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CHAP. II.

His Attempt to establish the Connexion contended for, from the Apostolic Commission and Primitive Precedent.

My respectable opponent commences this branch of the argument by quoting the apostolic commission, justly remarking, that whatever may be thought of John's baptism, the ceremony enjoined in that commission must belong, in the strictest sense, to the christian dispensation. The commission is as follows:-"Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." Matt. xxviii. 19, 20. Or as it is recorded in Luke-" Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth, and is baptized, shall be saved."

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This," Mr. Kinghorn observes, "is the law; the Acts of the Apostles are a commentary on that law; not leaving us to collect from mere precedents what ought to be done, but shewing us how the law was practically explained by those who perfectly understood it." He reminds us, "that in every instance where the history descends to particulars, we find they constantly adhered to this

rule; and that when they taught, and men believed, the apostles baptized them, and then further instructed them in the things pertaining to the kingdom of God."

We are as ready to allow as Mr. Kinghorn, that baptism was enjoined by the apostolic commission; we are perfectly agreed with him respecting the law of baptism, and are accustomed to explain its nature, and enforce its authority, by the same arguments as he himself would employ. We have no controversy with him, or with his party, on the subject of baptism, considered apart from the Lord's supper; and, were he disputing with such as deny its original appointment, or its perpetuity, the passages he quotes would be fully to his purpose. But, where the inquiry turns, not on the nature or obligation of baptism, but on the necessary dependence of another institution upon it, we are at a loss to perceive in what manner the quotation applies to the question before us. To us it is inconceivable how any thing more is deducible from the law of baptism, than its present and perpetual obligation. The existence of a law establishes the obligation of a correspondent duty, and nothing more. The utmost efforts of ingenuity can extort no other inference from it, than that a portion of blame attaches to such as have neglected to comply with it, variable in its degree by an infinity of circumstances, too subtle to be ascertained, and too numerous to be recited. We feel no hesitation in avowing our belief that

pædobaptists of all denominations have failed in a certain part of their duty; for this is a legitimate inference from the perpetuity of the baptismal ordinance, joined with our persuasion that we have interpreted it correctly. But if we are immediately to conclude from thence, that they are disqualified for christian communion, we must seek a church which consists of members who have failed in no branch of obedience; and must consequently despair of finding fit communicants apart from the spirits of just men made perfect. Examine the idea of law with the utmost rigour, turn it on all sides, and it will present nothing beyond the obligation to a certain species of conduct; so that if pædobaptists are really disqualified for the Lord's supper, it must be for some other reason than their non-compliance with a law, or otherwise we must insist upon the refusal of every individual who has not discharged all his obligations. To expatiate on the distinctness and solemnity with which the baptismal ceremony was enjoined, is little less than trifling, in a debate with persons who fully accede to every part of the statement, and who wish to be informed, not whether our pædobaptist brethren are in an error, but whether its moral amount, its specific nature, is such as to annul their claims to christian communion. On this point, the passages adduced maintain a profound silence.

If the practice of strict communion derives no support from the law of baptism, it is impossible

it should derive it from apostolical precedent; since the apostles, as this author observes, adhered constantly to the rule. They did neither more nor less than its letter enjoined: consequently, we must be mistaken, if we imagine we can infer any thing from their practice, beyond what a just and fair interpretation of its terms would suggest. If the Acts of the Apostles are, as Mr. Kinghorn asserts, "a commentary on the law, shewing us how it was practically explained," it is impossible it should contain a tittle more than is found in the text. Let us see how the apostles acted. "When they taught and men believed," says our author, "the apostles baptized them." Whom did they baptize? Undoubtedly such, and such only, as were convinced, not merely of the truth of christianity, but of the obligation of the particular rite to which they attended. This is precisely what we do. When we have reason to believe that any part of our hearers" have received the truth in the love of it," we proceed to explain the nature, and to enforce the duty, of baptism: and upon their expressing their conviction of its divine authority we baptize them. Such a previous conviction is necessary to render it "a reasonable service." We administer that rite to every description of persons whom our opponents themselves deem qualified, and withhold it under no circumstances in which the apostles would have practised it. Wherein, then, as far as that institution is concerned, does our practice differ from that of the apostles? Our

opponents will reply, that though in the administration of that rite, our conduct corresponds with the primitive pattern, yet it differs in this, that we receive the unbaptized to our communion, - which was not done in the apostolic age. To this we rejoin, that at that period no good men entertained a doubt respecting its nature-that it was impossible they should, while it was exemplified before their eyes in the practice of the apostles and the evangelists-that he who refused to abide by the decision of inspired men, would necessarily have forfeited his claim to be considered as a christian-that a new state of things has arisen, in which, from a variety of causes, the doctrine of baptism has been involved in obscurity that some of the best of men put a different interpretation on the language of scripture on this subject from ourselves-and that it is great presumption to claim the same deference with the apostles, and to treat those who differ from us on the sense of scripture, as though they avowedly opposed themselves to apostolic authority. To misinterpret is surely not the same thing as wilfully to contradict: and however confident we may be of the correctness of our own interpretation, to place such as are incapable of receiving it, on the same level with those who withstood the apostles, differs little, if at all, from the claim of infallibility.

We reason, as we conceive conclusively, in favour of adult, in opposition to infant, baptism :

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