volves an amount of evidence which some contend can be applied to mathematical subjects only, and certainly, on this point should have been adduced from indisputable statements of holy writ, which none could question or deny. Again, on page 58, "John said to all the people respecting Christ,' He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost,'" without assigning any reason why the Greek particle ey should be so rendered, when in a hundred and fifty places in the New Testament, in the greater part of which it would be perfectly absurd to put it otherwise, it is translated with, and one would naturally suppose should be so translated here as to talk of being immersed in the Holy Ghost is indubitably somewhat approaching to an absurdity. They were also, though our author forgets to add it, to be baptized "with fire," according to him "in fire," which, we think, would have been rather a perilous condition for any mortals to be in. Moreover, it would not be in accordance with the recorded fact, for the baptism by fire is stated to have been when the cloven tongues of flame descended and "sat upon" them. This was the baptism foretold. The fire fell on them. They were not plunged into it, nor surrounded with it. And as to their being "immersed in the Holy Ghost," or as he elsewhere terms it, "bathed in a Divine influence," because the sound filled the house where they were sitting, why, we reply, this is rather puerile: the sound was not the influence, but rather the report of its descent as it came upon them. Again, on page 14, where a gloss is furnished on the language of the apostle in 1 Corinthians x. 2, Mr. N. observes, "They were marked to be the disciples of Moses by following him into the Red sea, where they were buried for a while within the cloud and sea which surrounded them." Strange! prodigious! Whoever thought that the "cloudy pillar" was large enough to encircle or cover two millions of people? And as for their being buried in it and in the sea, we had always thought that this was the fate of the Egyptians, and not of the Israelites. If it were the reverse, and as Mr. N. represents it, it makes decidedly in favour of Paedobaptism, for then all the children, including the very infants, were baptized.

We adduce these as specimens of the reasoning, or rather the substitutes for it, with which the present volume abounds, and earnestly wish that our author had proceeded a little more in the way of fair ratiocination, and after the mode of the inductive philosophy, than he has thought proper, or ventured to do. Truth gains nothing by peremptory assertion, and when it abounds without sufficient evidence to sustain it, it always awakens in us the suspicion that such evidence is wanting, or that the writer

is not at ease in the views which he entertains. Especially does this apply to a subject which has been discussed by able writers on each side, just in proportion to whose intelligence and ability, it may be observed, has been the caution with which they have proceeded.

Now that we are on the point of the mode of baptism, and have patiently read all that this volume contains in favour of immersion, as well as that of some others, we take leave to affirm that we think all the author's reasoning vitiated and nullified by its want of accordance with the "thing signified," the invisible and spiritual grace. That it is not borne out by the statements of the New Testament, nor justified by the Scriptural use of the term, we firmly believe, and we think has again and again been proved. The present production contains nothing new on the subject. All it affirms has ofttimes been stated, and as often replied to-we think refuted. But it is a thing "most surely believed among us" that the baptism of water is an emblem of the influences of the Spirit of God, and designed to represent his gracious operation in cleansing and sanctifying the soul. This is undoubtedly true. All admit it. Mr. Noel repeatedly so describes it. But those influences and that operation are everywhere in Scripture represented as coming upon the soul. They are said to be "given to" it, to be "poured upon" it, to be "received" by it; that is, the purifying influence is applied to the mind, and not the mind to it; the former received by the latter, and not the latter by the former. In immersion, the water receives the subject, and not the subject the water. It reverses the order of grace. It contravenes an essential truth in theology. It is at variance with the work of God in the sanctification of the soul, which receives the purifying influence, and is not received by it. We cannot but think this a matter of some importance, and ought much to govern our decision. The philosophy of Christianity, and the manner of God's gracious operations on the human mind, are contradicted by immersion, (especially according to all Calvinistic views,) in which the subject is applied to the element, but fairly represented by sprinkling, pouring, or affusion, (which are the terms Scripture employs,) in which the element is applied to, and comes upon the subject. This we submit is of some consequence in the conclusion. The "thing signfied" is of more importance than that which signifies it and the latter should certainly be that which is most in unison with the former.

It is not our intention in the present article, as its appropriate limits necessarily forbid it, to enter into all the minute parts of the author's statements, or attempt to refute each of his separate positions in reference to

Averse as we are to controversy, especially with one whom we have been taught hitherto most highly to love and esteem, and much as we would prefer to be occupied with him in vindicating the glorious truths of salvation against the intrusions of a "vain philosophy" on the one hand, and the perversions of Popish origin, in the present day, on the other, we are constrained to enter our protest against much of the speculation, and as we think, misrepresentation, which this volume contains. There is such a mixture, such an association of things relevant and irrelevant, such implications, such an apparent fondness of magnifying little things and passing over the great, and withal such seeming delight in championship and supposed victory, that we have frequently been amused with the adroitness and courage displayed, though not edified by the love of truth or the love of his neighbour involved. There appears to us, likewise, a great absence of all due perception of the difference between the principal and the subordinate arguments for family or infant baptism. The former, in our estimation, notwithstanding all Mr. Noel has written, remain just as they were. With the latter he has dealt pretty largely, and attached far more importance to some of them than we are accustomed to do, or to hear of among our friends. As an instance of this we might notice that he has given a chapter to prove that the "promises to godly parents" are no evidence of the Divine institution of infant baptism. Who ever thought they were? In themselves they may not be. We do not affirm they are. But, says Bishop Butler in his Analogy, "that which, taken by itself, may be no evidence at all, yet when taken in connexion with other things, and associated with them, may amount to some."

We have no space to refer to some other parts of the argument to which we had intended to allude. Only, in approaching a conclusion, we must remark, that when our honourable and reverend friend endeavours most elaborately to prove that all the adult baptisms mentioned in the New Testament, beginning with John," even to the very end, were all, and each, baptisms of real converts and sincere believers, we had some misgivings, and on renewed examination are compelled to demur. We cannot quite understand how it was, if they were genuine converts and already renewed by grace, that the Baptist in the same hour addressed them as a "generation of vipers," and exhorted them to bring forth "fruits meet for repentance," which it does not appear they had hitherto done. Nor can we reconcile the recorded facts that such vast multitudes

were baptized by John, and by the attendant servants of his Master, and yet the latter had so few disciples. "Jerusalem, all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan," we are informed, "went out to him, and were baptized by him." Our Lord, by his disciples, it is said, "made and baptized more disciples than John." Now, if they were all good men and true, genuine disciples, faithful converts to the doctrine of the forerunner, or to Zion's manifested King, how comes it to pass that there were not more to welcome the Saviour's appearance-that on a subsequent occasion we find it written, "Many of his disciples went back and walked no more with him,"-that, at a still later period of his ministry, he could address them only as a "little flock,"-and that even on the glorious day of Pentecost, previous to the effusion of the Spirit, the number of the names amounted to only "a hundred and twenty?" We submit these facts to Mr. Noel's consideration. Verily we think the term "disciple" had a much wider meaning than he is disposed to yield to it, and that the administration of the initiatory rite of baptism by John, by the disciples of Jesus, and by his apostles also afterwards, was on a much more extended and general scale than he and other Baptist writers are willing to allow. All were not Israel who were of Israel, nor were they all genuine believers in Christ whose names are given in the New Testament as baptized.

There are some other matters in this volume to which, did our limits permit, we would like to have referred, and into which we should willingly have entered, but that either they have been sufficiently replied to before, or are scarcely worthy of observation. One however we must notice. We were not a little astounded to hear from one who, we might suppose, would have had a tolerable acquaintance with ecclesiastical antiquities, that "no mention is made of infant baptism till the third century." It caused us again to search into our authorities, and we found Justin Martyr, who was born near the close of the first century, affirming, when speaking of those who were members of the church, that,

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a part of these were sixty or seventy years old, who were made disciples of Christ from their infancy;" and it is admitted by all that there was never any other mode of making disciples from infancy except baptism, and that this by such language was understood. Irenæus, born about the year 97, a disciple of Polycarp, who was a disciple of the Evangelist John, says, "Christ came to save all persons who by him are born again unto God, infants and little ones," &c. Now, by being "born again," it is well known that he meant being baptized, as he himself afterwards clearly shows. Clemens Alexandri.

nus, towards the end of the second century, refers to it as an apostolic practice. Origen, a man probably of more information than any other of his times, a little later says, "The church hath received the tradition from the apostles, that baptism ought to be administered to infants." Cyprian, his cotemporary, states, that "Sixty-six bishops, being convened in a council at Carthage, having the question referred to them-whether infants might be baptized before they were eight days old?-decided unanimously that no infant is to be prohibited from the benefit of baptism, although but just born." Gregory Nazianzen, in the fourth century, exhorts parents to "offer their children to God in baptism." And a little after, Augustine, the greatest of them all, asserts in so many plain words that "the whole church practises infant baptism: it was not instituted by councils, but was always in use." And in another place, that he "did not remember ever to have read of any person, whether Catholic or heretic, who maintained that baptism ought to be denied to infants." "This," he observes, "the church has always maintained." This is the verdict of antiquity. We merely present it, not over careful to answer our opponents in this matter. But if it must be summoned and consulted, we fear not its testimony, even from the remotest, the very purest ages. Nor can we yet believe, although Mr. Noel has spoken, that the fathers of the church, the apostolic as well as others, the noble army of martyrs and confessors, the reformers of every age and country, the pastors, teachers, and divines, of every century, down to that in which we live, have, on this point, misunderstood the mind and will of their common Lord. We do not believe it. Infant baptism may be perverted, as every good thing has been, and abused, as the other positive rite of Christianity in transubstantiation continues to be, but we hold it still to be a rite of Divine institution, designed and adapted for the perpetuation of the religion of Christ in our world, and for the promotion of household or domestic piety in the church of God. And, therefore, with all respect and affection for the present writer, and for the noble stand which he has made against the amalgamation of the kingdom of Christ with the kingdoms of this world, we most entirely disagree with him in the subject to which his present production refers. "Amicus Plato, amicus Socrates, sed magis amica Veritas." Still we think we show the "more excellent way." "I thank God," says the eminent Matthew Henry, "for my infant baptism!"

EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE a Ground for assurance that Christianity is Divine. By GILBERT WARDLAW, A.M. Small 8vo. Glasgow, Maclehose.

WE regret that this interesting volume, upon a much neglected but highly important subject, has been so long overlooked by us. The author who has produced such an essay deserves to live, as a writer of equal power and discrimination.

At a time when a certain class of writers would merge the whole, or nearly the whole, of religion in the subjective, it is surely most important that we should be enabled to form accurate conceptions of the relation which subsist between the various branches of Christian evidence, and especially that we should be able to show our opponents that, subjectively viewed, Christianity is capable of sustaining its own claims, though not in the way which Newman and others would propose. We cannot conceive of a work better adapted to counteract the extravagant notions of such writers than the calm, enlightened, and philosophical treatise, which we now introduce to the notice of our readers. Had the subject of Experimental Evidence been more fully handled by our theologians, we cannot help thinking that it would have left but little scope for the class of writers who are now attempting to disturb and unsettle the faith of Christians.

In no work in our language, that we are acquainted with, has the subject of Experimental Evidence, as a ground for assurance that Christianity is Divine, been ever before thoroughly dealt with. In single discourses, or in occasional references, the subject has been touched in our theological literature; but it has never before, to the best of our belief, been fully handled in a distinct and elaborate treatise. If others receive as powerful an impression of the value of Mr. Wardlaw's labours, as we have done, from the perusal of his volume, they will feel as we do, most anxious for its extensive circulation. It is difficult to say, whether the piety or the logic of the essay is the more to be admired. Both are healthy and vigorous. A more valuable contribution to our theological science has not been made in these times. It is the very desideratum in theology which needed to be supplied; and it has been done with the devoutness of a Christian, and the penetration of a philosopher. We promise our intelligent friends, that, if they will furnish themselves with this delightful work, they will be constrained to read it from the first page to the last. We hope it will be the instrument of effecting great and general good; and commend it to the Christian world with equal sincerity and earnestness. It is really a theological work; and this is more than can be said of many works professing to belong to the department of theology.