Original the Chaldee Paraphrast Junius c. which sheweth that it must be understood of them that are Adulti and not of Infants If Infants be not circumcised it is the Parents fault as may appear in the Example of Moses whom the Lord punished and not the Child for neglecting it 3. Concerning Baptism I do believe it to be a very solemn Ordinance and also very useful in the Church of God yet I do not find that it is the Hand of the Spirit to convey Grace to the Heart of any Infant seeing what it conveys it doth it by Faith and by its Figure representing the Death Burial and Resurrection of Christ and ours with him c. of all which Infants know nothing being sprinkled as I formerly shewed very often when they are fast asleep and if awake they know nothing of the Mystery of Baptism But Mr. F. brought three Scriptures to prove his Doctrine we shall now consider them Ephes 5. 26. Christ loved his Church and gave himself for it that he might sanctify and cleanse it by the washing of Water through the Word I allow Baptismal Water to be here meant but then we see it does not cleanse but by or through the Word nor doth the Word profit unless it be mixed with Faith in them that hear it Heb. 4. 1 2. The Church is purified in obeying the Truth through the Spirit 1 Pet. 1. 22. And Baptism saves us as it is the answer of a good Conscience towards God by the Resurrection of Christ And to this agree his other two Scriptures Tit. 3. 11. 1 Pet. 3. 21. Now Infants being uncapable of being cleansed by Baptism according to the sense of these Scriptures we may in no wise apply them to Infant-Baptism Divis 2. And because it may be most convenient to treat of Regeneration in this place we will here consider Mr. F's Arguments to prove that Infants have Faith and Repentance His first Argument is as followeth Arg. 1. If all even adult Persons are passive in the work of Regeneration then Infants are capable of Regeneration But the Antecedent is true Answ 1. Here we are told that grown Persons are passive that is they do nothing at all in the work of Regeneration this is the meaning of his Antecedent Now if this be true as he says it is then if they do nothing they neither hear the Word nor believe it nor repent nor hate nor turn from Sin for these are at least some of the parts of the work of Regeneration Now I would fain know who is active in all this if the Party regenerate be not St. Paul tells us With the Heart Man believeth unto Righteousness and with the Mouth Confession is made unto Salvation Rom. 10. 10. When Peter shewed the Jews their Sin and preached Christ to them they were pricked to the Heart Now observe they came to hear the Word they gave Audience they gave Credit to it God blessed the Word with Power Now they cry out What shall we do Peter exhort them to repent c. and they gladly receive his word and had the washing of Regeneration the same day Now let God have the Glory of this and all Conversions who is the first Mover in it and the Efficient Cause of it yet he is absurd that will say Man is as passive as an Infant that can neither hear nor receive any Instruction at all And therefore I deny his Antecedent it is not true the Adult are some way active in the work of Conversion yea all that know the work do know what wrestling with Corruption is and how unable they are to overcome in the Conflict with Satan and Flesh without Supernatural Strength or Aid from Heaven but yet They act and wait for help in all their actings 2. Men are commanded to hear that their Souls may live Isa 55. If they hear and obey not they sin against God Rom. 10. 16 17 18. We grant that the Power Converting is not of the Creature We are not sufficient of our selves to think any thing as of our selves All our Faculties are given us of God. It 's our duty to put these Faculties into Act to hear repent and believe is Man's Duty It is not the Duty of Infants to hear repent believe c. therefore they are not regenerated this way What you urge from the Shunamite's Son and Lazarus being both dead and so equally passive as to rise from Death is wholly impertinent and being put into Argument is false for thus you must argue if you say any thing Infants dead are as capable to rise as the Adult being dead Ergo They are as capable of hearing beleiving and repenting as the Adult The Consequence is false many Instances we have of the Adult who hear believe and repent but no Instance of one Infant ever regenerated this way 3. As for your captious Demands about our being quickned c. you may well spare them till you give better Evidence of your own Conversion for your Books do evidently shew that a jeering idle Spirit has dominion in you Howbeit this we say The Original Cause of our Conversion is the Love of God The meritorious Cause is the Blood of Christ The ministerial Cause is the Evidence of Truth or the Word of Truth The efficient Cause is the Power of God's Grace John 1. 12. The formal Cause is believing and obeying the Truth through the Spirit The final Cause is God's Glory and our Salvation to the obtaining of which all our Faculties of Hearing Understanding Will and Affection are given us of God to be put into Act. This is not required of Infants and how they are sanctified by the Spirit God only knoweth 4. But now saith Mr. Firmin I will not have him for my God who cannot most omnipotently make me both will and do what he will. But I reply These are great swelling words of Vanity and nothing to the purpose We dispute not what God can do for he can of a Stone in the Street make a better Man than either of us And we deny not but God hath sometimes and may still if he please convert some by miraculous Operations But to say that all Conversions are miraculous as Mr. F. does is very false Paul was converted miraculously so was not Lydia What I say upon Ephes 1. 19 20. is mistaken by you for I extend it further than to the Resurrection of the Body for I expresly say he has power to do whatsoever he pleases and so to raise us up c. but if I was short or obscure this is my meaning The Faith of Christians is agreeable to the power which God shewed in Christ when he raised him from the dead and I think 1 Pet. 1. 3. doth very well explain Ephes 1. 19 20. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ which according to his abundant Mercy hath begotten us again to a lively Hope by the Resurrection of Christ from the Dead Mr.
THE Infants Advocate AGAINST The cruel Doctrine of those Presbyterians who hold That the greatest part of Dying Infants shall be DAMNED In Answer to a Book of Mr. GILES FIRMIN'S entituled Scripture Warrant c. By THO. GRANTHAM Exod. 32. 32 33. Yet now if thou wilt forgive their Sin and if not blot me I pray thee out of thy Book which thou hast written And the Lord said unto Moses Whosoever hath sinned against me him will I blot out of my Book Matth. 18. 10 11 14. Take heed that ye despise not one of these little Ones for I say unto you that in Heaven their Angels do always behold the Face of my Father which is in Heaven For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which is lost Even so it is not the Will of your Father which is in Heaven that one of these little Ones should perish London Printed by J. D. for the Author 1688. The PREFACE Honest Reader I Could not have thought that a Man reputed wise an old Professor and one who so bears himself upon his Father's Covenant whom he will have to be a Son of Abraham and so himself to be Abraham's Son also could have given such evident Proof of the contrary as by his Book he has brought forth Sure I am I answered his two Questions in much Love and Faithfulness according to my Ability being thereunto desired by some of his Neighbours And I hope no Impartial Reader will censure me to be a Scoffer as Mr. Firmin does But truly I think he was pleased to throw that Dirt that he might have some pretence to give scope to his ill Spirit to exercise it self that way I confess I use these words upon the occasion of his talking so high of his Father's Covenant that it would even make a well Man sick to see what pitiful work he makes of it And here I will give thee an account of it and then judg of me as thou pleasest Saith Mr. F. When I could not tell where to lay hold meaning in his dismal Temptations my Parental Covenant and Infant Baptism was a support to me So that I bless God 1. For Abraham ' s Covenant 2. I bless God that I had Godly Parents 3. I bless God my Parents were no Anabaptists c. Only a word some may think you had Godly Parents mine were not so It may be I had a Godly Grandfather or a Mother Had you so no doubt but you may improve the Covenant from him The second Commandment will help you others may say Baptized I am but my Parents bad enough Well art awake and art in earnest for Christ and the saving Blessings come by him you may improve your Covenant A Woman putting a Question how she might know whether ever she had these Qualifications Mr. F. tells us that whilst he was troubled about making out these Qualifications there comes a Motion into my Mind saith he What say you to your Father's Covenant you know your Parents were Godly will you stand to your Father's Covenant Here my Qualification was the choice of my Father's God who was mine before by an external Covenant But now to have him my God my Portion by an internal Covenant and Efficacy here I was pent up Will you chuse or refuse him c. Now whether this Discourse will not almost make a well Man sick I mean a serious Christian troubled to hear a wise Man talk at this rate And whether he does not lay his Foundation upon his Qualification for by that saith he was the choice of my Father's God. And does he not also set up his Will as high as ever any did in chusing or refusing God to be his God his Portion by internal Covenant and Efficacy Sure he doth Mr. F's great business is to abuse and disgrace me by false and foolish Stories which have been told him by others which I pass by as unworthy observation And then he falls in with the Papists against me in the case of abstaining from or eating Blood justifying himself and them in the latter Tho he confesses the believing Gentiles were forbidden to eat Blood by that Decree Act. 15. 29. And when these Decrees were repealed he cannot tell and whilst he makes us for observing them such as do not believe the Blood of Christ to be our Atonement and that we hold some things to be unclean of themselves he condemns also the Primitive Christians who religiously abstain'd from Blood for several hundred Years after Christ and makes himself wiser than the Apostles for had they known such to be the consequence they would not have made them nor have deliver'd them to be kept as they did Acts 16. 4. We know that that which goes into the Man defiles not and therefore Blood defiles not but acting against God's Word defiled Evah even by eating that which was good for Food and so may Mr. F. defile himself for he says he will eat Blood Puddings S. A. by which he means Sir Anabaptist and indeed a scornful Spirit breaths in many Pages of his late Books He is pleased to throw Dirt upon me very freely about an escape of the Pen or Press I am not sure which and yet he being a Scholar and acquainted with such over-sights could not but discern unless Malice blinded him that it was an oversight The Passage is about the time when Transubstantiation came into the World and the Book which he quarels has it thus How rigidly do they impose the Decrees of the Trent-Councils Where note the word Councils being plural he might easily have supposed Lateran which was wanting for thus it stands in the Catechism of the Papists of which I give notice Pag. 55. The Lateran and Trent Councils and from thence I took the date of Transubstantiation Not but that I have read the same in other Authors But here he brands me with gross Ignorance and I grant I am not so well read as himself if that will please him And my rejoycing is this that in Simplicity and Godly Sincerity I wrote that Book which he despises and I hope God will bless my Endeavours in which I trust I have no other scope but his Glory and the good of all Men heartily desiring that all Truth were restored to its Primitive Purity and Simplicity As to his three first Chapters I shall say little to them at present being very well satisfied with my Answers to his two Questions notwithstanding all that he has said to render them invalid The chief thing which I design in this Reply is to maintain what in me is the Mercy of God to all dying Infants against Mr. F. and others whose cruel Doctrine sends them by Millions to Hellish Torments as appears by this Book of Mr. Firmin's p. 8. If all dying Infants shall be saved there will be Millions in Heaven saith he in whom the Spirit of God had nothing to do in their Salvation I say to maintain the Salvation of
be able to prove them viz. That some Infants have Faith and Repentance seminally and others have Vnbelief and Impenitency seminally And which is another Impossibility no Man can distinguish the Infants one from another Nor can it ever be proved that Seminal Faith and Repentance if yet any Body can tell what it is do give us any ground to baptize any Body For Suppose we take this Seminal Faith and Repentance to be the faculties of Credence and Sorrow Or suppose some take them to be some secret Inspirations of the Spirit yet sith they appear not to us it is as if they were not For that Rule is good in this Case Deâ— non apparentibus non existantibus eidem est ratio It is the profession of Faith and Repentance that qualifies a Person in respect of us for Sacred Baptism the Church is not judg of of Hearts they are only known to God infallibly Division 4. Concerning Original Sin. It would even grieve a Sober Christian to read the strange Immaginations which Men have Published about Original Sin and the Extreams they have run into on the Right Hand and on the Left censuring one another very severely for their differing apprehensions in this Matter And it is remarkable how cruelly Censarious Mr. Firmin is against my self in particular representing me as a Master among the worst sort of Anabaptists who he says denies Original Sin. Concerning which he tells you we are Rotten That the foundation of Anabaptism lies in denying Original Sin. That in this we are given up to more blindness than the Heathens c. To all which I Answer 1. If I be one of the worst of my Brethren in this Point I hope the rest will be better thought of by Men of Moderation for my sake when they have had what violent Mr. Firmin hath not patience to consider what I have published upon the account of Original Sin and that long before I heard there was such a Man in the World as Mr. Firmin in my Christianismus Primitivus Book 2. Pag. 77 78. thus you read me 2. For the better attaining to a powerful conviction of Sin and a sence of Man's wretchedness by reason of Sin it is necessary to understate the general state of Transgression into which Mankind is involved concerning which we find the Scripture gives this Testimony That all have sinned and come short of the Glory of God Rom. 3. 23. And that by one Man Sin entred into the World for that all have sinned And that the whole World lieth in wickedness which is also evident by common Experience every Nation being greatly corrupted through the abounding of Iniquity and the universality of the ways of Sin does evince the same that the Apostle might well say Both Jew and Gentile are all under Sin. 3. The Sin of Mankind is either Original or Actual The first is come upon all even the very Infant-state of Mankind lie under it of whom that saying is true They have not sinned after the similitude of Adam ' s Transgression yet Death reigning over them proves the Transgression of Adam to be upon them This is that Root-Sin called the Sin of the World John 1. 29. whereof none are free Nor is it convenient to extenuate or lessen this Sin either in its nature or the punishment it brings with it it being indeed the Filum certissimum or Leading-Thred to all other Iniquities Mankind being hereby corrupt Ab Origine and wholly deprived of the Glory of God without the intervening Mercy of a Saviour And hence we find David when complaining of his sinful state looks back to his corrupt Original amongst the rest of his Iniquities complaining Psal 51. 5. Behold I was shapen in Iniquity and in Sin did my Mother conceive me Knowing as Job saith None can bring a clean thing out of an unclean one So that they are not to be despised who say that in our Humiliation for Sin we ought to bewail this our Sinful Original which had been to Adam's Posterity like the Sin of Traytors which bringeth with it corruption of Blood to their Off-spring for which they must bear the shame of such Transgressions How do we find that the Sin of Progenitors was wont to be lamented by their Off-spring among the Israelites And is there not the same reason Adam's Children should do the like as being sensible of the evil Consequences thereof We also may say Our Father hath sinned and we have born his Iniquity 4. And hence I like the saying of Irenaeus well which I will give in English because Mr. F. is pleased to lock it up in Latine Omnes enim venit c. Christ came to save all by himself all I say who are born again in God Infants Little ones Boys and Young Men and Old Men But as for his Ideo per omnem venit aetatem I let that alone for I do not find that Christ passed through the age of Old Men yet I say he came to Sanctifie every Age and therefore every Age who do not profane the Blood of Christ by which they were Sanctified as I am sure no Infant doth they shall certainly be Saved by him and hence the Salvation of all dying Infants is apparent enough But how Infants are born again in God is a secret and not to be Demonstrated by Mr. Firmin nor any other Surely had I written as Irenaeus doth he would have said I exclude the Operation of the Holy Ghost for Irenaeus says he came to save all by himself yet as 't is certain that the Holy Spirit is not wanting to the Aged Sinner there is no ground to doubt of his care of poor Infants Division 5. Of Free-Will Concerning Free-Will Mr. F. calls it our Diana and an Imperial Majesty representing us to deny God to be most Blessed because if his Will be resisted he failing of his End is to want a degree of Blessedness c. I Answer 1. Then it seems according to Mr. F. all that God wills to be saved must and therefore shall be Saved and the rest he wills to be Damned and they shall therefore be Damned But how he can reconcile his Doctrines to these Scriptures I cannot tell which saith I live I Will not the death of the Wicked And that this is good in the sight of God c. who will have all Men to be Saved 2. Was it God's Will that when he brought Israel out of Egypt that their Carcases should fall in the Wilderness If it were not then he wanted a degree of Blessedness Was it God's Will that Adam should fall and bring himself and his Posterity into so many Miseries If not God was not most Blessed because he failed of his End. If you say it was God's Will that Adam should fall and that Israel must fall in the Wilderness you had as good tell us that God has Decreed all the evil Actions that Men do and that they must do them else God cannot be most