respect to the whole Essence but only as a Logicall part Neither are teares in Repentance Essentiall to Contrition which is an Act of Displicence in the heart that they should Essentially pertaine to the meanes of Salvation But water is essentially necessary to ordinary Baptism though in extraordinary cases involving Extremum periculum horam Mortis extreame danger and the houre of death the defect of it may be supplied And the Declaration here as it is delivered in high terms so is it Essentiall with respect to the whole Essence of ordinary Baptism Which directed the Chair-divine of Aquine to speak high Si aliqui nunc sanctificarentur D. Tha. part 3. quaest 68. art 1. ad 3. in Utero necesse esset eos baptizari ut per susceptionem Characteris altis membris Christi conformarentur If any should be now sanctified in the womb as Jeremy and John the Baptist and clean'd from Originall sin they should of necessity be Baptized that by the susception of the Character they might be conformed to the other members of Christ this indelible Character having three Offices aptos nos facere ad culium divinum configurare Christo ejúsque Sanctis distinguere ab altis to apt the subject in some measure for Divine Worship to configure us to Christ and his Saints to Christ primarily and secundarily to his Saints under a new consideration and to distinguish the Baptized from the unbaptized even in Hell it selfe We are configur'd to Christ who Heb. 1. 3. is the brightnesse or effulgency of his Fathers Glory and the figure of his substance as the vulgar or as the Greek Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Edit vulgat Text. Graec. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Character of his subsistence or and the expresse Image of his Person as the English The subject of the Character is the Soul secunaùm partem Intellectivam according to the Intellective part in the which part Faith is And in Baptism that which is Sacramentum tamùm the Sacrament only is the corporeall and exteriour Ablution effected under the prescribed forme of words That which is Res tantùm the Thing only is the Justification of the Person Baptized And that which is Res Sacramentum the Thing and the Sacrament is the Character of Baptism And as the fit use of the prescribed words though necessary to ordinary Baptism which therefore may not be administred by one that is dumb is included here in the right use of the water tending to spirituall Birth so the impression of the Character though likewise necessary is here included in the worke of the Spirit Compleat Birth in Baptism supposing the performance of all works necessary to such Birth And all this holds faire with reason it belonging to young Sheep and initiated Servants and Soldiers to be signed with a Character and Christ being our good Shepheard Master Captaine who therefore was not himselfe signed with a created Character And therefore also neither Circumcision nor any Sacrament of the old Law did imprint a Character in the Soule CHAP. XV. I Confirm it secondly This Text agrees not with any Sacred Thing so evenly as with Baptism Let any man go and make a neer search percurrendo per singula examining the singulars in every kinde Let any man travell per enumerationem partium through the numbring of all the choice parts of Divine Worship or of Gods Word and in his return honestly give up his Verdict The child of the Hoop answers out of the Tub That by born of water is meant born of the word because the word is in Scripture oftentimes compar'd with water and that the word meant demeanes it selfe as an Instrumentall cause the Spirit as an Efficient I answer This is the Hocus Pocus of desperate Ignorance and a fugitive course For It is a breaking of all hoopes and bonds and a running hastily without cause from the literall or historicall Sense to a figure in open defiance of the Rule Minimè recurrendum est ad figuras ubinulla cogit Necessitas aut Absurditas We must not run back to figures where we are not compelled by Necessity or Absurdity Yea even against a fundamentall Axiom set in Divinity as a Star in the Firmament for our guidance in the right understanding of Scripture Which Axiom is precedent to the Rule The literall sense as the most obvious and sweetly dropping from the native simplicity and propriety of words as from a moderate Limbeck if it be Usher to no evident absurdity is alwaies the meaning of the Holy Ghost And if it were not The Readers of Scripture would be Vagabonds and never know where to sit down And if in every propulsion of our corrupt wils we might affix new senses we might also commonly deprave the most clear and most flourishing places of Scripture and unbottom them from their proper hold root and inclination The Herbe called Morsus Diaboli Devils-bit the God of Nature hath so deeply rooted that it is not pulled up entire From the root of which grew the name and fable that the Devill bites off the root envying to us the use of it as conducing so much to our health When we violently pluck Scriptures from their native root and letter with which they innocently bear towards us the Devill bites in earnest and ultra fabulaÌ„ beyond a fable And therefore we prove matters of Faith and matters in controversy only from the free-offering of the literall sense And hence the Maxime Theologia Symbolica vel Allegorica non est argumentativa Symbolicall or Allegoricall Divinity is not reducible to Argument For as the Spirituall sense super literalem fundatur cum supponit according D. Tho. p. 1. q. 1. art 10. in corp to the determination of Aquinas is founded upon the literall sense and supposeth it So it supposeth also that the Sense of the foundation is the first and most genuine Sense as being the first considerable and only root and prop of the rest And the same Aquinas Seasus literalis est quem Auctor intendit Idem ibid. The Author of Scripture intends the literall sense And againe treating of the literall sense he addeth Idem ibid. ad primum ex quo solo potest trahi argumeÌ„tum non autem ex his quae secundùm allegorâ—am dicuntur ut dicit Augustinus Out of which only we may draw an affirmative argument but not from the things spoken according to Allegory as St Austin saith Vincentius the Donatist had in a prodigall humour attempted to prove from a dark and mysticall St Aug. ep 4â— contra Vincentium Donatistam place in the Canticles that the Church of God was fled into Africa But St Austin betaking himselfe to the royall Fort here put him to flight with a Sarcasme ipsúmque vincebat Vincentium and conquer'd him that had his name from conquering with a Negative Argument CHAP. XVI THE Amplificator thinking to hoop us up amplifies
he sacrificed his Prayer to God in this humble manner Averte Domine facie â—uam à peccatis meis c. Lord turne away the Face of thy Justice from my sins and from the sins of the People with me And though we have all deserved thine Anger yet in thy Child Jesus spare us by sparing this innocent Babe with us that never sinned against thee and is now received by thine Ordinance into thy Favour Which Prayer being ended the Tempest ended and the Sea became as harmelesse as the Child and as calme as the water wherein the pretty Babe was baptized We grown Persons are like Lampreys we have all some strong string or other of poysonous actuall … ination in us but Babes have not 〈◊〉 therefore Men are exhorted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wax ye or be ye 1 Cor. 14. 20. children in evill or malice especially baptized Babes translated to a new and heavenly condition and in whom is presented a most pleasant part of Musicke even that wherein the falling from a short Discord to a sweet Concord causeth more than ordinary sweetnesse CHAP. VI. THe holy Doctrine of Infant-Baptisme hath been soyl'd much and polluted How may it be reduced and recall'd to its Native Purity The Naturalists have found Albertus lib. de Gemmis by curious Inquisition That if a Pearle which is foule be swallowed into the wombe of a Dove and remaine there some while the Dove will give it againe most pure and Orâ—â—ut So every Doctrine must be tryed and examined in the wombe of the Scripture-Dove the Holy Ghost which wombe is the Word of God proposed and interpreted by the Church of God And if the Doctrine be Pearle-proofe the Holy Ghost will quickly return it as such and free it from spots clouds deformity For the Church may well be subservient to the Scripture and the Scripture auxiliary to the Church in diverso Genere Causae puta Exemplaris instrumentalitèr effectivae Neither do the Logicians eliminate such Circles or Circulations of Arguments nor do such make us giddy Prophetae saith St Hierom appellabantur St Hieron ep ad Paulinum de sacra Scriptura videntes quia videbant cum quem caeteri non videbant The Prophets were called Seâ—rs because they saw Dono Prophetiae by the gift of Prophecy which gave them to foresee and understandingly to declare their foresight their Prediction including Prevision quia praedicebant ex Praevisione in the which they differed from the Sibyls who neither foresaw the things they Prophesied nor perfectly understood their own Declarations Christ whom the common Herd saw not The Prophets and Apostles in their Holy Writings and the Church interpreting them discover Supernaturall Truths to us which we know not by other meanes and their Testimonies are irresistible The Chymists and Alchumists Chymistae Alchymistae are agreed that the most tried way of effecting the strange Transmutations of bodies in Oyles Plants Minerals is to endeavour and urge pressingly by all means the reducing of them to their old Nothing The Scripture-Texts for Infant-Baptism are so substantiall and solid that rather than they shall prove nothing for it they take strange and many shapes every shape shaping a proofe It is a secret of secrets in Sounds That the whole Sound is not in the whole Aire only but also in every minute Part of the Aire otherwise one and the same Sound could not beat upon many eares and come with all the differences of it in such diversities of convenient Distance and Place True it is of the Apostles Their line is gone out thorough all the Earth and their words to the end of Psal 19. 4. the World as the Hebrew or as the Text. Hebr. Sept. Lectio Vulgat Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sensed by the Vulgar In omnem terram exivit sonus corum their sound is gone forth into all the earth and strictly followed by St Paul and the Arabicks Rom. 10. 18. Arab. Alex. Arab. Antioch Interpretes Syr. or as both the Syriack Interpreters Evangelium vel Annuciatio corum Their Gospell or Annunciation is gone forth All these running after the Septuagint in the neere Path of the Sense not with the Hebrew in the Road of the Letter May the Evangelicall sound of the Apostles in this matter reach even to the end of the World and come wholly to every mans and womans eares thorough all the earth The Great Wheele in the Worke after which and impelled by which all others move and the turning of which as the first movable shall be my care is to prove that the words of Christ Except a man be Joh. 3. 5. borne of water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdome of God preach Baptism CHAP. VII SOme of the blockish and more earthy kind seeme to be scrupled and scandalized that I have sometimes reformed a Text in the English Translation of the Bible by retriving it in the Original Which notwithstanding ought to be faithfully done by a faithfull Teacher for many Reasons one whereof I shall here indigitate Because the English Translation is now and then so large profuse redundant and running over and so spreading it selfe beyond the modest limits of the Original that it opens a way and window for an Adversary of Truth which the Originall shutteth up and blocketh against him As here The English Translation gives Except a man be borne c. And the Adversary swallows presently and concludes in haste Therefore if the Text hands forth Baptisme the baptized Person must be a grown man as the word man commonly imports Now can I be a faithfull and equall examiner and Preacher of Gods Word and conceale the discrasie of the Translation and the present Obstruction of Truth knowing that the Originall saith only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Vulgar Text. Graec. Edit vulgat answerably Nisi quis renatus fuerit Except one be borne And that except a Child be not one he is not excluded from Baptisme by the warrant of this Text but affixed to it Here the senselesse Censurer ignorantly retorts upon me that I speake my selfe wiser than all the English Interpreters of the Bible and set them before my Tribunall and above all this that I correct the Word of God when I am indeed Gods Advocate and set my selfe before the Tribunall of all the learned Knowers of the Originall to whom I humbly appeale as Judges and when I only vindicate Gods known Word from grosse errour and misinterpretation and protest against it lest I should partake of it according to the Rule in the Canon Law Error Gratian. D 80. C. error cui non cui non resistitur approbatur We approve the Errour which we do not resist The Black within the White is These blockish and dull-soul'd Censurers know no other Language than Mam-English or their mother Tongue and they would faine have the whole worke of sounding Scripture by the Line and
the comparison by describing in the rebound how the Word agrees and contracts with water As that 1 Water is of a purifying nature and so is the Word 2 Water is weak of it selfe except it be compounded and made comfortable with comfortable Ingredients and so the word is a dead letter and the comfortable Spirit and Life of the Word is the true sense thereof 3 Water hath a cooling and refreshing quality and so the Word I answer All this is true and all superlatively comprehended in Baptism As 1 Baptism is of a most purifying nature 2 Except the water in Baptism act with the spirit it is most weak and brings cold comfort But an argument raised from water here taken for the word in a word is as weak as water 3 Baptism is indued with a most cooling and refreshing quality Had the chiefe Properties of water closed with the word and not with Baptism and been proper to the word quarto modo proper to the word and only to the word the Adversary and the two proper Pages of his black Guard had made a fairer appearance with their Pageantry Thus did the Devils Oracles deliver many sound truths the better under such palliations to disseminate publish their most unsound errors Thus doth a stinke offend us more when concomitant with some weake perfume which it hath pro vehiculo than if it singly sets upon us the perfume procuring for the stink easier admittance into our sense the stinking Perfumer that smels of Italy knows it practically and stinking Perfumers are more offensive Thus poysons are most dangerous and irremediable when joyned in commission with a cordiall that is not able to resist them It serving to conduct them to the heart and being unable to vanquish their malignity This is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to leade Aristoph in Avibus Suidas in voce 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 silly women captive by the admixtion of truth with falshood as the old Fowlers deceiv'd Pigeons by shewing an exoculated Pigeon leaping and dancing in a net And these impious waies of enervating and cutting the sinews of Scripture may soone imbroyle the whole frame of it and overturn all Thus did the Tyrant Mezentius in Virgil binde the quick and the dead together and then throw them into a den leaving the living still imbracing the dead untill death imbraced the living and made the conjunction homogeneall Mortua quâ—netiam jungebat corpora vivis Virgil. Aeneid lib. 8. Componens mantbúsque manus atque oribê° Ora. Excellently Tertullian of Carthage Tert. lib. de Praescriptionibus adversus Haereticos Tantum Veritati obstrepit adulter Sensus quantum Corruptor Stylus An adulterating Sense is as obstreperous to Truth as a corrupting style a false Sense of a true and Divine Text being as mischievous and doing the same work as a profane and ascititious Text. And vel caeco apparet Violentam hanc quasi sidiculis extortam esse explicationem the blinde beggar may see this figurative explication or confession of the Text to be violent and as it were extorted with the Rack CHAP. XVII I Prove secondly that the Text proclaimes Baptism By answering the Arguments marching up in Batalia against this Truth The first is The new Birth is not attributed in Scripture to Baptism I answer This proposition is Antichristian and most odiously false as having the whole toad in it guts and all Baptism is named in scripture Lovacrum Regenerationis the Laver of Regeneration of which afterwards I will here only set in the middle a Text of the Apostolicall Epistle to the Colossians Colos 2. 12. Buried with him in Baptism wherein also you are risen with him through the Faith of the operation of God Buried and risen in Spiritualibus in Spirituall things is nothing else but born againe In the which Buriall and Resurrection Corruptio unius est Generatio alterius The corruption of the old man is the Generation of the new and of the Subjects of sin we are made the Adopted Children of God And the Baptism here exhibited must be Baptismus Fluminis the Baptism of the Flood or water-Baptism which was commonly given with Immersion to represent the Sepulture of Christ answerably to this Text And therefore the Text runs Buried with him And in Sacred Sincerity which in our dealing of sacred things ought to deale most sincerely the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Baptism properly signifieth Immersion though in rigore loquendo Ablution is of the Fssence of our Baptism but the manner of Ablution is accidentary because the Intention of the Law-giver with respect to the thing signified is in the substance ut abluamur that we be washed And in this Baptism whatsoever the Adversary muttereth and champeth betwixt his teeth we are properly Baptized into Christs Death and sufferings Because the virtue of this Baptism is derived from his Death by the which we dy to sin and live to God And what is there in the essentiall Constitution of the new Birth of a reasonable Creature that is in the constitution of a Child by Adoption which is not reasonably discovered in a Baptized Infant etiamsi passivè se gerat Adoption is by habituall Grace which the Infant may receive by Infusion though he cannot cry Abba Father as wanting actuall Gal. 4. 6. Faith Adoption differs from Naturall filiation in this Essentially that Naturall filiation is founded in communicatione naturae viventis in the communication of the Nature of a living Person Christ being called Mat. 16. 16. the Son of the living God quia viventium est generare sibi simile in natura because it is the part of living things to beget their like in Nature Vide Concil Francosordiense circâ— finem But Adoption is the Assumption of an extraneous Person into the place of a Son So may God assume a Child in his free goodnesse Adoptare est quasi optare ut sit quod per naturam non est To Adopt is in a manner to wish that he were a Son by Nature who is not So God may joyne Children closely to him as his Children the wish in the Notation of the Name failing here because it failes of Divine Perfection Adoptio fit per Filium naturalâ—m ubi naturalis Filius est Adoption is made through the naturall Son in whom the Right and Heirship stands where there is one who consentingly yeelds up something of his Right And Children may be Adopted through Christ the Naturall Son and be made partakers of his merits by the Sacrament of Baptism The Sacraments being the Conduit-pipes conveying the Grace of God and Merits of Christ to us The Eagle of the Thomists accords D. Tho. p. 3 q. 62. art â—â—n sine Corporis Unde manifestum est quòd Sacramenta Ecclesiae specialiter habent virtutem ex Passione Christi cujus Virtus quodammodò nobis copulatur per susceptionem Sacramentorum In cujus signum de latere Christi pendentis
cutteth away Carnall Concupiscence as instilling Grace into us by the which we may resist it And as in Circumcision Originall Sin was remitted so also not only in Baptism but even by the Grace of it the same Sin is exauctorated And in this Sense it was Signum typicum Signum Bonorum futurorum in Christo in cujus Mortem Baptizarentur Christiani CHAP. XLIX SHould I give it a kisse of Peace Dr Taylor in his Liberty of Prophesying Sect. 18. That Figures and Types prove nothing unlesse a Commandement go along with them or some expresse to signifie such to be their purpose although it unsalts yea grievously belepers Gregory the Great in a great part of his works I have expressed the Expresse being the Expresse expressed to the Colossians But I cannot give admittance to Idem ibid. all the following â—ardle Circumcision lâ—ft a Character in the flesh which being imprinted upon Infants did it's work to them when they came to age and such a Character was necessary because there was no word added to the signe but Baptism imprints nothing that remains on the Body the Character is on the Soule to which also the word is added which is as much a part of the Sacrament as the Signe it selfe is for both which reasons it is requisite that the Persons Baptized should be capable of Reason that they may be capable both of the Word of the Sacrament and of the Impresse made upon the Spirit Because the Godfathers anciently called Susceptores Undertakers and still Patrini and Compatres oblige themselves to acquaint these their Spirituall Children entring upon the years of Understanding with the ceremoniall Work and reall Effect of Baptism which involve both the Words and the Spirituall Character And the grown Children under the old Law could not understand the direction of the Character in the Flesh without such teaching which is the formall and lively direction the Fleshly Character being no direction without expresse teaching and but a materiall-one with it It was therefore even before the formall Institution of Priests and Levites the Duty of the Parent or Chiefe Person and First-born in the Family to instruct the Child afterwards And as words were not used in Circumcision so neither in any other Sacrament of the old Law because the words in Sacraments have necessary reference to the Word incarnate whom they designe and from whose actuall Passion words being inefficacious of themselves they have that they are effectuall Hence the School-Divines require that the Minister of a Sacrament in the administration of it shall intend to behave himselfe as a Dispenser of the Mysteries of Christ and farther teach that if he shall Baptize without intention or as a Devilish Engin of Contradiction with a positive Intention and resolution against it he will not act as a Dispenser of the Merits of Christ in his Mysteries but attribute strength to words in the manner of Witches and Conjurers which as meerly such are not forcible These Things orderly considered the Reason of the Parity betwixt the Sacraments fails not and the Argument though analogicall is efficacious I understand at last that I doe not make these Batteries against the Doctor 's Judgement but his Policy And again I bleed inwardly with grieving that the Divines in eminent places should betray Spirituall Truth to found the Colossus of a temporall Purpose for this was truly the false and unfriendly betraying of a most invinsible Fort to a most false enemy of Truth As if the mysticall Body and the chained Order of it were subordinate to a Civill Body and it's Order and Chaine And as if Heaven were not rightly placed above Earth and God above Princes I am assured that he found no such lineament in the Exemplar the Life of Christ Yet I hope he will furnish us with Holy Lifes and Prayers enough to redeeme his Errour And perhaps he will write seriously for God of the same Subject as he hath written against him in jest and mockery Fie fie Abeat in Proverbium Let it passe into a Proverbe A Doctor amongst the Anabaptists The Judgement of Agapetus was both ordinatâ— and edificatory as is evidenced by the religious Councill he gave to Justinâ—an the Emperour Caesar … ius Tom â—an Justâ—niano Sceptrum Imperil cùm a Deo susceperis cogitato quibusnam modis placebis et qui id tibi dedit cùmque omnibus Hominibus ab eo sis praelatus prae omnibus eum honorare festâ—na Whereas you have received the Scrpter of the Empire from God thinke by what means you shal please him who gave it unto you and whereas you are set by him before all men hasâ—en to Honour him before all Men and to set God-pleasing above the pleasing of Men. But the mourning Nightingale sitting upon the sharp Thorn in the midst of my Heart sweetly sings to me that the sublime Soul of the royall Clay abhorred this low hellish Atheisticall and most dirty Stratugem CHAP. L. I Confirm the Argument first If the Children of Christian Parents should be thus excluded from Baptism they would be empaled into a narrower and more limited Condition than the Children of the Jewes under the Law the Sacrament of Circumcision opening to these the royall Dore of God's Visible Church and entring them as blessed Partakers of his Promises And so the Sacred and compleat Ordinances of Christ should be most unnaturally Circumcised and Circumscribed which in their Nature Work and End are much more large and ample than those of the Law The Intention of the Ordainer in his Personall Comming Christ the Fountain of Grace now comming visibly and in Person with his Fountain running Wine and Oyl being not to shorten abridge or abolish but to lengthen enlarge and multiply Evangelicall priviledges as appears in the multitude of Persons now accepted to Grace by Generall acceptation and of their extraordinary Graces and the extraordinary Manners of their being given And the fundamentall aim of the divine Ordainer that works in his second works which are his works of Grace agreeably to his first Works which are his Works of Nature and in Whose only power it is to institute a Type because it is in his Power only to annex the Thing Typified being to make plain that the Substance is more effectuall than the Shadow the End more excellent than the meanes and the succeding Antitype than the preceding Type Children therefore may not be Losers but must be Gainers by the comming of Christ and that they may be Gainers must be supported from falling into a Chasâ—â— by an Evangelicall Sacrament He that shall urge here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 polemically Children accordingly Mr Tombs in his Examen should receive the Sacrament of the Eucharist because they were admitted to the Passeover must prove and binde it fast with the nerves and arâ—eires of strong Arguments that Infants were admitted to the Passeover as to the receiving of that Sacrament the manner of Exod.
that respect he hath already sure hold of them And Theodot Job 1. 6. Vide Theophylact in Mat. 12. he who according to Theodotion is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Adversary that lyeth in ambush against us is willing that the Anabaptists should greatly please themselves with a little smattering of Morality and a few beggerly rudiments of pious Profession whil'st they are Soule-poison'd themselves and whil'st they poison the Souls of the People with their impure Arguments which like the inchanted Castles of their Hearts are strong and impregnable only until the Charm be dissolved O the Saviour of Israell Nature in the Naturall Body doth alwaies endeavour to rectify it self And Grace in the Soule rectifies Nature But who shall rectify these out-law'd and strong-will'd people that strongly keep the Fort of their Hearts against Grace Even thou alone who art 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the mighty God CHAP. LXXXVIII THE Results here prefer themselves Whereof the first is This Text thus warded guarded and secur'd with Fortifications of all sorts professing for Baptism the Baptism of Infants is commanded in Scripture The Resultancy is thus brought neer to the Eye Every Proposition is either a Principle principally and properly belonging to some Science I speak of Science in a large Sense from which the Scâ—ence partly floweth and followeth every Science being Virtually contained in it's Principles or is a Conclusion deduced from a Principle Whence every Conclusion is reducible to the Principle from which it was deduced And Sciences are of two Kindes there being some which proceed from Principles known by the naturall Light of our understanding as Arithmetick Geometry and others and some that proceed from Principles known by the Light which a Superiour Science gives to us and these we name Subordinate Sciences As our Science called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Perspectiva proceeds from Principles Vide Alstedâ—i Cursum Philosophicum ultimae Ediâ—ion is in Perspectiva Musica made known by Geometry and Musick from Principles known by Arithmetick Now if the Proposition be a Principle of a Superiour Science it supposeth no other Principle of it's Kinde going before it yet is it big with Inference and the Propositions inferred are Conclusions regulated by it this being one applicatory Sense of the Rule Primum in unequoque Genere est Mensura reliquorum The first in every kinde is a Measure of the rest And every Conclusion supposeth and inferreth unlesse the last Conclusion that is deducible may be â—ound this inferring not but abundantly supposing And of what rank and Order soever the Proposition is which supposeth and inferreth of the very same Order and ranke are the Propositions inferred and supposed If that be a naturall Truth these also be naturall Truths If that be a divine Truth and God's Word these be God's Word and divine Truths Because as that in it selfe expresseth God's Speech so likewise by it selfe it supposeth and inferreth God speaking by these Take now the Text or Proposition here Except one be born of water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdome of God This Proposition supposeth and inferreth What doth it suppose Every Proposition necessarily and immediately supposeth the Proposition whereof it is the immediate Reason the Thing the immediate Reason of the Thing being immediately connexed and such a Reason orderly necessarily and most neerly following the Thing The Thing therefore which this Proposition must of necessity suppose is Go and Baptize all Persons qualified for Baptism yea even Infants offered by the Church it necessarily following as the immediate Reason For except one be born of water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdome of God Or Except ye Baptize all such and they be born of Water and of the Spirit they cannot enter into the Kingdome of God And the immediate Reason hath so severe and sincere a connexion with the Thing that the Thing which even now went before it and was supposed it can now againe infer and bring after it making the Thing omnimodously strong by supporting it on both sides and with both Arms upholding it As thus Except one be born of Water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdome of God Therefore goe and Baptize all Persons qualified for Baptism yea even Infants offered by the Church Finally This Proposition or Conclusion except one be born c. being the Word of God a divine Truth and a Proposition of the Superiour Science which is Scientia Dei Beaâ—orum the Science of God and the Blessed the other Proposition Go and Baptize all Persons qualified for Baptism yea even Infants c. must also be a Proposition of the Superiour Science a divine Truth and the Word of God even upon a double Account and as in the Supposition so in the Inference and must be received by all rationall Persons as of equall waight and worth with the written and expresse Proposition Except one be born c. by the which it is necessarily supposed and from the which it is inferred of necessity And therefore let our Anabaptists never ask more where we finde the Command of Baptizing Infants in the Word of God it being there once and againe within a short space of place And the Truths of Scripture cannot be more cleared by interpretation if we could mingle with our Interpretations the very Beams of the Sun Indeed A Conclusion may proceed ex falsa Hypothesi from a false Supposition But our Conclusion is the Word of God and in a false supposition the Thing supposed is not immediately necessarily naturally supposed but accidentally ad placitum as being far fetch 't neither is the Proposition supposing or before and to which we suppose the immediate Reason of it And the false Supposition may be soone discovered to have crep't and wedg'd it selfe unnaturally into the Order drawn from the Principle and not to belong orderly and naturally to it CHAP. LXXXIX THE second Result is The Baptizing of Infants is necessary tà m necessitate Pracepti quà m necessitate Medii by the necessity of Precept and by the necessity of Meanes That is necessary by the necessity of Precept which is necessary because it is divinely commanded And that is a Command at the least an implicit-one to the breach of which there is annexed an extreme Penaltie as here there is That is necessary by the necessity of Meanes which is appointed by divine appointment as a Meanes of our entring into the Kingdome of God And here Baptism is required as a necessary Condition Qualification or Meanes Except one be born c. the unbaptized being excepted by a contrary exception as unconditioned unqualified and without the Meanes The Reader may perhaps voice it here This is Popery If he doth I reply first I have repeated what I have read in Dr Featly who hath Dr Featly in his Dâ—pper dip't written as I have that Baptism is doubly necessary by these Necessities Secondly I reply
Cothurnos off with thy Buskins or Pantofles that set thee up so high and portly Alasse How long may the deluded World expect untill this proud thunder-jaw'd sower sullen and grim Sir shall be pleased vacare Deo to be vacant for God and bend his Abilities within the Circle of which he sits conceitedly sweltring and swelling against the Presbyterian or Anabaptist against both whom he can sufficiently rail by a good Fire But therin he supposeth Danger and he fears Hunger cold nakednesse and lest being hunger-starved he should be Tenasmo constrictus belly-bound Warm Broth is comfortable and a long Spit turn'd round and round before a good Fire with an oven heating are comely Ornaments in a faire Personage-House of our own These paultry Fears and this ugly disproportion betwixt Profession and Practise in the Clergy have unsainted it in the just opinion of the Anabaptists For my part I cherish no base or low Thoughts of Persons in Authority and I shall be fearfull only to give just Offence When I first imbraced England I discovered in her neither Anabaptista nor Presbyterians and therefore be it known to Heaven and Earth that I will not own either of them Now this Answerer Epicuri de Grege considers me as one against whom he may plausibly rave and raile and when he does bepope me and bedash me with the Sink-Dirt of Rome then he knows he sits in the midst of two Cradles and Cradlerocks the Presbyterian Anabaptist sings a merry song to them makes them laugh and reach over him and hugg one the other Abi Lutun◠Other Answerers like to the last here I hear of But the Night-Noddy Ranter the bezling bestiall and effeminate Person the Person that withers beyond a Name and is enslaved to the manifold windings and turnings of dissembling lying coosenage are beneath my Pen when they are beneath and under al worth CHAP. LXXXXVII A Paumphlet it is lawful to enterpose a Letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for good sound sake came lately to my Hands written against me by William Hartly a squintey'd-profession'd and Linsy-Wolsy-Brother of Stony-Stratford containing mingled Stuff and yoking the Ox and the Asse together The Author being more able to walke under a Pack of Holland and Scotch-Cloth or caricas clamitare to cry rotten Figs about the streets than to write sound Books The Naturalists observe that Weckerus in Secretis poison being in its naturall and proper place carries alwaies it's Antidote along with it If any sound Man be desirous to unbend his Bow and be merry let him view the Book-Poison of William Hartly otherwise call'd Infant Baptism none A Christs and the Non-sense Non-English and abundant folly it bears about it will abundantly answer it If the Votaries of his own Sect set a price upon it the Famine of Samaria See 2 Kin. 6. 25. is come upon them they so dearly prizing the Head of an Asse His Reader shall finde high good and unctions Words lest the Speech should be Sermo Redestris foot-language but those importunely misapplied and daub'd on I fear the Author hath gone amongst the Beggars as a Spy to the Door of some plunder'd Minister who having naught else to give gives good Words to the Beggers He is much taken though mistaken with the word Calculated it stands in the Front it comes in the Rere either because he lives in a Stony Place or because he lives by a stony Heart or because he is often troubled w th extraordinary fits of the Stone for such may be the Kidney of the Saint or because he accounts himselfe one of Account or because he hath taken it up and redeem'd it from the superstitiously-red letters in the painted porch of an Almanack He uses a word or two of Latine but falsly below the Schooll-Boy and timorously and as it were stammeringly and as if he would Cant or deliver Pedlers French under his Hand His Matter and the poor forbid creeping and crawling Spirit of it is the meer some scum froth of one in a deep Fit of the Falling Sicknesse Thus weak feeble and Epilepticall Brains will needs be opening their Packs and shewing themselves as it hapned also in the late Astrologicall Concertation at Newport betwixt the Star-travelling Physitian Mr Culpepper and a venturous Apothecary that in the mean time staies below and cures both Men and Beasts who would seem fairer and more able in the concealement and with an Irish blanket over them than they doe in the Show He defiles the Names of three Ministers as his use is in his Paumphlets whom the Ditch Frog impudently cals his Antagonists as he doth me and having no good Thing worthy of humane observation in himselfe he desires to make himselfe known to others by lackying after us The Gentlemen I know not Yet I beleeve there is worth in them because they are molested by so prodigious a Rhapsody of Unworthynesse and haunted by such a Will of the Wisp He is a cruell-thoughted and exenterated Person For being unable to quell and suppresse the mounting Flames of their Discourses and Reasons he would entangle them wrongfully in some Hook or Wire of State-Offence as if his pretended Christian Freedome were nothing but an extended Net Snare or Gin unchristianly to slave us The like false-dealing I have observed with griefe of Heart in Mr Tombs against Mr Baxter Which uncharitable and exitial Kinde of Heart-burning or Heartlying I never found but amongst the very Garbish and Off all of People utterly nescient of true Religion He rails against an old raggedbehaviourd Minister of Stony-Stratford and by objecting him as if he had the sleight of slaying many with the Jaw-bone of an Asse rejects the whole Militia of divinely-call'd Clergy-Men therein objecting Judas against the Apostles and behaving himselfe like the hungry Sow in Franzius that brake into a garden Franzius in Sue and carelessely passed by the Lillies Roses Violets and other gay Flowers and all the sweet Herbs and made great hast to a little dark place under the Hedge where the Gardners man a lusty Knave had laid his last load of Excrements and there she put her bold nose and unclean Mouth greedily to what she found If Ministers would stoop to be advised by me they should let this arid naked and empty Scull or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 alone and not answer him according to his Foolishnesse or mark every Puddle-Bubble of his Brain and Tayl-wagging of his noisom Pen but only stand patiently by him until he and some of his private Complices break and shatter into pieces and then they may hear publikely of him I will not say of his dark and fetid Nightworks When the Italian had lost out of his Memory many great sins committed the past year and Easter was now approaching which enjoyned him to Confession he anger'd his Wife and she quickly disgorg'd and vomited all up that he had done many a day Let Ministers bung up their Mouths and wait a
to beleeve there is an Element of Fire in the uppermost parts of the Air. So when the holy Spirit of God works upon our moist flesh and hard Hearts there is much strugling for a while the aim of the Spirit is that the Soul now iâ—flamed may be drawn upwards and set above the Body When therefore by the puissant strength of God's holy Spirit it is crowned with Victory and enthroned upon the Body it neglects the Body 〈◊〉 now tending to Consumption and Ashes and turns the point of it's Spirit altogether towards Heaven as waiting for a blessed Change and Separation O most Unchangeable God worke this Work of Charge upon the Hearts of the Anabaptists that they being Conquer'd by thy Spirit their Spirits may look upwards and ascend to thee in the bright flames of perfect Charity Gideon gave to his Souldiers Iudg. 7. Trumpets Pitchers and Lamps within the Pitchers who when they came to the Camp of their Enemies blew the Trumpets brake the Pitchers and held the Lamps in their Hands If we professe for Christ as they professed for Gideon by the blowing of their Trumpets and if when we come to the whole Camp of our Enemies after that our Pitcher-Bodies are broken by death our Lamps our Souls appeare burning with true Charity Faith being evacuated we shall goe Conquerours Men are diseased in their Bodies and they presently send in all hast for the most expert Physitian Men are disquieted in the Possession of their Goods and themselves presently run in all hast to the most cunning Lawyers Men are troubled and toâ—n in their Souls and their Consciences are discomposed and no Man runs or sends that unerring Science may be brought and applyed to Conscience and the true Seal of God to the Soul Therefore Men love their Bodies and Goods more than their Souls and God There are two sorts of People amongst us that are deafe to Goodnesse and almost irrecoverably and implacably wicked A kinde of scatter-brain'd phreneticall scandalousliv'd sulphureous and plainly Gunpowder-Papist and a mad ranting Atheist that questions the being of God of the Angels of the Soul of Heaven of Hell and indeed questions all the Articles of all the first Creeds the Apostolicall Creed the Nicen Creed St Athanasius his Creed and the Creed of Constantinople to whom we may reduce as their Sisters and Consorts those Bubbles of the feminine sort that spend their daies in jollity and wantonnesse and repent in Sack and not in Sackcloth These two sorts often revoke Alexander Crinitus l. de … sta Disciplina into my minde who commanded that the two notorious Rogues which infested his People should whip and scourge one the other out of his Dominions ut alter alterum fugeret alter fugaret alterum to the end the one might fly from the other and the other put this one to flight and so he and his People might in a good hour be rid of them both Yea These the women being added renew in my memory him in the Comedy that had three bad Ignoramus Dulman Wives of the which he said Duas Cacodaemoni darem â—â lege ut abriperet tertiam I would give two to the Devill on condition that he would come and fetch away the third But I will not be so merry in a Tragicall Businesse nor so vainly witty in Earnest Yet I earnestly and in earnest desire of God the removall of the Devil 's sworn Instruments even by Justice if they have sinn'd away all Mercy No Man pities the Devill as no Man pities a wounded Dragon though he grones And Serpens saith Albertus cùm Serpentem devorat Albertus Magnus sit Draco As the young Serpent devouring an old Serpent becomes a Dragon so the old Serpent devouring a young Serpent grows into a Dragon also Now I return to you O Anabaptists May the Spirit of Truth enter into your Hearts Be it unto your Souls as I wish to my own Remember that the most excellent Signes of our Predestination are If we are joined in Spirit-Communion with the People of God If we have the Bowels and Works of Charity Mercy Clemency If no sin rules and commands in us If there shine in our Lives many remarkeable extraordinary and heroicall Acts of Vertue If we are purged and purified by Afflictions and rejoyce in them If we be resigned to the will of God in his Word and it be not in our desires to pull him out of his wâ—rd after our wils the Contraries whereof if not contraried by us are the Signes of our Reprobation If ye censure me to have thinned my Ink with the spirit of wormwood I pray you let me be excused Because the Fathers and holy Writers St Cyprian St Hierom Russinus St Austin St Athanasius St Chrysostome St Gregory Nazianzen St Hilary St Prosper Optatus Milevitanus St Bernard Salvianus and others though otherwise meek-carriaged have taught me by their Examples to be fervorous vehement and high-strained in the Defence of God's Truth be it Veritas Doctrinae aut Veritas Vitae Truth of Doctrine or Truth of Life against obstinate Hereticks and Sinners The Grace of Conversion be with you all CHAP. CVII THE fifth Inference is Let this Defence of Infant-Baptism as God's Instrument hammer us into stedfastnesse of Faith And God said saith Moses Let there Gen. 1. 6 be a Firmament in the midst of the waters The Hebrew Word signifying Text. Hebr. Firmament is Rachiagh the Root of which being Raka as St Hierom S. Hieron in qq Hâ—braicis witnesseth is in strict Sense Expandere distendere distendendo Firmâ—re to stretch out and to firm and consolidate in expansion a Thing which was sluid and rare as the Matter of the Heavens was these being made of water Oleaster Cajetanus and Pagninus Oleast Câ— jet Pâ—gâ— iv Genesin Understand an expansion or extension instar extension is quae sit in laminâ Malleorum ictibus diductâ atque expansâ like the extension caused in a Plate beaten with Iron Hammers Ye must be beaten into solidity and stabiliment and a very Fâ—â—mament in the midst of these troubled and moving waters the Firmament being called also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the Septuagint Sept. by the Latins Firmamentum quia firmatur because it is made firm and solid and firms other Things adjoyning to it The Negroes that are Divers for Pearls in the West-Indies and walk under Water feel no waight or Burden because Grave non gravidat in suo Centro Heavy is not Heavy in it's proper and Originall place The Sea-Waters take their tumultuous Courses and rebound above and about them whilest they seek in the bottom earnestly for Jewels O thou pious Heart notwithstanding all the disorderly motions of Heresy round and round and round about thee do thou earnestly gather in the bottom the Spirit-Jewels of God's holy Truth In the beginning of the Creation Gen. 1. 2. the Spirit of God moved
upon the face of the Waters which for the honour of the Spirit were not said to be Cursed The Vulgar Spiritus Domini Interp. vulgat ferebatur super aquas the Spirit of God was carried upon the Waters So also the Septuagâ—nt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was Sept. Text. Hebr. born or carried The Originall Word is Moâ—akepheth incubabat more Avis sate brooding as a Dove or Bird S. Hieron in qq Hâ—br in Gem sin Cilix Diodor. in Cent. upon her Eggs to the which Cilix Diodorus accords attesting that the Hebrew word signifies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this holy Spirit though he brooded upon the Waters did not Effect that the World should be altogether uncrring in it's Productions but sometimes Monsters being the Vide Arist 2. Physic Text. 82. Sins of Nature are produced against the particular Course and rightnesse of Nature which Monsters notwithstanding doe not so prevaile that Nature is Universally deficient she indefatagably working agreeably to kindes and Species and according to Particulars for the most part ordinately and successivelâ— And in the beginning of our Recreation the same Holy Ghost was Heaven sent unto us who taught all Things in order to Spirituall Generations and a Spirituall End as before he wrought in his brooding chiefly and more amply for a materiall End Yet Many false Prophets Mat. 24. 11. shall rise and shall deceive many And oportet Hereses esse there must be also 1 Cor. 11. 19. Heresies among you that they which are approved may be made manifest among you And yet again God will preserve the waies of Life and Spirituall Generation shall remain successively and ordinately in the true Church of God For as God is not deficient in his Concourse with respect to necessaries in naturall Things so neither is he deficient in his CoÌ„course as proportioned to necessaries in Supernaturall Things and the divine Promiser in his Promise to the true Church intends Necessaries My Councill therefore to all wel-affected People is Waver not with reference to Sects and Heresies neither be ye of doubtfull Minde 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lu. 12. 29. â—â—xt Gâ—ac Theophylact in Lu. cant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saies the Greek Text Which Theophylact regives nolite esse animo instabili be not of an unstable Minde as if an Heretick or Scismatick è Cochlea prorepens creeping forward like an obscure Snail one of a vile shell under our Feet had some thing of divine Truth to tell us above all that the Councils and Fathers in all Ages have said and above all that we yet know Some Truths are indeed unknown to many but the Scismatick and Heretick know not all these nor any of them with Sanctified Knowledge Vatablus interprets it Nè animo Vatabl. pendeatis doe not hang in Minde or Judgement as if your Hearts hung in the Aire The Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is in Latine Words animi dubius suspensus nedum mente fixus in English doubtfull in Minde of a suspended Heart not yet fixt in Judgement Gaza let 's it fall pensilis hanging Gaza in Grammatica Gâ—aeca down towards something beneath us Oromazes in Plutarch was Master of an Egg and he boasted that Plut. in Parall there was included in it all the Happiness of the world Which Egg being broken proved a Winde-Egg nothing came forth but a corrupted Air. Likewise it is in the generall Cry of Hereticks that their Doctrines are saving Truths and write the Receivers of them happy But if we break them open and search throughly into them there only fumes out an ill sent caused by a noxious vapour first issuing from the corrupted and putrified Brains of their Authors In such a Case if ye need a Perfumer do not entertain a Popishont that hath learned the Perfuming sleight of Italy CHAP. CVIII THE sixth Inference is Let us carefully seek and serve God that had mercy on us and received us being Infants in Baptism when we could not ask his Mercy By which there is according to my former intimation a sweet Conveniency and most divine Oeconomy and Order apparent in gods Houshold For As in Originall Sin we sinned by Proxy and by our first Parents without us so in Baptism were we admitted to Grace by Proxy and by the presentation of our after-Parents without us And as Originall Sin encroached upon us without our Act and exercise of sin so are we washed from it ordinarily and in a setled Church without our Act and exercise of Faith This Conveniency is as ancient as Circumcision if not older with relation to something which God accepted in that kinde before it Which way of divine Ordination answers also to our Election and Creation these being without us and our consent or knowledge and the divine Record of St Austin being S Aug. Serm. 15. de verbis Apostoli Understood de Adultis of grown Persons Qui fecit te sine te non justificat te sine â—e fecit nescientem justificat volentem He that made thee without thee doth not justify thee without thee He made thee when thou wert ignorant that he made thee but he justifies thee having first prepared thy will to consent thereunto And here we may borrow authorized by the analogy of Scripture the Saying of Esaias and St Paul melted Rom. 10. 20. into one Esaias is very bold and saith I was found of them that sought me not I was made manifest unto them that asked not after me Hence As the Eucharâ—st is Sacramentum Vivorum the Sacrament of the Living nourishment being given to the Living only and the End of nourishment being the maintenance of Life So Baptism is Sacramentum Mortuorum the Sacrament of the dead we being dead in sin untill we are washed from it in Baptism And hence The Scripture calls Heb. 6. 4. Text. Graec. Vide Concil Neocaesar can 6 S. Jo. Damase Orthod Fid. lib 4. c. 10. c. the Baptized 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the illustrated or illuminated and Baptism is called by the Ancients 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 illumination because the Habit of Faith is infused in Baptism Live therefore O deare Christians as illuminated Persons and labour with a labour becomming the Gospell of Christ and everlasting Life that God may adopt you and being adopted pull not your selves away again from under the Shield-Canopy of his Vocation speciall Protection Adoption as many doe that are called specially protected adopted Vulnerum Animi tanquam Sanguis S. Greg. Nyss orat sunebâ—i de Placilla Lacrymae sunt It is the voice of St Gregory Nyssen Tears are the Blood that gushes out by the Eyes from the wounded Minde or Soul I have often wept he that wept over Jerusalem knows it in consideration that although there are more Stars under the Northern than under the Southern Pole yet I have seen more People-Stars in the Southern Parts than I ever saw in these of the North