the fall and ruin of all mankind by our first father's disobedience to a positive command," is more calculated to inflame the passions, than to elicit truth, or conduct the controversy to a satisfactory issue. When the sole inquiry is, what is the law of Christ, and we are fully persuaded that our interpretation of it is more natural and reasonable than that of our opponents, it is not a little absurd, to charge us with assuming a claim of dispensing with its authority. We know that he commanded his followers to be baptized; we know also that he commanded them to shew forth his death till he came: but where shall we look for a tittle of his law which forbids such as sincerely, though erroneously believe themselves to have complied with the first, to attend to the last of these injunctions? Where is the scriptural authority for resting the obligation of the eucharist, not on the precept that enjoins it, but on the previous reception of baptism? As the scripture is totally silent on this point, we are not disposed to accept the officious assistance of our brethren in supplying its deficiency; and beg permission to remind them, that to add to the word of God, is equally criminal with taking away from it.

Do we neglect the administration of that rite to any class of persons, whose state of mind is

such as would render it acceptable to God? Do we neglect to illustrate and enforce it in our public ministrations? Are we accustomed to insinuate that serious inquiry into the mind of Christ on this subject, is of little, or no importance? Are we found to decline its administration in any case whatever, in which our accusers would not equally decline it? Nothing of this can be alleged. Do they argue from the language of the original institute, from the examples of scripture, and the precedent of the early ages, that it is the duty of believers without exception to be immersed in the name of Jesus? So do we. Are they disposed to look upon such as have neglected, whether from inattention or prejudice, to perform this duty, as mistaken Christians? We also consider them in the same light. In what respect then are we guilty of dispensing with divine laws? Merely because we are incapable of perceiving that an involuntary mistake on this subject, disqualifies for christian communion. But how extremely unjust to load us, on that account, with the charge of assuming a dispensing power, when the only ground on which we maintain our opinion, whether true or false, is our conviction that it is founded on a legitimate interpretation of the oracles of God. The dispute is not concerning their authority, but

their meaning; and we dispense with baptism in no other sense, than that of denying it to be in all cases essential to communion; in which, whether we are mistaken or not, is a point open to controversy; but to be guilty first of a misnomer in defining our sentiments, and afterwards to convert an odious and erroneous appellation into an argument, is the height of injustice.

With what propriety our practice is compared to that of the church of Rome, in confining the communion to one kind, the intelligent reader will be at no loss to perceive. In that as in various other instances, that Church in order to raise the dignity of the priesthood, assumes a power

* "It must, I think, be acknowledged," says Mr. Booth,

even by our brethren themselves, that we have as good a warrant for omitting an essential branch of an ordinance, or to reverse the order in which the constituent parts of an ordinance were originally administered, as we have to lay aside a divine institution, or to change the order in which two different appointments were first fixed. And if so, were a reformed and converted Catholic, still retaining the popish error of communion in one kind only, desirous of having fellowship with our brethren at the Lord's table; they must if they would act consistently, on their present hypothesis, admit him to partake of the bread, though from a principle of conscience, he absolutely refused the wine in that sacred institution."-Booth's Apology, page 51.

of mutilating a divine ordinance. We are chargeable with no mutilation, nor presume in the smallest particular to innovate in the celebration of either sacraments; we merely refuse to acknowledge that dependence, one upon the other, on which the confidence of our opponents is so ill sustained by the silence of scripture.

It

We will close this part of the discussion by remarking that there is a happy equivocation in the word dispense, which has contributed not a little to its introduction into the present controversy. may either mean that we do not insist upon baptism as an indispensable condition of communion, in which sense the charge is true, but nothing to the purpose, since it is a mere statement, in other words, of our actual practice. Or it may intend that we knowingly and deliberately deviate from the injunctions of scripture; a serious accusation, which requires not to be asserted, but proved.

SECTION IV.

Our supposed opposition to the universal suffrages of the church considered.

IN admitting to our communion those whom we esteem unbaptized, we are accused of a presumptuous departure from the sentiments of all parties and denominations throughout the christian world, who however they may have differed upon other subjects, have unanimously concurred in considering baptism as a necessary preliminary to communion.*

*This charge is urged with much declamatory vehe. mence by Mr. Booth in his Apology:-" A sentiment so peculiar, and a conduct so uncommon," he says, "in regard to this institution, ought to be well supported by the testimony of the Holy Ghost. For were all the christian churches now in the world asked, except those few who plead for free communion, whether they thought it lawful to admit unbaptized believers to fellowship at the Lord's table, there is reason to believe they would readily unite in the declaration of Paul, we have no such custom, neither the churches of God that were before us. Yes, considering the novelty of their sentiments and conduct, and what a contradiction they are to the faith and order of the whole christian church, considering that it was never disputed, as far as I can learn, prior