For Hooker well says, "I hold it for a most infallible rule in expositions of sacred Scripture, that where a literal construction will stand, the farthest from the letter is commonly the worst. There is nothing more dangerous than this licentious and deluding art, which changeth the meaning of words, as alchemy doth, or would do, the substance of metals, maketh of any thing what it listeth, and bringeth in the end all truth to nothing. Or however such voluntary exercise of wit might be borne with otherwise; yet in places which usually serve, as this doth, concerning regeneration by water and the Holy Ghost, to be alleged for grounds and principles, less is permitted. To hide the general consent of antiquity, agreeing in the literal interpretation, they cunningly affirm, that certain have taken those words as meant of material water, WHEN THEY KNOW THAT OF ALL

THE ANCIENTS THERE IS NOT ONE TO BE NAMED THAT EVER DID OTHERWISE EITHER EXPOUND OR ALLEGE THE PLACE, THAN AS IMPLYING EXTERNAL BAPTISM."

Rather, as the prophecy which these same persons alleged, that Christ namely shall "baptize with the Holy Ghost, and with fire," received its literal fulfilment at the day of Pentecost, and in this the later Baptism of the Apostles, we find, "as well a visiblef descent of fire, as a secret miraculous infusion of the Spirit: if on us He accomplish likewise, the heavenly work of our new birth, not with the Spirit alone, but with water thereunto adjoined, saith the faithfullest expounders of His words are His own deeds, let that, which His hand hath manifestly wrought, declare what his speech did doubtfully utter."

to make mention of the Holy Spirit twice, and to say, 'Whosoever is not born of the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit,' or whosoever is not born of water which is the Holy Spirit.' -Bucer de vi et efficacia Baptismi. Script. Angli

can. p. 596.

"When the letter of the Law hath two things plainly and expressly specified, water and the Spirit; water as a duty required on our parts, the Spirit as a gift which God bestoweth; there is danger in presuming to interpret it, as if the clause which concerneth ourselves were more than needeth. Wer may by such rare expositions attain perhaps in the end to be thought witty, but with ill advice."-Hooker, L. v. c. 59.

"That we may be thus born of the Spirit we must be born also of water, which our Saviour here puts in the first place. Not as if there were any such virtue in water, whereby it could regenerate us; but because this is the rite or ordinance appointed by Christ, wherein He regenerates us by His Holy Spirit; our regeneration is wholly the act of the Spirit of Christ.-Seeing this [Baptism] is instituted by Christ Himself, as we cannot be born of water without the Spirit, so neither can we in an ordinary way be born of the Spirit without water, used or applied in obedience and conformity to His institution. Christ hath joined them together, and it is not in our power to part them; he that would be born of the Spirit, must be born of water also.”—Beverage's Sermons, vol 1. p. 304.

† Hooker, 1. c. See note A. at the end.

To name individuals in this universal consent is to disguise the extent of the evidence; it is to point to a few single luminaries in the nightly sky, when the whole heavens are lighted and thickly set with the stars which He has ordained." For those who, in their extant writings, were not led to explain this text of St. John, yet in their other language bear ample and implicit witness that they understood it in the same sense as the rest of the Christian Church. Every vestige of exposition of Scripture, every statement of Christian doctrine which can bear this way, implies the same. Thus, when one explainst the words, " He shall lead me to the waters of refreshment," of "the water of regeneration, whereby whoso is desirous of the Divine Grace, being baptized, layeth aside the old age of sin, and whereas he was decayed, hath his youth renewed;" or again, when David speaketh of the "blessedness of him to whom the Lord imputeth no sin," saith,‡ foreseeing with prophetic eyes the grace of the "New Testament, and that remission which through the all-holy Baptism is bestowed upon believers, he pronounceth them blessed, inasmuch as they received free remission of sin," no one could doubt how he would explain the words of St. John. No one could doubt that they who so expounded, had their minds filled with the benefits of Baptism, so that the very mention of forgiveness brought to their thoughts that full remission, whereby they were admitted into the kingdom of heaven; the very name of "waters of refreshment" re

* Vazquez, in 3 Part. S. Thomæ Disp. 131. n. 22, refers to Justin Apol. 2. Tertullian de Baptismo, c. 11. n. 89. Cyprian, L. 3. ad Quirin. c. 25. Ambrose, L. 3. de Spiritu Sancto, c. 11. Jerome in c. 16, Ezek. Basil and Gregory of Nyssa de Baptismo. Gregory Nazianzen, Orat. 40, in S. Bapt. and he adds "all the commentators, whom he omits as superfluous." Such are, to name the older, not only St. Chrysostome, St. Augustine, St. Cyril, of Alexandria, Nonnus, but Theodorus of Mopsuestia, Apolinarius, Amonius, Severus, (ap. Corderius Caten. in Joann. Evangel.) To these may be added, Recognit. Clem. vi. 9. [Hom. xi. c. 26. Epit. c. 17, 18.] Origen in Ep. ad Rom. L. v. c. 8. p. 561, ed. de la Rue. Nemesianus in Concil. Carthag. ap. Cyprian p. 338. [ed. Bened.] Auctor Lib. de rebaptismate, apud. eund. p. 355. Eusebius, ad Is. 3, 2, [Montfaucon Coll. Nov. t. ii. p. 368.1 St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Cat. xi. c. 9. Constitt. Apostol. L. vi. c. 15. Hilary of Arles, [Combefis. Bibl. Patr. v. 22.] Leo the Great, Ep. ad Demetriad. c. 11. Quæst. ad Antioch c. v. Hesychius in Ps. 103, [Catena Corderii.] A late writer in the "Record" [I am told] ventured the assertion that St. Chrysostome was the first who interpreted the text of Baptism! Of the witnesses here quoted he is the twentieth; and this without taking into account the manifest allusions to the text in S. Hermas, [L iii. c. 16.] S. Irenæus, [iii. 17. 2.] S. Dionysius of Alex. [c. Samosaten. L. iv. p. 230.] S. Optatus, [de Schism. Donatist. v. 5.] Let any one disposed to disparage this evidence, think how he would appreciate it, if it supported any point in the system which he has made his own.

†Theodoret, in Ps. xxii. 23, with whom St.Athanasius agrees, although not speaking quite so strongly. These are two, in whose extant works we happen to have no interpretation of the text of St. John.

Theodoret and St. Athanasius, in Ps. xli. 42, both alike positively.

called that health-giving stream, the Baptism of water and the Spirit, which had cleansed them of all sins, and given them a fresh life, the life from above. All such expositions are an a fortiori evidence that such writers must have understood, in like manner, the words of their Lord. Not only did they understand the words "water and the Spirit" of Baptism, but they regarded them as a sort of key to the rest of Holy Scripture, which any way bore upon the same subjects. Thence they inferred, that wherever, under the law, free remission of sins was set forth, there was an intimation of that gift of Christ in the Gospel, without which a man could not “ enter into the kingdom of Heaven;" thence, also, that when water was spoken of as cheering, cleansing, refreshing, there was a secret reference to that great mystery, wherein our Lord, by condescending to be Baptized, should" sanctify water to the mystical washing away of sin," and to the imparting of His holiness. And so of those words, (St. John i. 12, 13.) "As many as received Him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, to them that believe on his name, which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God;" whoso should explain them of the gift of God in Baptism, could not hesitate so to understand the words of our Lord. For this exposition is founded on the very notion, that the partaking of the Incarnation and the Christian relation of sonship to God, is imparted through Baptism, and is not imparted without it. Yet even Pelagius* understood the gift here spoken of to be realized through Baptism; and among the Christian fathers, allusions to this text are frequent, even where our Lord's words are not quoted; because this declares more positively the Christian's privilege of the birth of God: our Lord's words are spoken negatively, that no one shall see the kingdom of heaven without that birth.Controversy and error have driven us into narrower bounds, where our forefathers used to "feed freely in a large pasture.'

The force of the appeal to this text is much disguised again by mere reference to those who allege it. For beyond the simple fact of the unity of the whole Church, by whom one and one only sense is found in it, there is something very impressive in the very way in which it is quoted. It is impressive from very contrast, amid our strifes of words, to see the undoubtingness with which the whole Church embraced one meaning, alluded to, drew inferences from it, as having the nature of an axiom in religious truth. There is, however, yet another test. The very first author who names it, Justin Martyr, in a public document, written not forty years after the death of St. John, speaks of it as a recognized ground of Christian Bap

* His comment is, "Through Faith they are born of Him, through the renewal of Baptism and grace of the Holy Spirit."-App. ad Hieron. t. xi. p. 774.

tism. He speaks not in his own name, but in that of the whole Church.

"Whoever are persuaded and believe that what we teach and say is true, and undertake to live accordingly, are taught, with prayer and fasting, to beg of God the remission of their former sins, we also praying and fasting with them. Then they are led by us to a place where is water, and after the manner of new birth, that we also were new born, are they new born. For they are bathed in the water in the name of God the Father and Lord of all, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Ghost. For Christ said, 'Except ye be born again, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of Heaven.' But that it is impossible for those who have once been born to enter into the wombs of those who bare them is manifest to all.”

And not less Tertullian,† arguing the very point, whether, because faith sufficed to Abraham without Baptism, therefore it sufficed

now.

"Be it that in past times, before the Passion and Resurrection of the Lord, salvation was through bare faith. But when faith was enlarged by the belief in His Nativity, Passion, and Resurrection, there was added the sealing of Baptism, a clothing, as it were, of faith, which heretofore was bare, but which now avails not without the law annexed to it. For a law of Baptism, has been prescribed, and its form ordained. Go,' He saith, teach all nations, baptizing them,' &c. And that strict rule, Except a man,' &c. blended with this law, obliged faith to Baptism as a thing essential; so thenceforth all who believed were baptized."

In both these writers alike it is spoken of as a known fact, that Christians had ever been baptized, in obedience to these words of our Lord; and so it is assumed, as having been undoubted by the whole Church, from the Apostles downwards, that our Lord in those words spoke of His Baptism, that Faith, without the Baptism of Faith, did not regenerate. In St. Basil's clear and eloquent words,‡ "Faith and Baptism are two modes of salvation, akin and indivisible, for Faith is perfected by Baptism, and Baptism is founded by Faith, and both are accomplished through the same Names. For as we believe in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, so are we also baptized into the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit."

Thus, then, we have not only the universal consent of the early Church, but we have, in the very earliest writers, an appeal to the then practice, as resting upon the plain meaning of these words of Scripture, and implying an Apostolic tradition.

Apol. 1.

De Spiritu. S., c. 12. fin.

† De Baptismo, c. 13.

Again, if we must have recourse to the admissions of heretics, (since people will trust them rather than the Church,) there was no text by which the Pelagians were more pressed than this. Nothing but sin could exclude any from the kingdom of Heaven; but infants were baptized, because our Lord had said, "Except one be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven." This showed (the Catholics argued) that infants had sin, and since not actual, original sin. The Pelagians answered not, (as moderns would,) by cutting short the question, denying that the text had anything to do with Baptism, or that infants could need baptism; but they answered (also in a modern way,) by keeping close to the letter of Scripture, and disregarding its spirit, that "they did enter into life eternal, although "not into the kingdom of Heaven."*Here, then, we have a heresy requiring the attention of the whole Church; the Church appealing to the Apostolical custom of infant baptism, and our Lord's words, as the ground of that custom; the adversaries admitting both, but escaping the result of their admission by an expedient which attests into how great straits they were reduced. Now, let any one imagine the controversy transferred from that day to this, would the Pelagians have the same difficulty now? and can this difficulty be otherwise explained than through the fixed and rooted persuasion in the whole Church, that our Lord, when speaking of the "birth of water and the Spirit," spoke of the privileges of Baptism?

The Catholicity of this interpretation of our Lord's words, "Except a man be born of water and the Spirit," is still further illustrated by the use of them in the Baptismal Liturgies of the whole ancient Church. There is not a Liturgy, from Britian to India, which does not in some way incorporate it: the Eastern Liturgies rehearse it as the Gospel;†

*"These [the Pelagians] are alarmed at the words of the Lord, Unless a man be born again, he shall not see the kingdom of God,' which he explains, Unless a person be born again of water and the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of Heaven.' And so they would fain give unbaptized infants salvation and eternal life, as the deserts of their innocency, but make them aliens from the kingdom of Heaven, as not having been baptized; a new and strange assumption, as if there could be salvation and life eternal out of the inheritance of Christ, out of the kingdom of Heaven! They seek, namely, a lurking-place therein, that our Lord does not say, 'Unless a man be reborn of water and the Spirit, he shall not have life, but he shall not enter into the kingdom of God.”—S. Aug. de Peccat. Merit. et. Remis. i. § 26.

† John iii. 1-9. is a lesson in the Armenian Baptismal service, [see Assem. Cod. Liturg. t. ii. p. 196—206;] in that of Malabar, John ii. 25.-iii. 8. ib. t. i. p. 188; that of Antioch, c. 3, 1—11, ib. p. 229; that of St. James of Edessa, from the Greek, c. 3, 1--6, p. 248; and the Apostolic Liturgy, revised by Severus, t. ii. p. 274, c. 3, 1-21, Coptic and Ethiopic, [t. ii. p. 154.] In the Western Church, part of the beginning of each of the four Gospels was read in the service for the Catechumens, yet not simply as the beginning, but because each contained something suited thereto. The portions read were St. VOL. II.-2.