said, They believed and were baptized. I could give you a multitude of places for it."*--- "There are, or may be, innumerable persons baptized externally with water," says Hoornbeekius, "who yet are not real Christians; neither were they rightly baptized, because they were unbelievers; nor can they be justly said to have baptism, not that which Christ appointed.... Without faith, water baptism cannot by any means be lawful; for the command is, believe, first; then also, and not otherwise, be baptized. 'He that believeth and is baptized,' (Mark xvi. 16.) Then they that gladly received his word were baptized,' (Acts ii. 41.) If thou believest with all thy heart, thou mayest be baptized,' (Acts viii. 37; xvi. 31, 33.)"†- "A profession of faith," says Dr. Waterland, "was was from the beginning always required of persons before baptism. We have plain examples of, and allusions to, something of that kind, even in scripture itself, (Acts viii. 12, 37; 1 Pet. iii. 21.) Upon these instances the Christian church proceeded."‡"Faith and repentance were the great things required," says Dr. Watts, "of those that were admitted to baptism. This was the practice of John, this the practice of the apostles, in the history of their ministry, (Matt. iii.; Acts ii. 38, xix. 4, and viii. 37.)....Those who are baptized, are professed Christians; they are avowed disciples of Christ."§ -Anonymous: Sacraments are administered only to those, who either have faith, or pretend to have it."--Once more: Dr. Erskine says, " I have fully shown, that the seals of the covenant are, under the New Testament, peculiar to the inwardly pious." ¶-That these authors had any intention to impeach the propriety of infant baptism, is not pre * Works, vol. i. part i. p. 200. tom. iii. p. 384, 389. † Socin. Confut. Eight Serm. p. 317, edit. 2nd. § Berry Street Serm. vol. ii. p. 177, 178. || In Mr. Baxter's Disput. of Right to Sac. p. 245. tended; but whether the natural import of their language be quite consistent with it, the reader will judge. Reflect. IX. Some of these authors imagine that Pædobaptism is lawful, though it be not commanded. But here they seem to forget that baptism is a positive rite, and that when practised it is as an act of divine worship. A precept therefore, or an example, must be necessary to warrant the performance of it; and consequently to authorize its administration to any description of persons whatever. Whether infants only; whether all infants, or only some; and if the latter, whether none but the children of church-members, or of all that appear to be converted; or, finally, whether those persons only who profess faith in Jesus Christ, should be baptized; are things which lie entirely at the sovereign pleasure of the great Institutor. His will, which is always perfectly wise and good, is the sole determiner here. Now as we cannot know his divine pleasure unless it be revealed; as every intimation of his pleasure is attended with divine authority; and as the whole of his revealed will is contained in scripture; if the sacred page exhibit no command for Pædobaptism, nor any example of it, the lawfulness of baptizing infants must be a mere surmise-a conjecture without probability. For, not to urge the common arguments against Popish superstition; and, waiving that excellent maxim of Ambrose before mentioned, "Who shall speak where the scripture is silent?" I would only demand, whether the performance of a religious rite, in the name of JEHOVAH, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, can be lawful, if the divine Majesty have not appointed it? It is clear, Mr. James Owen thought it was not; because in a similar case he says, "It is a plain profanation of God's holy name, and of a great and holy ordinance, by lying and taking God's name in vain."* So Chemnitius, having informed us that the unction used in the * Validity of Dissenting Ministry, p. 143. Popish sacrament of confirmation, is performed in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, says, "If the divine name be employed without the injunction of God, it is an offence against the second command; which offence is the more aggravated, in proportion as the effects attributed to that which has neither the command nor the promise of God, are supposed to be the more excellent." *Or is the name of HIм who is a consuming fire so cheap, that we may borrow its most venerable sanction to dignify and adorn our own inventions? Surely, if the performance of any thing either does or can require the most explicit divine authority, it must be that which, if performed at all, should be expressly done in the NAME of the great Supreme. A requisition to administer baptism in that most holy name, implies the strongest prohibition of performing it in any manner, or on any subject, different from what is required by the law of administration. In this case, may and must are the same thing; agreeably to the following words of Mr. Baxter: "We enquire whether we either must, or may, baptize such; and suppose that the licet and the oportet do here go together: so that what we may do, we must do, supposing our own call; as, no doubt, what we must do, we may do."†-Thus also Dr. Owen: "What men have a right to do in the church by God's institution, that they have a command to do," ‡ If then the law of proceeding, in this case made and provided, require that infants should partake of the institution; we undoubtedly must act a condemnable part in withholding it from them. If, on the contrary, that divine rubric, that sacred canon, confine all that is said of it to such as profess faith in the Son of God; our opponents, for the same reason, must be highly culpable because their practice restrains it al *Exam. Concil. Trident. p. 248, 253. most entirely to such as lie under a natural incapacity of professing repentance and faith. Nor do we imagine any of them will say, with some of the Popish casuists, That a practice is innocent, because it is customary. We are frequently charged with being extremely fond of getting people into the water; but whether it be really so, I leave the impartial to judge. We, however, may say this for ourselves, that we never immerse a person in the sublimest of all names, without his consent; no, nor yet without his explicit request: whereas, those who lodge the complaint against us are well aware, that it would in general be very absurd for them to ask the consent of those whom they sprinkle in the same glorious name, because they are certain it could not be granted. Besides, they consider the consent of a parent, or of a proxy, as quite sufficient, though the subject of the ordinance be ever so reluctant. Farther: Positive laws imply their negative. A command from undoubted authority to perform an action in such a manner, and on such a subject, must be considered as prohibiting a different manner, and a different subject. So, for instance, when God commanded Abraham to circumcise his male posterity, on the eighth day; there was no necessity that a prohibition should be annexed, relating to any similar ceremony which might have been performed on females; nor to expressly forbid the circumcision of a finger, instead of the foreskin; nor to say in so many words, It shall not be performed on the seventh day; those positive precepts, "Ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin-he that is eight days old shall be circumcised,” plainly implying the forementioned prohibitions. So when Jehovah commanded the Israelites to take a lamb, a male of the first year, for the paschal feast, there was no need to forbid the choice of a ewe lamb, nor yet a ram of the second or third year. So likewise, when * See Mr. Clarkson's Pract. Div. of Papists, p. 377, 378. Paul, speaking of the sacred supper, says, "Let a man EXAMINE HIMSELF, and so let him eat," there was no necessity of adding, Those who cannot examine themselves ought not to eat.-Thus in regard to the ordinance before us. Our Lord having given a commission to baptize those that are taught, without saying any thing elsewhere, by way of precept or of example, concerning such being included in that commission as are not instructed; there was no necessity for him to prohibit the baptizing those who are not taught; much less to forbid the baptizing of infants, that cannot be taught, in order to render the baptism of them unlawful. We may safely conclude, therefore, that though negative arguments in various cases have no force; yet, in positive worship and ritual duty, they are, they must be valid. Otherwise, it will be impossible to vindicate the divine conduct in punishing the sons of Aaron, for offering strange fire; or Uzzah, for touching the ark; seeing neither the one nor the other of these particulars was expressly forbidden. Remarkably strong to our purpose, are the words of Dr. Owen, on Heb. i. 5: "An argument taken negatively," says he, "from the authority of the scripture, in matters of faith, or what relates to the worship of God, is valid and effectual, and here consecrated for ever to the use of the church by the apostle." And on those words: Our Lord sprang out of Judah; of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning the priesthood; the same excellent author says: "This silence of Moses in this matter, the apostle takes to be a sufficient argument to prove that the legal priesthood did not belong, nor could be transferred unto, the tribe of Judah. And the grounds hereof are resolved into this general maxim : That whatever is not revealed and appointed in the worship of God, by God himself, is to be considered as nothing, yea, as that which is to be rejected. And such he conceived to be the evidence of this maxim, that he |