only on "the one hundred and twenty," and not upon the promiscuous assembly. For the multitude, after the Spirit's descent, did still upbraid the disciples with drunkenness. Those who first received it that day, preached by it to the audience. The thousands who heard were pierced to the heart, and yet had not received the Spirit. They believed, and were in agony of fear and terror, but yet had not received the Spirit. They asked what they should do, and yet had not received it. Peter commanded them to "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." Of course, then, they had not yet received that gift. They, however, gladly received his word, and were baptized. We have, then, the first three thousand converts regenerated by gladly receiving the Word and baptism. This is a strong fact for the first one in my fourteenth argument.

The second fact of conversion is found Acts iv., and the question is, how were they regenerated? We shall read the passage "Howbeit, many of them which heard the Word believed, and the number of the men was about five thousand." We are now morally certain that these five thousand were converted by the Spirit only through the Word. We have already eight thousand examples of our allegation, and not one instance of one converted without the Word.

Our third exemplification is found Acts v. 14: "And believers were the more added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women." Women are here mentioned as well as men. We have, then, got multitudes of both sexes to add, in proof that the Spirit converted these, not without the Word, but by what they saw and heard.

We shall find a fourth example, Acts viii. 5, 6, 12. Philip went to Samaria and preached Christ to them. "And when they believed Philip preaching the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of the Lord Jesus, they were baptized, both men and women." So the Samaritans were regenerated by the Holy Spirit through faith in the Word, which Philip preached.

A fifth example is found in the eunuch. "If thou believest with all thy heart, thou mayest." He said: "I believe that Jesus is the Son of God." Then he, too, was born of the water, and converted, not without the Word.

Paul furnishes a sixth case. When he had fallen to the ground,

he heard "a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me--I am Jesus whom thou persecutest.' His case is certainly one of indisputable certainty. He both saw, heard, and believed, and was baptized.

To these I might add the case of Eneas, the citizens of Lydda and Saron, the assembly in the house of Dorcas, Cornelius, and his friends, Lydia and the jailer, Dionysius, Crispus, the Corinthians and the Ephesians, &c. &c., as reported in the Acts of the Apostles. In not one of these cases did the Holy Spirit operate without the Word, but always through it. Of the Corinthians, it was said, "And many of the Corinthians hearing, believed, and were baptized." This was true of all that were regenerated through the Spirit, during the ministry of the Apostles. Hence, to convert men by the accompanying influence of the Holy Spirit, we must do what Paul commanded Timothy "Preach the Word, be instant in season and out of season. Then, no doubt, many will be enlightened, renewed, sanctified, and comforted by the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit.

BOOK SIXTH.

Reviews of the Advocates of Enfant Baptism.

CHAPTER I..

REVIEW OF BISHOP KENRICK'S TREATISE.

THE Roman Bishop of Philadelphia, in 1843, published "A Treatise on Baptism, with an Exhortation to receive it, translated from the works of St. Basil the Great, to which is added a Treatise on Confirmation," with the following motto: "Let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ and the ministers of the mysteries of God." 1 Cor. iv. 1.-"Philadelphia: M. Fithian, 61, North Second Street: 1843."

In reviewing the arguments and apologies for infant baptism which have fallen under our notice, we intended to place the most ancient and authoritative treatise on that subject first before our readers; that, in reviewing its strong points, we should be relieved from the labour of reviewing more modern treatises, as they are generally but a reiteration or new modification of those which have preceded them. We had then purposed to place the celebrated work of Dr. Wall, or that of Peter Edwards, as first on our table. But on glancing over the works in my library on that subject, I found the work now before me, from the pen of a Roman Prelate; and although of recent and contemporaneous origin, containing, as it does, the varied ecclesiastic learning of the mother and mistress of all Pedobaptist churches, so far as this rite is derived from them, I concluded that popular judgment and popular taste would give precedence to the Mother Church, and hear her first, with all the respect due to her great learning and hoary antiquity.

The Bishops of Rome have a higher reputation for ecclesiastic learning than even the Protestant Prelates of England; whether deserved or not, I am not appointed an arbiter to decide; but

think, at least, having been the foster parents of infant baptism, they are worthy of precedence.

Now, although the work before us is of recent origin, we must regard it as better and even more learned than works of a higher antiquity; because, superadded to all that Roman Prelates formerly knew on that subject are the experience, reflections, and modern literature of our contemporary, Bishop Kenrick.

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We shall, therefore, hear him in his own language set forth the foundation on which he places the institution of infant baptism; and, for the sake of future reference, arrange numerically his arguments in proof of his position. First, then, we shall hear from him the doctrine of what he calls the Catholic Church-by which he does not mean the Greek Catholic nor the Protestant Catholic, but the Roman Catholic Church. The Catholic Church holds that all infants are capable of baptism, independently of the piety or faith of their parents; although the children of unbelievers are not to be baptized against the will of their parents, or in circumstances that expose the sacrament to manifest profanation."* The Calvinistic or Presbyterian Church, or "Calvin and his followers, ground the practice of baptizing infants on the principle that the covenant of God is with the faithful and their posterity; whence they restrict it to the children of believers; who, being embraced in the covenant, have a right to receive the sign of association with the visible church." See a discussion on Christian Baptism, by W. L. McCalla, Philadelphia, 1828.

Concerning this Presbyterian foundation of infant baptism, founded on a covenant with the faithful and their posterity, the Bishop only says that it is "gratuitously supposed, and cannot be inferred from the ancient covenant with Abraham and his seed." To which I may add, that this hypothesis is suicidal to the Presbyterian doctrine of election, or, if not, to the church itself. She maintains that the Christian ordinances belong to the visible elect family or church of God, and to none else. Now, as she does not believe nor teach that the children of even believing parents are, as such, the elect children of God, or regenerated in fact, or in form, or in profession, how can she dispense to them the ordinance of Christ, they not belonging in

* Page 125.

† Page 124

fact or profession to the elect of God?

She never has been

able, and, I predict, never will be able, to reconcile her doctrine of election and her doctrine of grace and the ordinances of grace with her assumption of the Abrahamic covenants; for all the children of Abraham were an elect nation for the same purpose -according to the flesh; and neither infants nor adults were required to believe in any doctrine of grace in order to circumcision. They were circumcised because of fleshly relation, and not because of any spiritual relation to God or Christ. But we have to do at present with Bishop Kenrick, of the Roman Church in Philadelphia; and now we shall consider his proof of his assumption that all infants, as such, whether the offspring of Turk, Jew, Infidel, or Christian, are alike the proper subjects of Christian baptism. His first is

Logical Argument, No. I.-"All of us are by nature children of wrath, being stained by sin. Baptism is the laver wherein sin is washed away. It must, then, be applicable to infants."

Romantic logic! A syllogism of four or five terms, and yet without a middle term! Pope Pius IX., with all his infallibility and liberality, could not consecrate it into a logical or rational argument. It is as if one should argue-“ All of us are by nature children of appetite, being impelled by hunger. The table is the place whereat hunger is driven away by those who can eat. The table, then, must be applicable to infants, whether they can eat or not." This is even a better argument than the bishop's syllogism: for that assumes that baptism is, without any qualification whatever on the part of the subject, the laver wherein sin is washed away! But no well-informed man does believe that. To make his argument stand out in all its logical grandeur, it would read thus:-"All of us are by nature children of wrath, being stained by sin. Baptism is the laver wherein the sin of living men is washed away. It must, then, be applicable to infants, living or dead." But we take more interest in his biblical than in his logical arguments. Of these the first is-

Bible Argument, No. I.-"Who," says the bishop, "would venture to deny that they can be saved of whom Christ has said, 'Suffer little children to come to me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God!'"

To this argument I have four objections: