprinkling be truely so called unlese it be in insano sensu alias non-sensaliter for in sano sensu it cannot yea I appeal to all men to recollect to their remembrance whether they ever saw any thing truly washt in the way of sprinkling especially whether ever they saw any one wash things so well as they must do who are said Lauare abluere to rinse to clense which are the senses in which ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies to wash in such a sleight way of wetting them as is made by such a sprinkling onely as you use Rantist The Pharises Mat. 7. 4. held the washing of hands cups pots brazen vessels beds and tables and their washings are called baptisms and yee can you conceive they did any more then sprinkle water upon them Baptist. Yea surely Sirs why not they swilled and rinsed and clensed and totally wetted them with water or else I am sure they could never be said properly to baptize but by the spirit whoever uses that word when he speaks of sprinkling they would
certainly be said to Rantize them Besides shew me any that use to wash whether it be hands face dishes spoones trenchers pots cups clothes brazen vessels or beds either when they are by any ishue defiled and I le venter to vent this verdict on such that they are but sluts and slovens if they do but sprinkle them Rantist There may he washings though and dippings too but what needs such a totall dipping as you use what command can you have in all the Word for such a madde manner of administration that surely is more then needs a man may love his house well enough and yet not ride on top on 't and so many persons like the way of dipping and washing in the dispensation we now talk of yea and practise it too and yet judge it needlesse to run persons into rivers and ponds and there plunge them quite over head and ears Baptist. To make good this doctrine of totall dipping against such as dippe onely secundum partem as well as those that in part also do but sprinkle I argue as followes Secondly from the practise of the primitive times wherein it is most evident they were totally baptized or dipped and that they were so appears plainly First by the Scripture formes of speech and expressions used about that matter which import and betoken no lesse viz. 1. if there were no other evidence the very denomination it self of baptized that is given shewes it which in propriety of speech and according to the prime and native signification of the word is as much as totally dipped or wholly overwhelmed and covered with water put under water which they could not possibly in common sense and reason be said properly to be if they were but a little wet about the eye-browes only as those are to whom you dispense handling thââ¦m as if you were affraid too much to wet them surely iâ⦠would not have been said baptized much lesse baptized in Iordan least of all baptized into Iordan as t was said of people had they not been immersi submersi for so baptized is i. e. put into put wholly under the water by Iohn Rantist But if you stand so much on the signification of the word why do you not drown persons when you baptize them for ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies to drown as well as douze or dip Baptist. This interposition is so weak and silly that some may suppose I frame such a simple businesse as this my self on purpose to render the Rantists the more ridiculous but I prosesse as ridiculous as it is it was once put to me by a Countrey Clergy man before a great Auditory of people and was as well laught at by them To which I answer if a little more yet much what to the same tune as I then did viz. besides the signication of the word which justifies our practise of putting under water we have president not only for that but also for the bringing persons up alive again not only for burying them in baptism but for the raââ¦ing them again therein before their bodies are dead neither have we any president that they of old did use to drown them and thereupon we let it alone yea Sirs we leave that Diabolicall dispensation of Drowning the disciples of Christ to the Churches of whom Dr. Featley boasts who at the Rates whereby you reckon us to be Anabaptists are An-Anabaptists whilest they ordered as he saââ¦es p. 68. That such as prophaned their first baptism by a second dipping should rue it by a third immersion as namely at Zeurick where after many disputations between Zwinglius and the Anabaptists the Senate made an act that if any presumed to rebaptize those that were baptised before they should be drowned and at Vienna where many Anabaptists so you call Christs true disciples were so tyed together in chaines that one drew the other after him into the river where they were all suffocated This president we leave to those Ministers and their Churches that list to prosecute according to it as Dr. Featley and not he only whose patience was Praelatical but even Presbyteriall Mr. Baxter also seem to do whilest they incense the Magistrate against us what in them lies meerly for baptizing believers totally according to Christs will as if we were even therefore only the veriest vipers undeâ⦠heaven and charge us downrightly for so Mr. Baxter doth p. 134. as wilful murderers which in conscience can call for no lesse then cutting off by the civil sword which rash charge of us the Lord never charge him with if it be his will to condemnation but only to conviction that he may see and confesse with confusion of face to his consââ¦lation that he hath wronged a people precious to God and more privy to his will in many things then himself But if he or any still list to be contentious for such a baptizing of disciples as that was viz. a drowning of them in the deep waters of affliction and overwhelming of them in the proud billowes of persecution the baptism wherewith Christ himself was and every disciple of his must be baptized let that be the custome of them and their Churches to baptize the Saints so if they will But I assure you we have no such custome nor the Churches of God Rantist Now you talk of dipping and drowning and baptizing by afflictions you put me in mind of one thing which seems to me to make against you in this for the very sufferings of the Saints with Christ as you hint above are stiled a baptism and therefore sure the word baptism may be used to expresse a smaller matter then that totall dipping and drowning which it signifies somtimes for the Saints though they have many sorrowes yet are they not totally drowned nor sââ¦nk under them for Christ both bears them up and brings them out if he should contend for ever their spirits would faile before him and those souls that he hath made and yet these are said to be baptized and also they are said to be baptized with the spirit when yet it s but powred upon them Baptist. Totally drowned no who doubââ¦s of that neither do we totally drown them we dip but bear them up and bring them out and save them from dying as else they would do under the water if they should ly there after a while and this we do in token and resemblance of that salvation which Christ shews to his Saints both under and after some small sufferings for him Neverthelesse the Saints sufferings are not so smal but that they are oft times totally drenched therby and overwhelmed as he that is baptized in water with tribulation temptation scorn ignominy and covered therewith as with a Cloud as we see the Saints complaints in this case Psal. 55. 5. horror hath overwhelmed me Psal. 61. 2. my heart is overwhelmed Psal. 77. 5. I am troubled my spirit is overwhelmd Psal. 102 1. intituled a prayer of the afflicted when he is
These are Dr. Featleys feat feigned and frivolous interjections indeed in Answer to Rs. Argument from the same examples to all which I reply as followes First from particulars universals will not follow is a rule that will not universally follow neither but in some particular cases only For first out of its particulars collââ¦im consideratis considered all together the knowledge and true understanding of the universall doth not onely consist but exist also i. e. appear by all its singulars severally observed Secondly Though there are cases wherein one or some few singulars singled out and considered Sigillatim apart from the rest do not prove all the rest universally so to be as they are as namely when that one or these few particulars are extraordinarily or as I may ââ¦v singularly or choicely so or so e. g. the particular cases of Iohn the Baptist being filled so timely with the holy spirit and of Ieremiahs being seperated for so the spirit meanes by that word sanctifyed Ier. 1. 5. from the womb to be a prophet and of Pauls being seperated from the womb to be an Apostle Gal. 1. 15. these do not prove as you sometimes very simply falsly and fallaciously infer at least from that of Iohn that therefore infants of believers at least are in general filled with the holy spirit and ordinarily sanctifyed in their infancy for it was only the measure of Iohn Baptists gifts say you my Ashsord Antagonists p. 16. that makes his Example extraordinary as if it were ordinarily commonly and generally so that believââ¦rs in fants are filled with the spirit as well as he though not so fully as he was but these are childish consequences and infantish inferences indeed from these singulars for the cases were singular cases and notoriously known not to be incident to all Or else when the matters in such particulars from which we would argue that t is generally or universally so are meerly fortuito accidentally adventitious not necessary per se de essentia natura thereunto then there is no evincing a general by it for it followes not that because one man or a few men are blind and lame or maimed or sick therefore all are so or when a matter is meerly indifferent ad placitum and not ex necessitate praecepti necessary by any positive command of the same thing unto all as well as some then t is silly Syllogizing from some to all as to say some men who were weak did eat herbs therefore all the disciples did and we all must eat no other But again there are cases wherein it followes from one to all as when the matter spoken of that one doth agree to it per se and qua tale then t is true de omni also as one man quâ homo is a reasonable creature Ergo all men are so there are cases also wherein the Example of what particular persons then did do prove what all then did or should have done what all ejusdem capacitatis now should do in like manner as namly when the matter done by those particulars is necessary no other then what by duty they stood bound to that by vertue of a cleer command given out not to them only but to all those that are in the same capacity in common with them but specially when those particulars are recorded for our instruction and to be patterns and examples for us to follow then all ought to be in general as that is and so Paul followed Christ and others ought to follow him be as he was and of this sort is the case here in hand and the examples of the baptism of Christ Jesus and the Eunuch from which we shew how all men if at all ought of right to be baptized for though your Doctor disciples you not denying in the mean while but that baptizing in Rivers is lawful and mark that I pray for it sets our baptizing in rivers out of the reach of all your exceptions who snarle at it though I say he disciples you blindly into a belief that there is another baptism lawful besides that which Christ the Eunuch had and that dipping in rivers is not so necessary to baptism but that they may be accounted baptized who never were dipped after such a manner yet I tell you through whom he being dead yet speaketh that if by Rivers he means as we mean viz. any places where there is so much water as will well serve to dipp persons and some must mean for else it might be but a pond for ought he knew where the Eunuch was dipped for it is called but a certain water in the way and if by that other lawful baptizing then that which is received in Rivers and places of much water he mean no other then rantizing at Fonts or as you have now contracted the businesse at Basons where there is water enough to sprinkle an 100. but not half water enough to baptize one you will find that at last to be so far off from being the same water baptism wherewith Christ and the Eunuch were baptized that it doth not come so neer it as it would do if it were as the Doctor calls it another baptism sith it is not so much as any bapââ¦ism at all for another baptism such as Paedo-baptism would be if men did use it would be some kind of kin to the baptism of Christ they both meeting at least in the name of baptism yet so little that Christ will never own it for his but no baptism and such Paedo-rantism is is not so much as nomine tenus in the bare name of baptism any kin to Christ but that you falsly father it on him as his So that in truth our talk with you about another kind of baptizing then that of Christ and the Eunuch will be but impertinent unlesse you practised another neverthelesse for discourse sake and in resolution to the question as the Doctor states it in reference no question to his own practise viz. whether no other baptizing thââ¦n that which Christ and the Eunuch had is lawful which is as much as to say whether another water baptism may not serve the turn as well or whether Christ hath not more water baptismes then one I answer no there is i. e. ought to be but one baptism Eph. 4. but one water baptisme one kind of baptisme of that one kind that must be the meaning for else there 's more i. e. more kinds of baptisme then one Hebr. 6. 2. i. e. of Water Spirit Sufferings Supposing therefore your Baby-rantism to be that other baptism where note that himself confesses yours for that sure he means to be another baptizing then that Iohn and Philip dispensed supposing it I say to be that other baptism he pleads the lawfulnesse of yet sith Christ ownes but one even that alienation were enough to discard it as unlawful and none of Christs as well as its being none at all for new baptism and no
does he speak and that out of these Scriptures we are upon that we ought thus to be baptized and these things are exactly exemplified to us saith he as if he had the lively Essigies of all that was done to him in his baptism dwelling indelably in his mind as if he had been truly buried and raised visibly in baptism indeed and yet behold I believe I may be so bold as to guesse by what he saies in favour of infants sprinkling and by one thing or other that he was not baptized all this while but meerly a Rantist and none of us in practice though so much for the way of dipping in his discourses Rantist But quorsum haec what mean you by all this quotation of Authors Baptist. Because Damnati lingua vocem habet vim non habet the words and constructions of a condemned man that is prejudged to be a heretick before he is heard are like to sway but little among his Accusers and therefore I rather chose to convince Mr. ââ¦ook and Mr. Blake who deny these Scriptures either to expresse or imply a representation of death burial and resurrection to be held forth in baptism by immersion submersion emersion by the judgments of their own approved orthodox Authors then by my own judging within my self that those words of Paul Act. the 17. 28. viz. as certain of your own poets have said was ad hominem an argument of more weight then an Argument of ten times more weight then it self and that if the joint harmony of Modern Divines holding forth from Rom. 6. Col. 2. a necessity of resemblance of burial and resurrection to be made in baptism by immersion submersion emersion be not considered the never so well grounded Testimony of my single silly self must needs be sleighted Neverthelesse whether you will hear or whether you will forbear I shall leave a word or two upon record whereby either to inlighten you that there is a resemblance of a burial and resurrection necessarily to be held forth in baptism and that no lesse is necessarily implyed at least in these two places Romans 6. and Coloss. 2. or else to leave you without excuse in your disownings of it For First this will appear plainly if it be considered that by the word baptized in the texts is undoubtedly meant the outward rite ceremony sign and form of the administration of baptism Secondly if it be considered that the phrase buried with him and risen with him i. e. Christ doth expressely relate immediately and specially if not onely in those texts to that outward sign it self as that in which taken distinctly from the mistery and inward grace we are said to be buried and risen not onely in signification but in lively representation of the inward and spritual burial and resurrection with Christ and not to the spiritual internal death and resurrection it self as that which is to be understood by those phrases at all muchlesse onely or altogether or abstractively and apart from any outward and bodily burial and resurrection in baptism as Mr. Cook and Mr. Blake seeme too impishly to imagine Thirdly this appears yet further insomuch as there are other phrases in that 6 of the Rom. that do intimate and expresse that spirituall death and resurrection that is signified by the an alogical and representative burial of the body in water and raising it again in baptism viz. dead to sin alive to God newnesse of life c. Here is mention made of the things signified And as for that that is spoken of undâ⦠this expression buried in baptism t is delievered as a medium whereby as a motive whereupon as a reason wherefore as an image and representative wherein we are both to read and remember and also to practise and perform that other for do but mark how shall we saith he that are dead to sinne i. e. should be so live any longer therein know you not that as many of you as were baptized into Christ i. e. into or in token of an interest in him of a onenesse and fellowship with him by faith are baptized into his death i. e. in token of such a communion with the power of his death as kills sin and crucifies the old man So that henceforth we should not serve sin therefore or hence it is saith he that in baptism i. e. the outward ordinance we are buried with him i. e. outwardly visibly bodily in water into death i. e. in token and resemblance of our dying to sin by vertue of his death that we should be ever practically mindful of this that like as Christ rose again after he was dead so we should rise to a new life for if we have bin planted together in the likenesse of his death i. e. signally in outward baptism spiritually and really in the inward work and washing performed by the spirit upon the soul we shall be also in the likenesse of his resurrection i. e. we should be de jure and shall de facto as we believe Fourthly this burial and resurrection that is immediately expressed by the words buried with him in baptism wherein you are also risen with him is made a motive argument and incitement to the spiritual death and resurrection for therefore are we perswaded to die to sin and live righteously because in baptism we are buried in water and raised again in token that we ought so to do and on this condââ¦on are we baptized and buried and raised therein and so interessed into all the other benefits of Christs death remission of sins and salvation viz. that we should die to sin and live holily and to this end also that we may be minded thereby to do so Nos ea conditione in mortem sepeliri in baptismo Scriptura reclamet ut emoriamur ac mortificationem istam exinde meditemer Saith Calvin l. 4. c. 16. S. 16. Now if this death and burial that we are buried with in baptism be to this end to teach us and shew us that and how we must die to sin then the buriall in baptism there spoken of is not the death to sin it self for the motive and things we are moved to are two and so are the sign and thing signified now Fifthly t is not only such as is made a motive to the other therefore is not the other but such a death and resurrection as is performed accomplisht transacted ãâã baptism i. e. in the very time and juncture of our baptizing therefore cannot be meant of our spiritual death and resurection immediatly but oâ⦠that burial and resurrection which the outward man in a figure or resemblance passes through both at in the administration of the ordinance for the spiritual death and resurection is that which though it be signified and resembled in baptism yet it is seldom if ever transacted in a person in that juncture of time wherein he is baptizing but for the most part before or after yea ever either before or after and
chariot any sooner for sprinkling then for dipping of the same stamp is your inference from Mat. 3. 16. Mark 1. 10. from Christs ascending from the water for as Christ was pleased to be baptized with water so he was pleased to go where the water was viz. in the channel where there was a descent and from which there was an ascent so that he must go down to and come up from the water Nay rather your conceit is here confuted for if our blessed Saviour had been plunged of John into the water then it would rather have been said that John cast or plunged Christ into the water and took him out of the water but it is onely implyed that Christ went down to the water and came up again from it Mr. Blake thus to Mr. Blackwood viz. for your criticism of the ascending and descending if you compare Acts 24. 1. 25. 1. also with your places quoted you will see it nothing for your purpose those phrases are used when men go to a place or from a place when they neither ascend upwards neither descend downwards Bishop Usher will furnish you with ten severall Scriptures where the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã in the Acts of the Apostles is used for no descent from a higher place to a lower but onely a removing from place to place though in this place we may believe there was some ascent and descent waters being lower places and when they went to the place of waters the channell in which the waters had their current they may be fitly said to go into the water howsoever one or two examples serve not your purpose but a General concurrence of all examples We have examples giving full evidence of a different practise and nothing can be concluded from those examples Baptist. O the wondrous wayes of wretchednesse if not of wilful wilinesse that the wits of these men work in whereby to wave of the way of God from taking place among them how do they strive to keep it off as ââ¦were at staves end not yielding it an inch lest it should get an ell one brings one kind of furniture wherewith to fight it another another yet altogether are but a bullrush a flag that shewes like sword and Rapier but will scarce hold a push if put to it to the purpose Mr. Blake he fetches furniture from Bishop Usher that saies there are ten Scriptures in the acts where the words ascend and descend expresse no more then removing from one place to another of which if those he alledges be two of the ten or supernumerary it matters not for if there were 10000 it would do him no right and truth no wrong in this place where it is believed by every of the three both himself and his two Colleagues that here was going up and down from higher places to lower therefore he may set that cypher some where else or send it home again to the book whence he had it and where perhaps it was of use for here it stands void and serves for nothing And as for their joint sneaping the words they went down into the water and came out of the water into such a short sense as may serve your own curtaild and cloudy conceptions of the matter and exclude our construction that is most clear and congruous perverting and mincing it thus viz. that they went down to the water i. e. the channel where the water was to which there was a descent and ascended from the water or if it be allowed to be read as t is most properly rendred by the Translators into the water yet the meaning of that word into must be no other then unto I admire how men of such professed piety can convince their consciences to content with such home-spun coverings such greivous glosses pittiful put ofs as they do in this case I profess they might almost as good say that the heard of Swine that Mat. 8. 32. are said to run down into the Sea did but run down to the Sea and no further as to limit these Scriptures that relate the baptism of Christ and of the Eunuch so as to force them to no further signification then this to and unto and from the water as if they went not into it at all Rantist Nay not so neither by your leave for the words that follow which relate that the Swine were choaked in the waters shew plain enough that the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã though we will not allow it the sense of into Mark 1 9. must needs be Englished into here and that the English word into though we allow it to signisie no more then to or unto Acts the 8. verse 38. yet signifyes that the Swine were really not at onely but in the waters for how else could they be choaked there Baptist. How why man t is as possible a creature may be choaked with water powring down his throat yea and a little more possible then t is for any Creature to be said truly not Synechdochically to be baptized by sprinkling or powring water only upon his face and yet t is sure enough that this choaking of the Swine was otherwise then so and no other then by an overwhelming in water forasmuch as it is said they ran down INTO the Lake and were choaked Luke 8. 33. choaked IN the Waters Matth. 8. 32. IN the Sea Mark 5. 13. and yet t is as sure to me who dare not suppose the spirit to speak nonsence as they do in my mind who say that this baptizing Act. 8. 38 39. Matth. 3. 16. Mark 1. 9 10. was though with water also as their choaking was and therefore Dr. Featley will get nothing by pleading for ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã to signify with yet not as truly inthe water also i. e. by an overwhelming therewith forasmuch as t is said Act. 8 38 39. they went down both into the water both Philip and the Eunuch and he baptized Angliââ¦e dippt or overwhelmed or if you will have washed washed him by dipping for as dipping and swilling is a true washing so by washing as ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is Englished by it is meant neither infusing nor sprinkling but that washing onely that is by the way of dipping and I testify to their faces that would fain make a baptizm of rantism that t is more easy to choak then to baptize a man without overwhelming But Mr. Cook foreseeing no doubt what absurdity must needs be committed in granting the words to be read as they be translated viz. they went down into the water and ascended out of the water and yet denying that they were at all in the water and being sensible also surely how it might be noted as a piece of paultry and partiallity to allow the sense of into to the preposition ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã in Acts 8. 38. and yet so deeply to disown and deny that sence of into to the same preposition in Mark 1. 9. as he does he is more wary then
either Mr. Blake or Mr Baxter in that particular and will not by any meanes read it as the other do viz. they went down into the water nor yet as t is in the text they came up out of the water but runs it over more smoothly in a phrase sutable to his own purpose viz. they went down to the water and came up from the water but I hope he'el condescend freely to be corrected for the same fault and with the same rod of reproof with which himself hath corrected others or else his partiallity will so appear as to deny him to have any of that wisdome which is from above Iames 3 the last wherefore as he checks A. R. most sharply for offering to alter and vary from the wisdome of interpreters so as to English the preposition ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã by in which they thought good to English with p. 12 in these words viz. I would demand of you whether you think that our Translators and most or all others who have englished it with knew not how to render the original in its proper signification as well as your self So I must take the boldnesse sith our Translators and most or all others but himself do read Act. 8. 38. thus they went down both into the water and ascended out of the water to demand of him in his own words to A. R. whether he think that our Translators and most or all others who english those passages by into the water knew not how to render the originall in its proper signification as well as himself As for the other two viz. Mr. Blake and Mr. Baxter they foreseeing no doubt it would be no safe handsome acceptable nor advantagious way to take upon them as they saw Mr. Cook did to correct the Translators and mend their constructions they are more wary then Mr. Cook in that particular and so thus incidit in Scillam qui vult c. to decline the Rock of insolence they drop into the gulf of nonsence owning the original to be rightly rendred and reading them according to that rendition viz. into the water and up out of the water yet denying those phrases they descended into the water and came up out of the water to sound out any more then Mr. Cook saies the Greek words do viz. to and from the water But I must intreat those two Parallels in that opinion to consider what imparalleld improprietie it is to expresse no more then going to the water side and comming from it again by these phrases viz. going down into the water and comming out of the water for they imply necessarily a being in the water and not only at it he descended into hell is more then being at the brinks of hell he descended into the lower parts of the Earth is more then bare being on the superficies of the Earth and so he descended into the water is necessarily more then being at the side the situation of the water below in the bottoms will not salve the absurdity of such expression concerning being at the water only and returning for he descended to it and ascended from it is enough for that but to expresse that only by into it and out of it is superfluous and superlative simplicity whatsoever element or place in any element we are said to go down into and come up out of we were once in or else we are fowlly belied had it been said of Philip and the Eunuch they went down both to the water or into the bottoms they descended into the vallies where the water was as Mr. Cook prates by a Periphrasis and when they came up out of the valley or bottom from the water then it had shewed somwhat like the sense these men like best and long to have it in but into the water and out of the water expresse not only a bare being in the bottomes where the water was but in the water also for whatsoever place or element is put after the prepositions into and out of is a place or element that the persons denominated to go into and out of were once really and truly in Daniel was thrown into and taken up out of the Lyons den does not that shew plainly enough that he was in it the Swine ran into the sea were they not then in it I threw it into the fire saies Aaron of the molten image he made and there came out this calf will any say that the mettals he made it of were only warmed at the fire side they went down both into the water both Philip and the Eunuch and came up out of the water Iesus was baptized of Iohn into Iordan Mark 1. 9. and when he was baptized went straitway out of the water Math. 3. 16. can any man say that these two persons Iesus and the Eunuch of whom also Dr. Featley grants that they were baptized in the River were never in it at all but only wetted at the water side But that Philip and the Eunuch went into and were in the water and not unto it and at it only is evident by what I have hinted once already viz. in that it is said they were come unto the water before and therefore this mustneeds be into it or else either the Spirit Tautologized or they tautopoiized and came unto the water twice over but never into it at all Two more odd conceits and emblemes of the emptinesse of their apprehension in this point two a piece I mean in Mr. Cook and Mr. Blake I shall take notice of briefly in their fore-cited shuffles and so passe on to the rest First how peartly doth Mr. Cook squitch up A. R. with a question or two as if he would catechise him in that which he hath yet need to be further chatechisd himself Must they not go down to the water saith he if they would use it would the water come up to them in the Chariot any sooner for sprinkling then for dipping In answer to which question I intreat Mr. Cook to ask his conscience this question whether if they had used the water only for sprinkling there was such necessity of going down to it as he seemes to intimate would not the water have come up to them in the Chariot sooner by far for sprinkling then for dipping yea verily both Philip and the Eunuch might have sat still in the Chariot and commanded water enough for sprinkling to be brought up to them thither in the hollow of the Chariot drivers hand if there were no bigger a vessel to bear it in but for dipping enough could never possibly be brought up into the Chariot at all Secondly he must saies he of Christ go down and come up from the water but here is not the least hint that John doused Christ over head or under water nay rather that conceit of yours saith he to A. R. is here confuted for if our blessed Saviour had been plunged of John into the water then it would rather have been said
the other but what will the men make of all this that because baptism signifies a kind of washing viz. the washing of its own kind or such a washing as dipping plunging or swilling is therefore it signifies all manner of washing a kind of washing it ever did but all kind of washing it never did yet signifie since the world stood a washing by immersion and submersion is the sense out a washing by infusion is not but as for your washing by bare aspersion so far is it from being the true sense of ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that it is no kind of washing at all yea if you will go critically to work as Mr. Blake would have us about ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã between which yet there is no such difference as he imagines and keep close to the signification of the words both your petty powring and your spoil-all sprinkling will be discarded so far from the name of baptizing that they will not be found to meet it half way nor on a true account to amount to so much as the name of washing for that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies originally to dip plunge or overwhelm and therefore consequenly to wash we deny not that being indeed not onely a way but also the most effectual and usual way of washing therefore ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is sometimes promiscuously used with ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã both which originally signifie washing of what kind soever whether that which is by dipping in water or rubbing water upon the subject when they are each applied unto the other but as for ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the one signifies to powre out onely the other to sprinkle onely but neither this nor that alone and abstract from some other concurrent action as rubbing the water on that 's so applied which was never done at any Rantizing that ever I saw doth yet signifie so much as any kind of washing whatsoever therefore though ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is rendred not onely by mergo submergo to dip or plunge over head and ears but also by lavo abluo to wash clense or wash away and very fitly sith baptizing or dipping is really and truly such a washing yet'â⦠ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is rendred effundo to powre out and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã by aspergoâ⦠perfundo irroro to sprinkle or moisten as it were with a small dew but neither of them by lavo abluo nor do they signifie such a thing as to wash nor are they such a thing as washing in any wise so far are they therefore from bearing the name of baptism that you may as well render baptizing by rantizing and say to baptize is to sprinkle which is a thing that all men in the world cannot shew to be so much as a remote sense of the greek word baptize as render rantizing by baptizing that is to say that to sprinkle is to baptize which likewise can never be shewen to be so much as a remote sense of the word Rantize if therefore ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã come not so neer ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã as to be idem with it in tertio to be latind with it into lavo or to be englisht with it so much as by the name of washing which is but a secondary sense of the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã how will you ever reach your rantism into the name of baptism it self whose prime signification is submergo i. e. to overwhelm out of which prime signification that it should be used continually as you say the spirit uses it in Scripture where all along you strain a point to have it englisht washing and never overwhelming at all for pray where shall it be englisht by the term of overwhelming just no where by your good will is a piece of simple slipslop to utter Rantist But Mr. Blake tells you another tale that I believe will make you eat these words you last declared for whereas you talk so much of dippings being the prime signification of ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã what then he p. 2. saies in way of answer to that that there is nothing more ordinary then to have words used out of their prime signification Baptist. Nothing more ordinary then to have words out of their prime signification what a strange extraordinary expression is that I dare undertake to shew him something more ordinary then that and venture to avouch that it is more ordinary to have words used in their prime signification then out of it or else I know not how we should handsomely understand one another in any tongue for howbeit there is now and then a word figuratized besides its proper meaning yet that a secondary borrowed bastard forraign sense should carry words so quite away from their own proper direct prime proxime native signification that we must take them in no sense no not in their genuine sense more ordinarily then in those secondary senses is such a peece of senslesse as will hardly enter into the center of my understanding while I have one yet so do you dote upon the farre fetcht senses of words when they onely though never so untowardly too may be wrested in o serve your turn that nothing is more ordinary among your selves indeed in such a case then to shut out the aptest the amplest acceptions altogether and force the first senses from having to do at all with those words whose own whose plainest whose neerest whose likeliest whose chiefest properest senses they are and on this wise do you deal with the truest sense and signification of this word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã which because it signifies sometimes onely as Mr. Blake observes which is however argumentum ad hoââ¦m though I grant it signifies ever yet onely secondarily to wish therefore if you may have the vote of it it must never sigaifie any thing else and never be interpreted by its prime signification at all it signifies i. e. usually and for the most part and primarily for who can take Mr Blake as meaning otherwise to dip or drown c. and sometimes quoth he out of Scapula to wash but if I should ask Mr. Blake how often he would give it leave throughout the whole new testament to be taken in that sense which his word sometimes annexed to the sense of washing shewes he takes to be the most usual and common sense of ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã viz. to dip plunge or overwhelm I am afraid he will change his note and say it signifies alvvayes to vvash and not allovv the sense of it to dip or plunge so much as sometimes no not yet so much as once throughout the gospel yea I demand of him vvhere he dare give vvay to ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã to be construed in its prime sense i. e. to dip overvvhelm or in vvhat one place he vvill be pleased to let us give it any other then the
piece remarkable or worth recording of it self or in any other respect in the world save for this end onely as it was an expression of the malice that Saul who was afterward converted and called Paul did at that time bear against the truth for surely had there not been that good reason wherefore the laying aside of their clothes had not been worth our notice nor should it ever have been mentioned simply for it self sake but now there was no such weighty end as this nor any end or purpose at all in order to which it was needfull to mention the circumstance of their clothing and unclothing about the administration of baptism it is enough that we have recorded of the thing in the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã viz. that and how and why it was done but it would have been frustraneous and even every way endlesse to have minded us of such impertinent appertenances to baptism as the dressing and undressing of the disciples if any one tell me a story that such and such infants were sprinkled at such places is not that relation sufficient and compleat unlesse he tell me how the infants were drest in their blankets and what a fidling was made by the midwife and the minister about the unpinning and turning up of their face clothes is not the story of Naamans washing himself seven times in Iordan full enough to our use because there is no mention of his putting off and on Christ washt his disciples feet and wiped them it may well be supposed they put off their shoes first and put them on again yet there is no mention of that Mr. Blake thinks that among all the multitudes that were baptized there must have been some words about their unclothings and clothings and specially that there was reason that we should have heard that Paul had dry and warm clothes put on him after his baptism as well as mention of meat given him if he had been baptized by immersion because he had been weak but what crude conceits are all these it was related that he was weak through fasting three daies and that was but proper and answering to the other to tell how after he eat his meat and gathered strength but the other must have come in for ought I see without either sense or reason and sith he stranges that among so many baptized no mention should be made of their preparations viz. the seponing and resuming their garments I wonder what mention he finds of the accommodations that those multitudes had that were circumcised in Ahrahams family in one day and in the City of the Shechemits and those thousands in the wildernesse after the long cessation both before and after circumcision and yet that was such a tedious bloody sore and painfull piece of service as required no question ten times more attendance with clothes and other accomplishments till it was whole then this of baptism even in that so troublesome way to you wherein we dispense it Rantist But pray give me leave a little Now we talk of their Cloaths I remember that no sooner was Christ come out of the water but immediately the spirit drove him into the wilderness the spirit of the Lord caught away Philip and the Eunuch went on his way rejoicing Act. 8. whence I argue thus viz. if they put off their Cloathes they did not stay to put them on but went away naked ãâã they had them on then being as you say dipped over head and ears they must have worn them wet but the first had been unseemly the later prejudiciall to their health Baptist. Well argued Mr. Simpson again as sure as can be you have got his Arguments by root of heart for these also are Mr. Simpsons very words in that letter of his above mentioned Rantist Whose Argument this is it matters not I suppose it is past your answer and here is reason enough in it to disprove Christ and the Eunuchs total dipping as a meer groundlesse and reasonlesse conjecture and crotchââ¦t of your own coining or if you have any thing to say to it I pray let us have it out of hand Baptist. Reason say you it were well if there were so much as common sense in it for my part I suppose it a senselesse fancy but I am sure there is so little truth in the ground of it that its stark rotten at the very rooâ⦠it is a dispute Ex falso suââ¦posit is t is taken by you for granted as necessary when it shall never be yielded to by us for so much as probable that Christ and the Eunuch were baptized either naked or else in the cloathes they ware immediately both before or after either for both Christ comming purposely to be baptized and the Eunuch though not thinking of baptism till Philip met him yet returning homeward from Jerusalem where he had been for some time were undoubtedly accomodated otherwise and with change sutable enough to such a businesse Secondly it supposes that both Christ Philip and the Eunuch posted all so immediately several waies from the water that they staied not so much as to cover themselves with other Cloathes then those they went with into and came up with out of the water whereas as nature it self ââ¦orbids us to believe they went in much more that they went away naked for common sense forbids us to take the word immediately in so strict a sense as to think they departed in such extremity of hast as was no way consistent with the shifting and so fitting of themselves for departure Immediately doth seldome sound forth such a suddennesse as admits of no intertime nor invening action at all yea sometimes it signifies no sooner then some howers some daies some years after according to the nature of the matter asserted in the sentence wherein it hath its use as Matth. 24. 29. nor doth it expresse any other in Mark 1. 13. where it is said Immediately the spirit drave Christ into the Wildernesse then within a while after his baptism as appears not only by Matth. 4. 1. where it is not ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã but ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã which woââ¦d is there per act is praedict is ordinative of another story but specially by Luke 4. 1. where iââ¦s said plainly that he was returned from Iordan before it is said he was led into the wildernesse and had you or Mr. Simpson compared Scripture with Scripture or heeded the harmony of the Evangelists you had saved your selves the labour of all those lines and lost nothing by it but what is worth nothing viz. the Argument it self for as if I should say immediately after the child was sprinkled the Gossips and friends went along with it home it were absurd to understand me so as if I meant that they did not stay so long after as to wipe the childs face and put the face cloathes over it and lap it up again in the loose blanket to keep it warm
then the children of heathens Again who holds or practises such a thing as naked dipping of women and maids not I nor any man breathing under heaven I imagin nor will any wise man be coxcombd into the belief of it that t is our practice I hope because Mr. Ba. disputes against it as ours yet these are the main matters argl'd against well nigh in all those pages yea if he prove the baptism of Christians children at years ordinarily to be against rule t is fully sufficient against the Anabaptists faith he if we had not a word more against them the man feigns adversaries to himself and finds himself work with them and takes on and layes about him like a Thatcher and fights and fences against his foes when he hath none at all about him Secondly much if not more then a third part of it viz. from p. 262. to p. 286. consists almost universally in a particular private publike prate to Mr. Tombs in vindication of himself from Mr. Tombs's valedictory vindication of himself from Mr. Baxs abuses of him which tedious mixt blattering recrimination and red-argumentation if any save Mr. Tombs himself whom it so personally relates to shall trouble himself with from better employment and the world with any more reply to then the Lord rebuke him he hath more time then wisdom profitably to improve it Thirdly much if not much more then a third part of the residue viz. from p. 289. to 338. he spends in division with other divines for pleading and practising baptism to infants from other grounds and principles and to other ends and purposes then himself doth as namely from Tradition and yet in order to baptismal regeneration as Mr Bedford who is fain to fly to tradition for proof of infant baptism and yet holds that baptism doth really as an instrumental efficient cause confer and effect the grace of regeneration of nature on infants which Mr Bedford Dr. Burges Dr. Ward together with Mr. Baxter himself and I know not how many more Divines in the meandrous multitudinous mist of whose pro and con opinions a man may sooner loose himself then find the truth are all ore the tops of the boots in dissentaneous discourses about a businesse called baptismal regeneration the quiddity quantity and commodity of which non ens of which nonsense as to infants is so curiously pryed into and learnedly inquired after by them that it is not for every ordinary body that hath no more learning then Peter and Iohn had who never Scholasticallized the plain Gospel out of the reach of plain men and poor folks as our Rabbies now adaies do to come within a mile or two of their meaning some divining on this wise some on that some one thing some another some that baptism is instituted to work the first grace in infants i. e. habitual but not in men in whom the first grace is prerequired as Mr. Bedford some thwarting that by this reason that baptism cannot have two different uses to men and infants and yet saying with all that it may be for some ends to the Aged for which it is not to infants as Mr. Baxter some saying that baptism is a Physical some a Metaphysical some a Hiperphysical instrument to convey real grace into infants the spirit working it in them thereby naturally or rather supernaturally as Mr. Bedford who holds that it really conveyes grace on all infants elect or non elect and Dr. Burges who yet differs and subdivides from him holding that it conveyes grace on the elect infants only and not on the non-elect some that baptism is onely a moral instrument and the spirit neither a Physical nor Hyperphysical but a moral Agent in baptism signifying and so working on the souls sealing and conveying no real grace but relative grace i. e. right to the real as Mr. Baxter who saith that real true grace and change of mind is to go before baptism as a condition both in the institution and every example of baptism through all the bible therefore not to be conveyed in it this Mr. Baxter proveth by the institution Math. 28. 18. Mark 16. and by the examples of the Iewes Samaritans the Eunuch Paul Lydia the Iaylor the Corinthians who all did gladly receive the word repent and believe and then and thereupon only were baptized p. 300. and because all this is exclusive of infants who have no faith nor grace for to the utter confutation of the Ashford Disputers who say infants in their infancy have faith and the spirit of grace and that apparently enough the Scripture making it plainly appear concerning them Mr. Baxter professeth that it is utterly unknown to any man on earth and unrevealed in the word whether God give infants any inherent spiritual grace or not p 301. Therefore to salve his baptism of infants that have not that grace and faith in them that is prerequired to be in persons to be baptized as a condition he very goodly tells us that by grace and faith being prerequired as a condition he means either in the party or another for him so then though infants have no faith in themselves yet o mirandum they have faith in the loines i. e. in the hearts of their parents and so are to be baptized they are buryed in the dipping of the Ministers hand saith Featley and believe by the faith of their Parents saith Mr. Baxter Thus oh how these men who more stink of the Schooles then skill in the Scriptures are at variance about their own inventions bending their brains some one way some another to botch up their businesse of infant-baptism and yet as fast as one builds up another of them saves us a labour and razes and pulls down to our hands oh what stoch what stuff what stirs what strife what stickling what striking flatly against each others principles what a ditty what a do is here among them as if the Divines were all mad so let all the fraternity of divines be divided o God and fall out ever about their own falsities till they find thy truth and never let them agree better among themselves on what account to baptize infants till they ashamed of themselves and people ashamed of waiting on the Seers for determination of what is truth be all driven to confesse as blessed be thy name Mr. Baxter doth already p. 301. That they find it a hard controversie to prove infant baptism it is so dark in the Scripture much more a hard task to prove different uses of it to men and infants as needs they must if they prove it to be of use to infants for it signifies not at all to them as it does to men and so to conclude to the freeing of themselves from that puzzle and perplexity and fire of contention that now they fry in for their hatred of that one onely plain way of truth that leades to piece that verily t is not thy will that any infant at all should be baptized
to perfection in order whereunto unto this visible church Ephes. 3. 21. which though it exists in many several particular bodies each of which is independent on any other head then Christ and impowered from him to determine all its own affaires ultimately within it self yet since it endeavours to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace is said to be but one body because of one spirit one call one hope one Lord one faith one baptism one God and father of them all who is above all and through all and in them all God hath given officers gifted for its service viz. some Apostles some Prophets some Pastors and teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministery for the edifying of this visible body of Christ till we all come to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fulnesse of ââ¦hrist Eph. 4. 3. 4. 5. 6. 11. 12. 13. As for that Catholique visible church I mean that voluminous body or part of the world commonly called Christ'ndome which was once all as it were of one language and one speech and is now rather three in one or a Triune treader of the truch viz. Papall Prelaticall Presbyterial yet to this day exists in those particular visibles as were never thus seperated and called and constituted upon the foundation of the doctrine of the Apostles but conglomerated by the lump by the Apostle Peters supposed successor into Nationall Provinciall Parochiall to call a spade a spade I can call it no other then the C C Catholique Beast that bears now in three parts a B B Babilonish C C Clergy Rev. 16. 19. i. e. indeed the very C C Catholique whore Rev. 17. As for particular persons though professing to be believers that yet are not baptized and added to some such particular visible society or church but are yet abiding in the capacity only of single though visible Saints till they are both baptizd and added as members to walk in fellowship with some particular assembly and congregation in breaking bread and prayers as every such a one as supposes himself to be a saint ought to be or else his saintship may be much suspected if he will not they are no visible members of the visible church but onely fitter materials then they were before their faith and in a neerer right to be both baptized and admitted to be members then when they had none they are better matter for the visible church but not yet formally of the visible church have jus ad reâ⦠not in re ad ecclesiam not in Ecclesia a right to the church but not actual standing in it till entered and admitted Nor yet are they immediate matter for or in immediate right to membership though believing till baptized but materia remota and ââ¦n ââ¦re quodam conditionali remoto a certain remote matter though neerer then when meerly men and in a conditional and remote right For as believers are the immediate matter for or in immediate right to baptism so baptized believers after laying on of hands in prayer are the immediate subject i. e. in immediate right to be admitted yet neither are baptized believers actuall members till admitted the formality and most immediate entrance and way of becoming a visible member of a particular visible Church and so consequently of the generall visible if I may so call it which hath its existence in all the particular churches which are the immediate matter of which that is made up being not simply the act of baptism but the act of joining our selves after it Act 9. 26. and the constitutive form of a visible Church is not their being all baptized but their free falling into fellowship with each other and though we are said to be all baptized into one body t is an expression of the necessity only of every ones being baptized in order to a being in the visible Church for none hath right to be of the visible body unbaptized but though the baptized have immediate right to be of the body yet are they not meerly of it because baptized till added to it and as one cannot be said to be actually under baptism from an immediate right to it by faith till he have submitted so neither can we be said to be actually in the body from our immediate right to it by baptism till we are admitted Self condemned sinners have a right to believe in Christ believers a right to baptism baptized believers a right to the spirit of promise to have hands laid on with prayer that they may receive it according to the promise Asts 2. Acts 8. Acts 19. such as these to fellowship in the visible Church yet not in fellowship till assaying to join themselves they are accepted and yet in a visible state of salvation too both before baptized as the thief and after baptized before added to the Church visible as the Eunuch who both were seemingly members of the invisible Church and yet then when converted and baptized neither one nor the other as yet actual members of the visible stones though never so unhewn and ragged are remote matter hewn and polished stones immediate and fit matter for a building yet not a building till built together many sheep are fit matter to make a flock yet not formally a flock till they come neer together Christs visible church is Christs flock Gods house Temple building several sheep and single disciples that hear his voice believe in him and are baptized into his name for remission of sins are pecious materials and in potentiâ proximâ thereunto yet be they never so many of them not visibly actually nor formally a flock an house a Temple a Building his visible Church longer then imbodyed into fellowships nor till fitly framed together they are builded an habitation of God through the spirit Ephes. 2. 20. 21. 22. any more then many sheep that never came neer each other are a flock and a multitude of fitted and squared stones lying a long way a sunder each from other make a building Mr. B. shall be no Champion of my choosing to mannage the matter against the non-churchers of these times for all he flourishes his sword so against them at the end of his book if he plead the cause of them so that sit down satisfyed in single fellowship between God and themselves onely living up with him in the spirit contenting themselves to believe onely and renouncing all ordinances forsaking the assembling of themselves together and all fellowship in breaking of bread and prayers if he grant the denomination of the true visible Church to such as these as well as to those that continue stedfast in the Apostles doctrine and in fellowship in breaking bread and prayers yet Mr. B. does not yet agree with me in this that the particular assemblies collectively taken are the only visible Church for indeed he is aware that it overturns all his visibilities from the bottom and layes
of the thing signified and yet that outward service is needful to be performed so though water baptism doth not save us ex opero operaâ⦠and unlesse it be answered wiââ¦h in by the answer of a good conscience yet what consequence is there from hence that it need not be done at all neither doth Peter altogether exclude the patting away the filth of the flesh as not to be practââ¦sed and place the business of baptism wholly in the answer of a good conscience as you here say he doth but rather places the baptism that saves in both these not in either without the other yea in that he saies thus baptism doth also now save us not the putting away the filth of the flesh but the answer of a good conscience he includes the baptism with water as that which is to be done but not to be rested in as available to salvation without the other Ranterist There is no man sent by Christ to baptize so that were I never so willing to be baptized yet there is none to baptize me for though it should be granted which neverthelesse is false and cannot be evinced out of the Scripture that the Apostles were sent to baptize with water yet this doth not waââ¦rant others to do so likewiâ⦠unlesse they can prove that whatsoever was spoken to the Apostles was spoken to them and by this account they must go into all Nations and make them disââ¦iples having first stayed at Ierusalem ââ¦ill they have been ââ¦dued with power from on high for both things are injoined to the Apostles by Christ. Baptist. That the Apostles were not sent to baptize in water in such a sense as Paul sales 1 Cor. 1. Christ sent not him to baptize in i. e. to dispense that ordinance necessarily with their own hands so but that when they had preacht and converted persons to the faith others might help ââ¦o administer it I granted above but that they were not sent to preach the Gospel i. e. the baptsâ⦠of faith and repentance for remession of sââ¦s among all Nations as far as they were capable and that baptism in water was not a part of that Gospel ministration which was committed to ãâã to command all Nations to observe and to see dispensed on all that should be discipled therein this I utterly deââ¦y and the contrary to it is so clearly ââ¦vinced in the word that he that runs may read it for either Christ commandeâ⦠them Mat. 28. to teââ¦ch bapââ¦izing not with the spirit but in water or ãâã Pââ¦ter miserably mistook his commission that in obedience thereto presses 1000 of people at once enquiring what they should do to be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus promising onely that so doing they should not from him sorely ãâã from Christ receive the holy spirit Act. 2. 39. and also concerning a people that were already baptized with the spirit asks who can forbid water why these may not be baptized commanding them who were ready to hear no more then what was commanded him of God to deliver to them Act. 10. 23. to be baptizââ¦d in the name of the Lord and if by the Apostles you mean the eleven onely that were within hearing when Christ spake as t is to him that is not afraid of cold water undoubtedly true that these were so as uââ¦deniable it is that others were sent to baptize in water as well as they viz. Philip that baptized the ãâã and Euââ¦uch Paul that baptized so many of the Corinthians as he did and Ananias that baptized him or else they made and preacht a Gospel of their own heads another Gospel and not Christs which if they did they made more hast then good speed to themselves for such as teach for doctrines of Christ their own traditions and run before they are sent do both worship God in vain and shall neither of them have any thank from him for their labour and that what was spoken to those 11 Apostles themselves as to the point of baptism was spoken also to us even to such in all Nations as being once discipled are after that enabled from God to preach the Gospel is no lesse evident then all the rest Matth. 28. 19. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you among which water baptism was one v. 18. and whereas you say upon this account we must go into all nations and make them disciples who doubts but that t is our duty so to do to the utmost of our power and they could do no more for that 's commanded and baptism too to be observed to the end but for their staying at Ierusalem till they were indued with power from on high and beginning first to preach there that did concern them only as a special circumstance for that time not pertaining to the substance of the service nor required of all the Apostles themselves and administrators of baptism then for if it had Ananias Philip Paul began at the wrong end of their businesse when one of them began to preach the Gospel at Samaria the other at Damascus not going up to Ierusalem first Gal. 1. 17. and if not of them why it should be of us I know not Neverthelesse as to the substance of that command I grant that every one is to tarââ¦y till he be indued more or lesse with power i. e. boldnesse wisdome knowledge utterance resolution self denyall c. before he goes out as Christs Messenger to preach to the nations but being so indued and furnished must out for ought I know among all people as he hath ability and occasion beginning at the place where he is and proceeding to spread the Gospel afar off if he find not woââ¦k enough neerer home Ranterist Could it be proved as it cannot that there are some sent to baptize yet even then will it not follow that I and such as I am ought to be baptized by ââ¦hem for we do not read that any of the Apostles or Apostolike men did ever baptize any but such as are newly converted to the Christian Religion but I and such as I am have from our infancy imbraced the Christian Religion and ãâã ââ¦er now if our Adversaries did rightly infer that because there is neither pââ¦cept noâ⦠example in Scripture for baptizing of infants therefore it is a needlesâ⦠thing in like manner I may as truââ¦y conclude for as much as their is neither precept nor example in Scripture for baptizing such as have been bred up in the Christian Religion and never professeâ⦠any other I and suââ¦h as I am have no need at all to be baptized Baptist. That some are sent to baptize is proved above and sure enough if it be as we see t is Act. 2. 39. 10. 47 48. mens duty to be baptizd or else Christ hath required a service of every man and that sub poena too and yet though never so willing to be baptized left them in no possible capacity to perform
prayer in order to receiving the holy spirit both was in the primitive times and was to be preached to all baptized believers as that which was no lesse then their duty to own and submit to have dispensed to them And as it was so universally taught and preached so was it as universally in those times practised dispensed submitted to ownd and observed in all the churches and among all baptized believers even men and women without exception This is evident out of the four forenamed places viz. in the first of which it is not only expresse that they i. e. all that Jewish Church had been taught this principle among the rest but also that it had been practically owned and observed among them as well as all the rest for as it s said there of all the principles together that these Jewes had need to be taught them again so that they should not now lay them again but go on to perfection which shews that as these principles had been all preacht to them all so all these Jewes or Hebrews did once lay them all as a foundation at their first beginning to be a Church and therfore this of laying on of hands among the rest In the second we read that Paul laid his hands on all the baptized believers that he found at Ephesus being then no more in number then about 12. speaking as it were by way of blame and reproof of those by whom they were baptized that this was not also done by them at their baptism in order to their receiving the holy spirit much more in that they were not so much as informed that there was a holy spirit to be expected by them ver 32. 3. which may serve also as an Argument to them that say as some of the inquirers do that the reproof of the omission of any service doth evince that that service ought to have been performed and as an answer also to the fourth question of the abovenamed enquirers with the ground thereof which is this viz. In the third place we find it most expressely asserted that Peter and Iohn prayed for them that they might receive the holy spirit and laid their hands on them i. e. all those men and women for that 's the only substantive to this pronoun them in that place of whom it s said before that they were baptized in the name of the Lord Iesus which word only they were baptized intimates to us thus much also viz. that though they had submitted so far as to baptism yet they had not practised all that was to be practised by them but that some other service was yet behind which ought to be performed towards them viz. that of laying on of hands In the fourth it s asserted also most plainly that all the three thousand believers that were baptized did gladly receive the word i. e. the word that Peter preacht to them who exhorted them with many other words then those that are there specified viz. repentance and baptism and that they continued in the Apostles doctrine of which word and doctrine if we may judge the word or doctrine of Christ the Apostles to be one and the same laying on of hands was part as well as faith repentance baptism resurrection and judgement Heb. 6. 1. 2. besides if the word and doctrine of Christ that was preacht and practised at Jerusalem was the self same word and doctrine that was after preacht and practised at Samaria then we may safely gather that whatever was preacht and practised by them at Samaria had been preacht and practised by them at Ierusalem before from whence they came immediately to Samaria where its easie to be discerned by any but such as will bend their brains to multiply impertinencies and to make bluries to themselves and others in businesses that are beyond doubt to impartial inquirers that they laid hands praying for them that they might receive the holy spirit on all those believers there that were baptized whether men or women without exception if we may as warrantably understand the men and women that are said to be baptized v. 12. to be the same persons that are said to be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus v. 16. and the same persons that are denoted by that pronoun them v. 14. 15. 16. as I am sure we cannot warrantably because not congruously do otherwise for who else can be meant all along but the very same and not some of them onely but even all the sââ¦me even the men and women that are related above to be baptized for whereas its said ver 12. when they believed they were baptized both men and women and v. 16. that the holy spirit was fallen upon none of them onely they were baptized must not they and them there be taken for all those that are said to be baptized above and so consequently when it is said ver 15. that they prayed for them and ver 17. that they laid their hands on them doth not them denote out the very same Yet this cannot be digested for truth with some of the inquirers for t was asserted as his opinion the rest assenting to it by their silence by one of those with whom we had some discourse at Ely house March 27. 1653. whether the same be the sense of all those that sent him I know not that Peter and Iohn did not with prayer lay hands on all the baptized believers at Samaria but on the men only and not on the women And whereas in proof of the contrary I asserted that the pronoun them in v. 14. 15. 16. 17. doth relate to not the men onely but the men and women even all those that are said to be baptized as the adaequate substantive with which it did agree t was answered by him to this purpose a pretty put off I confesse but nothing to the purpose viz. that the Scripture had expressions both particular indefinite and universal that the word them here as t was not a particular so t was not an universal for then it would have been said all them but an indefinit expression signifying some onely not all whereby he bewrayed his too little acquaintance with one received rule among the Rationallists viz. that an indefinite proposition or expression in a necessary matter is equivalent ever to an universal howbeit my reply to him then was not so but on this wise viz. that if we must take them but indefinitely only for some and not all the persons or things before spoken of unlesse that particle all be added to it then we had consequently no clear command from Matth. 28. 19 20. to baptize all that are discipled and converted to the faith for by the pronoun them that is there used also we must not mean all them but some of them onely in the nations that are discipled because it s not said all them but meerly them but I intreated him from his conscience to tell me whether he did think
that when Christ saies Go teach all nations baptizing them teaching them he meant that they should baptize all them or but some of them only in the nations that were discipled his return was that if there were not other places that did more clearly prove it that Christ commanded that all should be baptized then Matth 28. he could not see it fully commanded there and being desired to assign any place wherein Christ did more universally command baptism then there he directs us to Luke 7. 30. where its said the Pharisees rejected the Counsel of God against themselves in not being baptized whence he gathered that baptism was the Councel and consequently the commandement of God to all men because they are here reproved for rejecting it which if it be a sound Argument to prove baptism to be the command of God to all men because the pharisees in particular for the Pharisees is but a particular expression indigitating one single sort of men among all the rest and not so much as an indefinit much lesse an universal because I say the Pharisees in particular are reproved for refusing to obey it how much better may we collect that both baptism and laying on of hands with prayer for the spirit are commanded by God to all men because we find all those save Simon witnesse his giving them his holy spirit recorded as most highly approved of God that at any time did reject neither but silently submit themselves both Those passages between that my beloved friend and my self I could not conscientiously neglect to set down least I should seem to love any man more then the truth for the sake of which principally and partly for his also and theirs he walks with whom I love in truth as far as they love the truth I write this that he reviewing here his own empty evasions may more evidently discern himself to be mistaken in many things then he may be capable to do in a discourse by word of mouth and that they remembring how they in proof of baptism it self to be Christs command to all believers aââ¦e necessitated to use such cloudy inferences and deductions as those above may excuse us more then many if not most of that party do if in proof of laying on of hands to be the duty of all baptized believers we take the like liberty to our selves in order to their satisfaction to use more clear inferences and deductions then those out of Scripture and out of Heb. 6. 2. it self as t will appear that we do to reason it self rightly acted in comparing of Scripture with Scripture which I for my part refer the enquirers unto as the surââ¦st rule to try the spirits by and to try all inferences or deductions by because the best of men are liable to mistakes and sure enough to fall into them if ceasing to exercise their reason in deducing inferring and gathering one thing out of another they will receive notââ¦ing for truth though otherwise never so plain even to common sense and reason unlesse they find it in so many words in Scripture as t is by us exprest in and this is all that I shall trouble my self to say in reference to the seventh and eighth questions of the late Enquirers with the grounds thereof which are laid down in these words And now further to prove the Minor of the forecited syllogism in some other particulars of it that remain unproved viz. that laying on of hands was not only taught and practised disââ¦enst and submitted to ownd and observed among all baptized believers in the primitive times but all this as by command from God I argue thus viz. Either by command from God or without it But neither without nor against command from God Ergo by it the consequence of the first proposition is most clear for whatever Gospel administration was never commanded by God to be dispensed is practised if practised at all as a tradition of men and without nay against Gods command whose command it is that no man shall presume to teach for doctrines of his the traditions or commandments of men the Minor is as clear that the Apostles did not teach for doctrines of Christ any traditions of their own for as Paul who was one of them that practised laying on of hands saies of himself 1. Cor. 11. 23. that he received from Christ that which he delivered unto the Church at Corinth so may we say on the behalf of all the rest as concerning what doctrines they delivered and dispensations they practised to the Churches for surely as Christ the great and immediate messenger from the father could do nothing of himself was not to do his own will but the will of his father which sent him nor to speak or do any thing but as the father gave him commandement confessing that even his doctrine was not his own but his that sent him so they that were the great and immediate messengers from Christ might speak and do nothing in things pertaining to him but as God by him gave commandements unto them neither were any doctrines they delivered among the Churches their own nor any other then the doctrines of Christ whereupon though as Christs doctrine and commandements aââ¦e called his because he preacht and gave them from God and yet were not his own but the fathers so theirs are called the doctrine and commandements of the Apostles as they had them immediately from him yet are they not their own but the doctrine and comman-of Christ and had they done any thing more then they had order for from him who from him were to give order to the Churches either in the point of laying on of hands or any thing else they would surely have heard harshly from him for it been reproved by the spirit in the word but as to this service of prayer and laying on of hands on all baptized believers in many places he is recorded as approving of them in all they did Moreover that laying on ofââ¦hands was taught and practised not of their own heads but as t is asserted in the argument as a practical part of the Law will and Testament of Christ concerning baptized believers as one of the oracles or holy things of God as one of the very principles of the doctrine of Christ as a part of the foundation or beginning word of Christ as well as baptism or of the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles on which the true visible Church is built as upon a certain basis and from which the whole building growth up an holy temple in the Lord toward perfection an habitation of God through the spirit being first fitly framed together by a joint uniform visible obedience unto that one whole form of doctrine whereof I say this laying on of hands was a part and was practised at their first beginning to be disciples at or about the time of their baptism and before actual fellowship in the
remnant of whose Questions remain yet unanswered here though not so unanswerable as some do deem them I shall adde a word or two more toward the removeal of these two sorts of blinding bushes whereby I fear many may be infatua ted so as to turn aside from the way of truth in this particular and so leave both it and them unto the Lord. First then whereas by word of mouth some tell me That Laying on of hands was a way peculier to that juncture designed of god to the time then being only wherein the Apostles say some and othersome the Lord gave the holy spirit in some visible eminent and extraordinary gifts thereof as tongues prophecy miracles healing c. simply to this end that these might be a sign to confirm it visibly to the eyes of people that the doctrine they taught and practised in the principles and other parts of it was from above and no other then the oracles of God First I grant that in the primitive times there were and that in the way of prayer and laying on of hands given not by the Apostles though for as is shewed above they were not baptizers with the spirit but by the Lord onely whose onely prerogative that is to baptize with the holy spirit sundry gifts as healing c. which may be called extraordinary and rare respectively to these times wherein they have bin seldome or never seen or heard of as I know not that that of tongues now adaies ever was though as to that of healing and that of discerning of spirits and some other manifestations of the spirit given to profit withall as a word of wisdome and a word of knowledge it is within a little of past doubt to some that such as these as the Lord pleases are some lesse some more frequently given now among them that walk in truth though what gifts some have seen and been sensible of in others or themselves t is not so fit to boast of as to be silent Secondly I grant that many of this sort and hapily many more then either are or need to be or shall be given now were given then ââ¦o confirm the New Testament doctrine in the first delivery of it to the world in the room of the old one to be of God of some of which there may be a cessation the end they had such special respect to then being sufficiently accomplished and the word being now committed unto writing Mark 16. 17 18 c. Heb. 2. 3 4. But thirdly that either such gifts of the spirit as these were either the onely or the chief kind of gifts of the spirit that were to be and were expected lookt after or given in that way of prayer and laying on of hands as a service destinated pro tempore only in order to the receiving of such or that these gifts were so extraordinary in respect of the eminency or excellency of them because more visible and ad extra beyond such as may be warrantably by promise expected and are in that way assuredly and ordinarily given at this day these two I see no warrant to subscribe to for as t is most sure that the promise was so far as I find in terminis nor onely nor so oft of these things though I deny not but these were at that time for ends that concern not these times promised too but of the spirit to several other purposes as above the holy spirit the spirit in the fruits and graces and comforts of it the gift of the holy spirit we find it all along almost in no lesse then scores of Scriptures whereof some few are more plain so assuredly the holy spirit in that way of prayer and laying on of hands was given to baptized believers in other gifts then these viz. the graces comforts and fruits of it love joy peace assurance c. In respect of which in case those outward gifts of the spirit should all have failed or shall fail now yet that dispensation is not therefore rendred empty useless and out of date but remaines rather more gloriously useful then as to external gifts of tongues and such like continually even unto the end yea also if we speak of gifts meerly externall and visible as some call them though for my part I judge the spirit is as visible to us and manifested to be in men by the fruits and graces as by those things that are more commonly but not more properly then those called gifts I suppose his senses as well as his reason doth not a little fail him that descerns not not only those most excellent waies of grace as love joy c. 1 Cor. 12. 31. but even the best and most excellent and profitable outward gift of the spirit even that of prophecy or speaking to exhortation edification and comfort for that is the gift of prophecy and the best outward gift that we can covet or compasse given unto baptized believers whom we pray for and lay hands on at this day to whom nature and University Nursery never gave it And if any say we see such a kind of gift as you call prophecy given also to others aswel as such as submit to it That 's nothing to us what God does whose word binds us to such or such a way but not himself we are quaerying what we are required to do by him upon the account of which we may by promise expect the holy spirit not what God does God often anticipates his own promise and is better then his word as Act. 10. 47. he gave the spirit before baptism which is promised onely to baptized believers Act. 2. 39. yet that does neither give us disingagement from Gods outward way nor warrant us to expect the spirit out of it but ingage us so much the more unto it ver 48. If God will give any other men his holy spirit out of that way I am glad sith it pleases himself he is so good to them but as that assures me not that I specially if inlightned about his way yea then assuredly I shall not shall have it so too so sure I am that in his way I shall obtain it and if any have been so highly favoured of god as that he mercifully meets them out of his way that does not exempt them from comming into it but much more oblige them if they had no further need of it as Christ had none of baptism save to fulfill all righteousness even meerly upon that account to meet him the more cheerfully in it for thus it becometh us me thinks as well as it did Christ himself to fulfil all the righteousnes of his law If any say I deny not the dispensation of laying on of hands in its due seasoâ⦠even in this age on baptized believers for the spirit but as they were bid to tarry at Ierusalem till they were indued with power from on high Luke 24 50. Act. 1. 4. that they might have some men
same in kind distinguished onely by the different capacities of membership and ministership eldership messengership to each of which laying on of hands was Antecedent yea these were one and the same kind of imposition of hands used all in order to one and the same end in general viz. receiving the holy spirit or as occasion was more and more of the spirit in a measure answerable to their places diversified onely by the different degrees or stations in the Church to which they were thereby visibly designed but what if there were never so many kinds of laying on of hands is it therefore so impossible to determine as by your query you seem to imagine which among all the rest is meant in such or such a place shall we think the Apostles meant to deliver the mind and doctrine of Christ and that in the very principles or first rudiments of it too which ought to be the plainest in such obstruse dark and aeââ¦igmatical wayes that men should scarcely be capable possibly to know what they meant there 's several sorts of baptism spoken of in the Scripture is it therefore so difficult if men be not willing as some are to puzzle themselves besides the practise of water baptism to know when he speaks of water when of sufferings when of the spirit But to the questionââ¦ith some will needs though needlesly query which of all these layings on of lands the Scripture speaks of is called the foundation principle or beginning doctrine I answer that laying on of hands that t was dispensed with prayer on baptized believers not as yet to be set apart to office mentioned Act. 8. 15. 16. 17. not in order to gifted mens giving it for though you will mistake us do whatwe can and bring us in as confessing it here yet we ever utterly deny that any men were ever so gifted as that they could give it but in order to Gods giving and our receiving the holy spirit from the Lord that laying on of hands I say is it which in Heb. 6. 1. 2. is called a principle a part of that foundation of Christs doctrine on which the visible Church is built In proof of which let this Argument be considered viz. It s none of all the other kinds of laying on of lands mentioned by you thas is meant Heb. 6. 2. therefore it must necessarily be that Most undoubââ¦edly ââ¦s not that mentioned Luke 21. 12. where its said prophetically as concerning the wickeds persecution of the Saints thââ¦y shall lay their hands on you c. which we read of also as fulfilled accordingly and spoken of historically Act. 5. 18. they laid their hands on the Apostles and put them in prison c. Fââ¦rst because that is not simply a laying on of hands but a laying on of violent hands and so it should be ââ¦ead if the word there used were rightly ãâã and translated into its true English out of the Greek for t is not the same but a word of a far different sense from that which is used every where else where this ãâã of imposition of hands is spoken of for one ââ¦ounds forth as much as a violent handling the other a gentle putting or laying our hands upon the persons Secondly as for that violent laying on of hands in way of persecution wherby the saints suffer that 's included in the doctââ¦ine of baptisms immediately foregoing it belonging to one of the three viz. the bitter baptism of sufferings as a branch thereof so that it were but confusion and tautology to expresse that ore again as if t were another doctrine which was but a part of the doctrine going before by another name and such a one too as is never given it in the original viz. of impoiââ¦ion of hands Thirdly whatever doctrine is called a principle or part of the foundation of the doctrine of Christ Heb. 6. 2. the same is called Heb. 5. 12. one of the principles of the oracles or the holy things of God But the laying on of violent hands on the saints in way of persecution is one of the principles of the devils doctrine and a principal part of the very foundation of his kingdome yea one of the most wicked things ââ¦hat the devil does or delivers aâ⦠Christs doctrine to his disciples Nor was it a laying on of hands though such a one was used some times in order to healing the sick or curing the blind that was taught as a principle and practically ownd and laid as a part of the foundation among all the Hebrewes Heb. 5. 12. 6. 1 2. for they were neither all sick surely nor all blind when they past under this dispensation so as to have all need to have hands laid on them all upon such accoââ¦nts as healing or curing Nor was it in order to ordination of them to offices that they might be gifted and sitted by the spirit thereunto for the laying on of hands there spoken of was laid as a principle as a part of the foundation on which the Church stood but the laying on of hands to set apart men to administer either temporal things or spiritual things in the Church is no principle nor beginning thing nor foundation anââ¦cedent to the Church as every foundation must be to the building for the visible Church ever since the first Apostles whose doctrine was the foundââ¦tion to it was antecedent to its officers and not they to it the churches were first collected and constituted upon the foundation or first form of doctrine delivered by the Apostles and then offiââ¦ers were ordained in every Church for the true visible Church may be without officers though not without ordinances but Church officers cannot be chosen nor ordained in it till there be a Church besides this imposition Heb. 6. 2. was learnt owned and laid by the whole body of the Church whom he reproves saying ye might have been teachers but ye had need to be taught again which be the first principles of the oracles of God but they were not all at first surely by laying on of hands ordained to office As to the sixth question of the Enquirers which is also the last that I am to speak to having spoke to the seventh and ãâã above which with the ground thereof runs thus it is grounded upon such a grosse and grievous mistake that I am almost amazed that of the fifteen hands that subscribe to those Questions not one of them did find occasion to subscribe his dissent to this for whereas t is supposed and proposed so publiquely for truth by the Enquirers that Heb. 6. 2. speaks not of any one layiââ¦g on of hands onely but pluââ¦ally as of the doctrine of baptisms its most palpably apparent to such as are not a sleep in their reading of that text that it speaks in the singular number of one laying on of hands alone and not of layings on of hands as it must have been expressed for so you aââ¦e fain to expresse it
world to him and though it hath leave from him to grow besides him and will too among some yet he hopes to loosen it by lending it so much scope that it may come up the more easily by the roots and seeks what he can to kill it by his kindnesse The other viz. thou P P Priest though that thou mayest seem to be totally for the truth and all others to be enemies to it but thy self and thine thou cravest I might say commandest and challengest such a large toleration for what thou callest truth that nothing else must be tolerated besides it yet the truth is the truth as it is in Jesus which is Heresie with thee is lesse beholding to thee then to the other for iâ⦠hath not so much as leave from thee to live if it can nay it can take no root at all at least not thrive above ground if it do where thou livest at the length of thy Lordlines for like Nimrod the mighty hanter before the Lord thou hast built to thy self great B B Babel a Triple Tower a threefold Fort or form of Tyrannical Churchlines wherein thou seatest and securest thy self and whence being jealous least all that comes neer thee under the name of truth should undermine thee thou fightest it afar off Thou art as it were a wild man like Ismael having thy hand against every man and every mans hand against thee dwelling alone as much as thou canst in the midst of thy brethren by thy sword and thy bow by cutting and fleshing and shooting out thy sharp arrowes even bitter words viz. Hereticks Hereticks against all that heed not what thou sayest before thou hearest them these are the rough hands of Esau wherewith thou handlest thy brother Iacob that will obtain the blessing before thee TTThou art the 3 heads of that Eagle spoken of 2 Esdras cap. 11. cap. 12. and wheresoever thou lookest and spreadest thy black wings thou lookest that all other birds should tremble under thee and be subject to thee so that none of old durst so much as chirp against thee no not one creature upon earth but so soon as any began to appear any where within thy range that was not Pullus Aquilae a chicken of thy own brood thou hast rapaciously torn it with thy Talents and made it a prey to thy youngones and whersoever thy wonted principle of persecution for conscience hath taken place and thy gawdy greedy griping Government stood up in full force the truth hath lien groaning and grovling under thee upon the ground Thus verily hath it been not onely for ages and generations within the dominions of the old Bruitish but also more lately under the domination of our BBrittish Priesthood Yea thou O P P Priest hast been such a thicket of thorns to the Lilly that she could never flourish upwards without a thousand scratches from thee such a tall crop of tares as hath overtopt starved and strangled the wheat TTThou knowest not what spirit TTThou art of thou wouldst fain command fire to come down from heaven and consume them as if it were Christs mind that receive not Christ Jesus in the wayes of thy own invention thou judgest them that are without that are none of thy C C Church whom were thy Church the true Church thou should leave to God to judge 1 Cor. 5. 13 if they be but in the same Nations wherein thy Church is and that shrewdly too sometimes when thou canst get the strength and power of states to stand to thee and execute such censure as thou saiest is due to Hereticks and Schismaticks in the Church yet I cannot much blame thee whilst thou clap'st whole common-wealths at once under thee as thy Church which ought as much to be corrected into an observance of the directories and decrees of Synodical power in matters spiritual as of the Senatical in matters civill thy chief way to cure Hereticks when they are in health is to kill them this Paââ¦pharmacon is letting blood thy present remedy against the remedilesse disease of Truth-telling Truth-spreading is Truth treading and present smoothering it from the vulgar by stopping the passage of the press and opening the Pipes in the Pulpit and present tampering with the Truth-teller who if he unsee not what he sees is ââ¦nse recidââ¦ndus to be dispatcht out of the way ne pars sincera trahatur lest sincere ones that seek after truth should find it when it flies abroad and be in-per-fected by it as well as he thou massaciest men to the Masse slayest men into thy service books sââ¦st up thy religion by treason when it can stand no more by reason fightest with fire and sword when thou canst do little by the spirit and word makest thy pen knife keen enough to cut when thy pen is not quick enough to countetfeit thou stopst Stevens mouth with stones and bearest him down with brick-bats that he blasphemes when thou canst not resist the Wisdome and the Spirit by which he speaks like the wolf in the fable thou accuâ⦠the poor innocent lamb of troubling the waters for nothing but drinking at the pure fountain and when the lamb replies my cause is better then thinâ⦠On but quoth the wolf my teeth are better then thine I must devour ãâã Now therefore as to the civil Magistracy throwout all Nations Tongues kââ¦ds and people where thou O proud P P Priesthood ridest them I humbly beg of them in the name of Christ and on behalf of his truth and people which thou haâ⦠suppressed that they would no longer set TTThee up as Lady of Kingdoms as ãâã over Gods heritage as Supream dictators to the whole nations where they live so in all Matters of Religion faith and Gospel as that all people must fal down to thee and worship God only according to thy more dimme and divided then divine directions but that people may go forth from under thy Egyptian prohibition to serve the Lord according to his own will and word which thou hast hid from the vulgar by unknown tongues and forcing thy own constructions on men in nations wherein its mostly truly translated and believe no more at a venture as the P P Priests believe by any law as from the Magistrate whose duty it is not to force men to unity of faith and uniformity in Religion further then they find freedome to fall into such unity among themselves but to force men to live at unity and peace in honesty and innocency in all justice and civility one towards another under what diversity of religion soever may be among them and whilest any Religion puts its people in mind to be subject to principalities and powers to obey Magistrates in civil things for conscience sake and not to resist them in rebellious waies in such cases under pain of resisting the ordinance of God and receiving to themselves damnation according to Rom. 13. 1 2. Titus 3. 1. 1 Pet. 2. 13. 14. 15. to see
suitable to the simplicity and plainess of speech in which the Gospel ought to be declared and discussed nor reasonable to reason in with Russet Rabbies that are otherwise reasonable enough to give you such reasons of their faith and practise as you can never rationally resist nor is it much more profitable to our honest hearted people then if you spake wilde Irish. And when you have done then you smother and cloud over all that was more plainly and punctually answered and uttered to you on truths behalf in some true counterfeit Account or other in many if not most of which waies this Ashford Dââ¦spute as I have already shewed before both was and was designed to be smothered Thus like the fish Caepia when you are like to be catcht with playing too neer the mouth of plain truth you cast a flood of ink behind you and darken all that 's done and like the Lizard making good prints with your feet putting on as fair pretences as may be of willingnesse to try and have all things seen as they are upon the forepart of your work and then dashing all out with your tail and blurring all ore again with with some after and hinder part practises whereby to hinder the truth still from taking place in the spirits of the people As your Fathers have done before you for ages and generations together so do your selves in this point more too not a few Their delight was to hide their counsels and to do their works in the dark that they might say who seeth and who knoweth us Yea the whole Creation of you out of the Chaos of Romes Catholicon have been a very race of Smotherers that have cryed down truth as Heresie Saints as Schismaticks their tendernesse as stubbornnesse their serviceablenesse to Christ as selfishnesse seperation from your superstitions and corrupt communions as Sectarism singularity perseverance in Christs way without turning back to the flesh pots of Aegypt as obstinacy and will fulnesse Church meetings as Conventicles Church Messengers who are Christs true Ministers to the world even to the end of it approving themselves as so as few of you do in much patience in tumults c. reducing men to primitive purenes of faith fellowship worship baptism Supper life as Fools Bedlams Juglers Seducers Seditious Tumultuous deservedly round and rough reprovings of you who are more then any men hardened in your abominations as Elias Iohn Christ and others did them that were like you disgracing tailing reviling the one and onely true baptism as Anabaptism basenesse Enthusiasm Scripture searching by the Laity the onely way of Christs own appointment for all men to come to acquaintance with him by as medling more then needs Scripture opening by the illiterate Weaver Taylor Shoomaker Souldier upon whom the spirit that onely makes a preacher may as soon blow as upon a Schollar a means to multiply errors And thus what you Popish would smother in an unknown tongue you English P Priesthood who deliver it from that would more subtilly smother in a known whilest how far soever men see into the word yet they must see and say nothing or presume to see no farther nor practise any faster than the Priest Yea to shew how little you degenerate from him you even fill up the measure of your Father the Pope that wrath may come upon you all to the utmost whilst in these last breakings forth of light from all that smother wherewith Synodicall constitution hath overcast it even since your own seperation from Rome you damn it all by whole sale for darknesse ye are therefore of your Father Abaddââ¦n and the works of that Father of yours ye do he was a Smotherer from his beginning and neither could abide in nor can yet abide the truth because there is no truth in him he opened the bottomelesse pit and raised up such a smoak of traditions Ceremonies Canons Calumnies lyes nicknames misrepresentations of things to the world as the smoak of a great furnace to the darkning of the sun and the air when he speaks a ly he speaks of his own for he is a lyar and next to the devill the Father of it when he smothers that which should come to light he acts most like himself for he is a Smotherer also and the father of that practise Wherefore also as beloved that curse even darknesse drynesse and smother so it is come unto him and his CCClergy as he delighted not in the blessing of light so it is far from him as he cloathed himself and his with smoak and smother like as with a garment so it is come into his very bowells and like oile into his bones it must be to him as the garment that covereth him and for a girdle wherewith he must be girded this is the Reward of that Adversary from the lord and of all that speak evil with him against the truth Thus God hath lese you in his just severity to wander in by waies and to be lost in the laborinth of your learned Legands till you be all moped and sââ¦red even in the works of your own hands and smothered to blindnesse by your own smoak because when you should have Fathered and Mothered the Gospel so as to have brought it out in its primitive native beauty and brightnesse you CCClergy men have been the generation in all ages of your raign that have murdered and smothered it in the world And instead of Patronizing the truth and its professors and promoters you have belyed blasphemed both by the termes of Heresie Hereticks and worse witnesse Featly specially who from a few feats of some few mad men or rather Monsters of Manster and other place hapily like to our English mad braind Ranters whose rudenesse is in reason no reproach to us sith the way of baptism and Church-membership we walk in which these either never owned or abode not in allowes not but is more at odds with open wickedness then any other waies whatever who I say from some particular pranks of one Iohn of Leyden and his compeares that is no more kin to us then one Ioan of Lin is to the whole CCClergy denominates all the Baptists whom he yoaks together with them under the nick-name Anabaptists an Impure and carnall sect a cruell and bloody sect a prophane and sacrilegious sect a lying and blasphemous sect an illiterate and sottish sect all how truly it agrees to those men of Munster and their Chiââ¦ftan Iohn of Leyden it matters not but I am sure as much as you wipe your mouths and shift it of from your selves to the people of God that walk in the truth of the Gospel yet there 's no generation of men upon earth whom it all laies more claim to then the PPPreisthood of the Nations Forfirst though you stile your selves the Spirituality and holy men of God you are a race of men exceptis excipiendis still setting a side those few even all such whose consciences do not check them of
to doââ¦ineer ovââ¦r the Clergy 1 Pet. 5. 3. ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. we see therefore God calls the flock and not the Sheepheards muchlessâ⦠tââ¦e Sheepsââ¦ers by the name of Clergy but the Pope as if he had projected purposely to betheeve Gods people out of all their priviledges and rights leaves them not so much as their own proper name to be known by but bestows the name of Clergy upon the Creatures of his own creating and leaves them the name of Laicks in its stead tââ¦lling them when they begin ââ¦o charge his CC Clergy with impropriation of preaching and pay to themselves that they are but a Clergy of Laicks see Featleys Epistle but to say the truth excepting some few of his sons of the Episcopal and Presbyterian CClergy that are come from him two wayes viz. by dissent and descent who may be honester and wiser then the rest and yet are not so wiâ⦠as to know their own father the rest are mostly A CCClergy of Lazicks or lazy locustâ⦠In like manner hath heââ¦ingrost other titles to himself and his CCClergy all which the Scripture gives to all Christs people as namely that of Spiritual men as if all the world were but Natural at least but Temporal men besides themââ¦elves thus the Bishops were called Lords Spirituââ¦l and other Lordâ⦠Lords Temporal so thâ⦠of Priests see the book of Common-prayer and of ordination of Priests and Deacons whereas these are titles afforded by the spirit to all the Sââ¦ints of God as well as some 1 Cor. 2. 15. 1 Pet. 2. 9. Rev. 1. 6. 5. 10 yeâ⦠I call them by tââ¦se ââ¦mes because these are now the most common names whereby they are known or ââ¦lso properly I cannot call them by these nor by any other names whereby they commonly call themsââ¦lves I cannot call them the Spiritualty for not one of many of them hath any Spiritualnesse in him I cannot call them Devines for they are rather Humanes if they have their due whilst they teââ¦ch Gods fear after mens precepts and for doctrines the Traditions of men I cannot call them the Tribe of Levi for Levi though he took Tith according to the Law whereof he was the Priest in the loines of Abraham paid Tithes to the person of that high Priââ¦st that we are undââ¦r viz. Melchizedeck or the King of Righteousnesse Christ Iesus but these are so fââ¦r from paying Tithes to Christ that they most grievously gripe his people if they pââ¦y it not to them I cannot call them Ministers i. e. servants of Christ of the Church for they are rather Lords and Masters over his heritage unlesse Servus Servorum and Dominus Dominorum may stand together I cannot call them Pastors or Shepheards till I can own their Parishes for Christs Sheep for if we denominate them by the General temper of their people they profess to stand Pastors too they seem to be Swinheards rather by their peoples wallowing in the mire I cannot call them Presbyters or Elders though some of them be Seniores annis unlesse they were Saniores Animis then they are for they are not yet sound nor Orthodox in either their judgements doctrine or practise so long as they are against the truest baptism and abide unbaptized I cannot call them Preachers of the Gospel for they preach down that Gospel which was at first preached concerning Christs dying for the sins of the whole world I cannot call them Bââ¦shops or Overseers of Christs flock in the spirits sense i. e. in respect of their care to take heed to or feed it but Overseers in another sense rather I may properly stile them for verily Christs flock is so little and low poor and plain mean and base hated and dispised and themselves so lofty and high minded that as not many noble and mighty so few or none of these wise men after the flesh can stoop or look so low as it is and so for the most part they oversee it and lastly if those be the true Clergy and Priests of God that are obedient to his word as the Scripture saies they are the CCClergy need not find fault as they do with the Mar-priests of these times for in very deed the CCClergy PPPriests and Presbiters have been the truest Priest-biters Claw-clergies and Mar-Priests themselves * Rem enim ndig nam esse putent c. saith Calvin Inst. li. 4. c. 11. 5. 15. they deem it a disparagement that they should be made to answer in their own personall causes before any civil Magistrate and suppose both the liberty and dignity of the Church i. e. the Clergy to ly in an exemption from the common seats of judicature and their laws but the Bishops of old who were otherwise strict enough in pleading the priviledges of the Church did judge it no disgrace either to themselves or their function to subject themselves to civill powers * whose work ãâã mostly in reading service in old time till the Gospel came again to be preached in these latter daies * Act. 19. 24. to 39. * who saw some truth in their daies wherein t was twilight but not all that is nowtobe seen for though I reverence the men as I do every man that sees truth as far as iâ⦠shines clearly in his time yet Luther left much truth unseen to himself be hind him and some of Calvins Institutions too are none of Christs * For verily these Starrs for their light of learning as Dr. Featley confesses p. 165. 166. have been the Authors devisers and broachers of Heresies yea peruse saith he if thou please all the antient Heresies listed by Epiphanius Austin Philastrius Alphonsus a castro Ambrosius de Rusconibus and others and therein thou shall find the Ring-seaders great Clerks and accute Sophisters whence is that true observation of Tertullian Philosophi Hereticorum Patriarchae Philosophers have been the great Grandfathers of Hereticks * Nahum 3. thy crowned are as the locusts O King of Assyria Apollyon in the Antitype * Of which chain of succession of Ministry if but one link fail or chance to be lost so that it meets with interruption you confesse all your Ministry lies on the ground too and cannot at any hand be counted valid or raised again and yet if there was not a breach of that line in the link of Pope Joan aliâs Gilberta an English woman born at Lin who was both literally and mystically the Whore of Rome and therefore far I wot from being a true Presbyter or Minister of Christs Church in which women are forbid to usurp authority then my understanding failes me not a little * Who by Austin the Monk dispatcht an Ordination hither with resolution about infants viz. that in case of necessity they might be baptized by which ordination men have ever since bin authorized to ordain here and such as have been ordained to baptize * For the civil Magistracy may reside in women as is also shewed above who though by Pope
ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã may be rendred with as well as in for t is both with and in water that we are baptized when we are baptized as we should be when it stands between ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã so that we may read it as well I baptize you with water as in water yet can it not be very properly read so when it stands between ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and yet so it stands Mat. 3. 6. Mark 1. 5. for though I can bear with him that saies thus viz. Iohn baptized with water yet he that shall say that Iohn baptized with Iordan or with the River Iordââ¦n as if all Iordan was used to every ones baptizing rather then in Iordan and in the River Iordan I shall think that his braines crow out nonsense which is intolerable Whereupon as to the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã all Translators do there English it in and not with and though I can read it with together with them as well as in when the Greek is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã yet by their leave and with non-submission to their judgements as no way sleighting them further then I find them not fallible and saving both the Dr. and Mr. Cooks conceits to the contrary I see no reason sith one of those places is a relation of the same thing with the other but that as Mat. 3. 6. Mat. 5. 1. we must read thus viz. they were baptized of Iohn in the River Iordan so we may without such uncouth utterance of the thing as seems to them to be in it yea and as agreeably to Scripture language as otherwise read Mat 3. 11. Mar. 1. 8. thus viz. I indeed baptize you in water but he shall baptize you in the holy spirit and fire But more then all this yet though the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that is used in those places may without any advantage to you be read with as well as in yet the praeposition ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã which is used Mark 1. 9. where it is said that Christ was baptized of Iohn into Iordan that cannot possibly be rendred with which yet in the intent of the spirit is doubtlesse the same in sense and signification as ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is in the other and more significant to our purpose for howbeit it be rendred in Iordan as ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is elsewhere yet into Iordan were more agreeable to that rendition of it that is usuall in other places but so to read it viz. he was baptized of Iohn into Iordan doth render your sprinkling a plain piece of Nonsence for it cannot be sensibly said he was sprinkled into Iordan therefore you will in no wise give way to that the Doctor indeed leaves A. R. and bids him farewell in that point as if he were affraid to have any noise of it and saies not a word against it but Mr. Cook and Mr Blake who saves himself a labor uses not a joâ⦠more then what Mr. Cook furnishes him with to that purpose do both sternuously stand against the reading of the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Mark 1. 9. by into Mr. Cook p. 14. and Mr Blake p. 4. of their respective returns to A. R. and Mr. Blackwood who both make mention of that passage yet the utmost that both these repugnants bring against it is of no more force then a very feather for all that they say is this that the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã doth often signify in or by and not into as Mat. 2. 23. Mark 4. 13. Mat. 5. 45. Mat 10. 9. 11. 13. 33. he dwelt in Nazareth in Capernaum neither by Ierusalem t. neither possesse mony in your purses in the name of a prophet she hid it in three measures of slour in all which places the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã is Englished in or by Resp. As iâ⦠because this word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã hath other significations besides into but specially the signification in in other places where very common sense and reason shew that it cannot there bear be Englished into but only in therefore it cannot by any meanes bear to be Englished into in this place where it s as good sense save that it shewes sprinkling to be nonsense yea and more suitable to a genuine and candid construction of the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and undoubtedly to the spirits meaning in the place to English it into then to English it in for though he was rantized Anglice sprinkled into Iordan be ridiculous yet he was baptized Anglice dipped into Iordan is as proper to the full as he was baptizââ¦d in Jordan yet they blush not to say for so saies Mr. Cook and there lies the very force of his reason viz. that because ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies in though he knowesi signifies into also therefore it were absurd to render it into here at all Mr. Bââ¦ake also makes this his sole ground whereupon to say that the Scripture is against our Englishing ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã here by into because elsewhere viz. in the places they alledge where the sense will not bear it to be read into ââ¦s rendred all along in or by I cannot but believe that those two gentlemen are Judicious enough to discern their own halting and meer shuffling ãâã this case for if I should argue upon them as to but one of those places where they will have ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã to be Englished in on this wise viz the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã very frequently and most properly signifies into as namely Luke 5. 3. he entered into one of the ships Rom. 11. 24. thou art grafââ¦ed into a good olââ¦ve tree Ephes. 4. 9. He descended into the lower parts of the Earth Mat. 6. 6. Enter into thy Closâ⦠Mat. 6 13. lead us not into temptation Acts 8. 38. they went down both into the water both Philip and thâ⦠Eunuch therefore it is absurd for you to render it in in Mat. 4. 13. and the Scripture is against that interpretation if I say I should urge so upon them and so they argue to us ward they would quickly spye out my nakednesse in that consequence but O how abominable blind are they at home Neverthelesse I tell you plaiââ¦ly that though right is right and to be stood for to a tittle and that if the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Mark 1. 9. were rightly rendred it should be rather into then in yet the service the word in will do us in that place is little lesse then what the word into will do so that we need not stand contending for the sense of into having enough from your own professed sence of in without the other wherefore waving our right in that at present we wââ¦ll freely fall in with you as the sense is in yea we grant that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã signifies in and