in error in their peculiar views, because they are a minority, so Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists, are all in error, because they also are severally minorities.

But further; since, according to this doctrine, a minority must be in the wrong, a majority must, consequently, be in the right; and Baptists appear, upon closer investigation, to be in the right on this ground. 1. All hold, with Baptists, that unbaptized believers ought to be baptized. 2. A majority hold, with them, that baptism does not regenerate. 3. A majority hold, with them, that the faith of the parent is not the foundation of the child's right to baptism. 4. A majority hold, with them, that the right of all adults to baptism is not the foundation of the baptism of infants; and 5. A majority hold, with them, that the promises to parents, the baptism of households, the alleged holiness of the children of a Christian parent, and the blessing pronounced upon some little children by our Lord, are not sufficient grounds for infant-baptism. Although, therefore, the majority deny the Baptist conclusion, the majority admit the Baptist arguments from which that conclusion legitimately follows. The Baptist arguments, tried by this test of majorities, are sound, and therefore the legitimate conclusion from those arguments must be sound also.

Nay, tried by this test, the whole doctrine of infant-baptism must fall. For that doctrine, if true, must rest upon some foundation; but by this test it has none. The direct evidence from the New Testa

ment is thought by the majority to be insufficient, and therefore is so. Baptismal regeneration, for the same reason, is no foundation for it; and a supposed covenant with believing parents, and a supposed right of all sincere applicants to baptism, are, by the same test, equally exploded. No foundation of infant-baptism can be adduced which the majority of Christians do not repudiate; that doctrine has, therefore, no foundation; and the Baptists must be right in rejecting it.

A majority of Christians, indeed, uphold infantbaptism, but since their arguments for it are mutually destructive, their common conclusion must be invalidated. Most persons superficially look no further than the common conclusion; but what is the value of a conclusion built on contradictory reasonings? No majority can make it plausible. If all agreed in the proofs of the divine institution of infant-baptism, then their authority would be more formidable to their dissentient brethren. But how stands the case? One class believes that infants ought to be baptized because baptism regenerates ; which reason being erroneous, the practice of infantbaptism, if built on that alone, must be erroneous too. A second class believes that infants ought to be baptized because they are included with their parents in the covenant of grace; and this reason also being erroneous, infant-baptism, if built upon it, must be likewise erroneous. A third class believes that infants ought to be baptized because all applicants ought to be, and since this reason also is erro

neous, if infant-baptism rests upon it, it must be likewise erroneous. Since, then, each of these false reasons is unable to sanction the practice, all of them together are unable to sanction it; and infantbaptism, which remains without a single solid foundation, must be treated as an error, though upheld by the conclusion of the majority.

CHAPTER IV.

THE EFFECTS OF BAPTISM.

BEING created to the end that we may love and serve our Creator, we have, on the contrary, rebelled against him. For this we must obtain pardon through the Lord Jesus Christ, who has borne the sins of all believers in his own body on the tree, 1 Pet. ii. 24; 2 Cor. v. 21. But as those only receive the forgiveness of their sins who trust in Christ, all men need the influence of the Holy Spirit, through which alone they can obtain saving faith, John, iii. 16, 36; Rom. iii. 19-28; John, vi. 44; Acts, ii. 47; xi. 21; xiii. 48; 1 Cor. iii. 5. All are thus called to give themselves up to the service of God the Father, through faith in God the Son, by the aid of God the Holy Spirit; to die to sin, and begin a new life of devotedness to the Triune God: to yield themselves up to God their Creator, Preserver, Benefactor, and King; to the Lord Jesus Christ, their Redeemer and Mediator; and to the Holy Spirit, their Sanctifier: to consecrate themselves to the Triune God.

All this must be done openly. Since God is our Father, we must honour him as such; since the Lord Jesus Christ has died to save us, we must confess him before men; since the Holy Spirit has converted and sanctified us, we must acknowledge his work. Hence, some solemn and public profession of faith in the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, naturally follows from a real subjection of heart to the Father through the Son by the Holy Spirit. The Church of Christ, likewise, which is the society of Christ's disciples, ought not to receive into fellowship as brethren those who would disgrace it either by false doctrine or by a discreditable life. Each church, therefore, should ask some public profession of faith and of consecration to God from all its members before they are admitted. Both these objects are secured by the appointed rite of baptism. As Christ will confess us openly before the universe, if we are his true disciples (Matt. xxv.), so we ought to own him openly before men, Matt. x. 32. We must confess him everywhere, before all men, through our whole lives and it is right that we should enter on this life by a public and solemn act of profession. Baptism is that appointed act. Each Christian confesses Christ at the Lord's Supper. But this Supper, while expressing faith and discipleship, does not distinctly express either the renunciation of sin or consecration in a new life to the Triune God. In the Supper, likewise, the whole Church confesses Christ, and each believer is undistinguished from the rest: but baptism is an individual and often a solitary act,

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