THE MILLENNIAL HARBINGER.

-- EXTRA --

No. 3. BETHANY, VIRGINIA: MONDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1831. Vol. II.

      NO person has evinced more candor and more ingenuity in opposing Immersion for the Remission of Sins, than my friend Andrew Broaddus. But human nature, he says, is prone to extremes, and, therefore, candid and ingenious men sometimes are found in the opposite extremes upon matters of even the plainest import. Thus some make a saviour of baptism, and others labor to save men without it. For our part, we only preach baptism for the remission of sins, and the Holy Spirit for holiness; and thus represent God as saving us, in the words of Paul, "by the washing of regeneration, AND the renewing of the Holy Spirit."

      Our friend Broaddus gives to baptism no instrumentality at all in the work of salvation. It only indicates, he says, "that the subject, a pardoned sinner, (yes, a pardoned sinner,) is openly and formally received into the Lord's service;" and that the pledge is openly and formally given that he devotes himself to Christ by thus visibly, or externally putting on Christ." p. 89. It is but a mutual pledge between God and the pardoned sinner. This is its moral and religious value in the christian institution--a mutual pledge of an open and formal reception into the Lord's service. Truly this is a great matter; and no wonder that those who view it thus should make an announcement a month before that such persons are going to be openly and formally received into the service! Unfortunate it was for the jailor to have been immersed at night; for Saul and the eunuch, and myriads more, to have been immersed privately; for it was to them no pledge of an open and formal reception into the service. "Would," adds our pious friend, "that all who are baptized felt and continued to feel the sacred force of this mutual pledge!"

      Ah me! how fond are good men of their own inventions! This "mutual pledge," how dear to its author and inventor! He prays not that all might feel the sacred force of "he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved," or "be immersed every one of you for the remission of sins," but that all may feel the force of the mutual pledge! which saying occurs not in all the oracles of God. But this only in proof of his own position, that human nature is prone to extremes.

      Desiring most sincerely the recovery of my quondam brother from the extreme into which he has run, and many with him, I will most studiously in these remarks endeavor to meet fairly and fully his [1] arguments, objections, and difficulties. I can in all good conscience call him who searches the hearts of all to witness, that I attempt this with full conviction that he is mistaken in his views of immersion; that he misrepresents mine; and, that I am most benevolently disposed to him, and still willing to fraternize with him under Jesus Christ.

      Andrew, for I would rather he would call me Alexander than Mr. C. and, therefore, I call him Andrew, has conceived a great veneration for his "host of evangelical writers from the era of the Reformation," and no doubt he thinks for reasons good and relevant. These I am sure have caused many a candid student of the Bible to err. I am one of that class. My early preachings, and writings too, might be adduced in proof of it. Less than twenty years ago I could have said Amen to almost every page of the pamphlet before me. Then, too, I boasted of the Bible and the whole host of evangelical writers; and then, indeed, Andrew would have been enrolled by me as one of the host of evangelical writers on "Living Faith," and every other essential point. But I thank the Father of Mercies, with my whole heart, that the charm or spell which held me to that host has long since been dissipated, and that I now call no man master or father on earth in evangelical affairs. God has shown me their weaknesses, their errors--and therefore I am willing to be slandered and reviled by such evangelical writers as Abner W. Clopton, W. T. Brantley, cum multis aliis of the same school, for preferring the simple testimony of the Apostles to all the evangelical writers in the Church of Rome or out of it.

      These evangelical writers have failed to fill the churches which they builded with true-hearted christians. What shall we think of the renewal of the hearts of these prayerless, Christless worldlings, which have filled so many congregations of the most evangelical sects in the land! How many hundred Baptist and Presbyterian congregations of these evangelical converts can be found, a large majority of which seldom or never pray to God in their families, or spend an hour in the week in their closets, or by their firesides, in the exercises of devotion! How many churches are there, even among the Regular Baptists, who plead for special regeneration before baptism, and for "pardoned sinners" as the only subjects of baptism, composed of from 50 to 200 members, with not more than sometimes one, and sometimes two or three persons to the hundred, who pretend to keep up any of the forms of godliness in their families, except a stale "grace before meat"--who appear not, even in their forms of religion, to worship God in spirit and in truth--I can readily conceive of the form of godliness without the power, but not so easily of the power without the form.

      Our greatest objection to the systems which we oppose is their impotency on the heart. Alas! what multitudes of prayerless, saintless, Christless, joyless hearts, have crowded christianity out of the congregations by their experiences before baptism! They seem to have had all their religion before they professed it. They can relate [2] no experience since baptism comparable to that professed before this "mutual pledge" was tendered and received.

      It was the indubitable proofs of the superabundance of this fruit which caused me first to suspicion the far famed tree of evangelical orthodoxy. That cold heartedness; that stiff and mercenary formality; that tithing of mint, anise, and dill; that negligence of mercy, justice, truth, and the love of God, which stalked through the communions of sectarian altars; that apathy and indifference about "thus saith the Lord;" that zeal for human prescriptions; and above all, that willing ignorance of the sayings and doings of Jesus Christ and his Apostles, which so generally appeared, first of all created, fostered, and matured my distrust in the reformed systems of evangelical sectaries. Communion with me was communion of kindred souls, immersed into one spirit--congenial spirits, hearts touched with the love of God, that celestial magnet which turns our aspirations and adorations to him who washed us from our sins in his own blood, and made us kings and priests to God.

      To sit in the same pew; to gather round the same pulpit; to put our names to the same covenant, or subscription list; to contribute for a weekly sermon; to lisp the same opinions, extracted from the same creed, always appeared to me unworthy bonds of union or communion, and therefore my soul abhorred them as substitutes for the love of God shed abroad in the heart, for the communion of the Holy Spirit. "If a man would give all the substance of his house as a substitute for love, it should be utterly contemned."

      The Divine Philosopher preached reformation by addressing himself to the heart. We begin with the heart. "Make the tree good," then good fruit may be expected. To this point all our labors tend, and, therefore, judge, candid reader, with what astonishment we heard Andrew (page 1) preface his defence of the popular notions of faith, baptism, &c. by telling us "that the great error which lies at the bottom of Mr. C's theory, of the actual forgiveness of sins in baptism, appears to consist in an undervaluing of the exercises of the heart, and attaching to external conduct or action the importance which really belongs to these exercises."--Every No. of the Christian Baptist, from the essay on "the Christian Religion, No. 1," to the last number of the Millennial Harbinger, disproves the above suspicion and imputation.

      But this appears to be the error of all sects, in a greater or less degree; they set about mending the heart, as preliminary to that which alone can create a new heart. Jesus gives as the philosophy of his scheme in an address to a sinner of that time--"Your sins," says he, "are forgiven you; go, and sin no more." He first changes the sinner's state, "not external but internal," and then says, "Go, and sin no more." He frankly forgave the debt. The sinner loved him.

      There was much of this philosophy in the question, "Who loves most: he that was forgiven five hundred pence, or he that was forgiven fifty? How much does he love who is not forgiven at all?" Aye, that question brings us onward a little to the reason why the first act [3] of obedience to Jesus Christ should be baptism into his name, and that for the remission of sins.

      But now we speak of the exercises of the heart. While any man believes the words of Jesus, "out of the heart proceed the actions which defile the man," he can never lose sight of the heart, as the object on which all evangelical arguments are to terminate, and as the fons et principium, the fountain and origin of all piety and humanity.

      It was an inquiry into this matter which gave all importance to immersion for the remission of sins. The reader curious to understand this subject will find, in No. 2 vol. 1 Christian Baptist, for September 1823, page 32, 2d edition, in a letter from my father signed T. W. the first developement which appeared in this century of this capital item of what he calls "the apostolic gospel," with special reference to the heart. Before my debate with Mr. McCalla in the following month, we had much reasoning and debating on this topic. It was not hastily, nor crudely, nor hazardously introduced into that discussion. He and brother W. Scott, after much deliberation, concurred with me at that time in the opinion, that I should exhibit in that discussion immersion for the remission of sins, and exhort to an immediate attendance upon this institution as commanded in the 2d chapter of the Acts of the Apostles for that purpose. This was fully done in that discussion, and the importance of that view of immersion, because of its influence upon the heart, is fully demonstrated in the letter alluded to. Now how my friend Andrew, with that and a hundred similar documents before him, which he had doubtless read, could so misrepresent our views of the importance of the exercises of the heart is, I think, to be attributed to the obfuscating influence of system, to the obliquities of those evangelical writers, rather than to any perversity of mind or wish to misrepresent.

      Once for all let it be distinctly noted, that we appreciate nothing in religion which tends not directly and immediately, proximately and remotely, to the purification and perfection of the heart. Paul acts the philosopher fully once, and if we recollect right but once, in all his writings upon this subject. It has been for many years a favorite topic with me. It is in his first Epistle to Timothy--"Now the end of the commandment, or gospel, is love, out of a pure heart, out of a good conscience, out of faith unfeigned." Faith unfeigned brings a person to remission, or to a good conscience; a good conscience precedes, in the order of nature, a pure heart; and that is the only soil in which love, that plant of celestial origin, can grow. This is our philosophy of christianity, of the gospel. And thus it is the wisdom and power of God to salvation. We proceed upon these as our axiomata in all our reasonings, preachings, writings--1st, unfeigned faith; 2d, a good conscience; 3d, a pure heart; 4th, love. The testimony of God apprehended produces unfeigned or genuine faith; faith obeyed produces a good conscience. This Peter defines to be the use of baptism, the answer of a good conscience. This produces a pure heart, and then the consummation is love--love to God and man. [4]

      Paul's order or arrangement is adopted by us as infallible: Testimony--faith unfeigned--remission, or a good conscience--a pure heart--love. Preaching, praying, singing, commemorating, meditating, all issue here. "Happy the pure in heart, for they shall see God." These things premised, we proceed to detect the errors in the reasoning and in the system advanced by our friend Andrew in his Extra Examined.

      Having reduced my estimate of heart exercises down to nothing, he starts with this as his grand postulatum, just as Euclid builds his science of geometry, upon a point which has no magnitude. His whole pamphlet rests upon this assumption, as gratuitous as was his who represented Paul as teaching "Let us do evil that good may come." Hear him, page 6, at his starting point--'From this defect in Mr. C's estimate of heart exercises it came to pass that he so heavily censured the definition of conversion as given by Christianos, viz: that it is a turning of the heart to holiness, &c.--See M. H. Vol, 1, p. 155." "Hence too," he adds, "it is that he considers baptism to be the proper scriptural conversion--regeneration--new birth." I have quoted these words that the reader may perceive on what ground it is that my friend Andrew begins to build. These are his assumptions: I will abundantly prove that these are gross errors, and that they tincture every thing in his pamphlet from the first to the last page. I turned over to vol. 1 p.155, and to the pages referred to, and find that it was the new datum for understanding participles, submitted by Andrew, which is so heavily censured, and not the exercises of the heart! His representing conversion as a mere "turning of the heart to holiness" is also censured, because it is not the import of the word convert, in any passage in the New Testament. But how any grammarian, logician, or common sense reasoner could infer that the exercises of the heart are thus undervalued, is to be explained upon the principle that there is a disease called jealousy, and another called the spiritual jaundice. Because I do not define the Greek word Epistrophe, or the English imperative "be converted," by "turn the heart to holiness," therefore heart exercises in religion are worth nothing! I should not like to have any of my political rights tried before judges who thus discriminate by their hearts and not by their heads, unless, forsooth, they were my very best friends.

      I do, indeed, believe that mere mental converts are not christian converts; and in the very passage to which he refers, I very explicitly declare that the hearts of all christian converts are thoroughly changed. My words in that passage are--"True, they do love truth, goodness, holiness; but they show this lore by obedience. I am for purity and holiness of life in all disciples." p. 155.

      The most worldly sect in christendom are those who confine all religion to the heart. The heart is with them the temple of the Lord. They care not for bread, wine, water, sacred songs, nor holy days in religion--the heart is all. To many of these talkers about their heart religion I would say, "Repent and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out." But am I for this an enemy to the exercises of the [5] heart! I will repress my feelings on this occasion, and simply ask the reader, Was there, from the data now before him--and there is not a hundredth part of the evidences to be found in my writings here presented--was there ever, I ask, a more gratuitous assumption than this starting point of the Extra examiner? In the Extra itself there is one proposition on which great stress is laid, viz: the 7th; and in this proposition there is a full refutation of this assumption. It is in these words: "Though a change of heart necessarily precedes, it is in no case equivalent to, and never to be identified with a change of state."--See also page 35, Extra No. 1, for a full refutation of this imputation.

      Some persons are always canting about heart religion, and condemning others for the want of the sanctuary tone, and good old puritanical sigh; but into their sanctuary my soul fears to enter. Cowards talk much about valor; rakes about chastity; thieves about honesty; liars about truth; misers about generosity; and hypocrites about heart religion. This I have often noticed, and again repeat it. But do I in so saying deprecate the exercises of the heart? By no means. But in fact I have found most true and cordial devotion where there is the least talk about the heart, and the least godly sincerity and real holiness of spirit where there is the most said about it. This may be an excuse for my friend Andrew's wholly misunderstanding me; for I would rather impute an error so palpable to his understanding than to his heart.

      "With these general introductory remarks we are," says my friend Broaddus, "about to enter more particularly into our proposed examination. Candid indeed! Reader, this thread runs to the end of the web. These assumptions, then, are laid down as his premises!

      The twelve first pages, called his No. 1, are devoted to the first six propositions in the Extra, occupying nine pages of that essay. "These six propositions are admitted," he says, "for they are clearly established by the author."

      "As engrossed by Mr. C. into "one leading proposition," they stand thus:--"The converts made to Jesus Christ by the Apostles, were taught to consider themselves pardoned, justified, sanctified, reconciled, adopted, and saved; and were addressed as pardoned, justified, sanctified, reconciled, adopted, and saved persons, by all who first preached the gospel of Christ."

      "But though we cordially agree to this whole proposition, and every part thereof, we are far from concurring with Mr. C's comment, and the use which he afterwards makes of it. "It may be expedient to remark" (says he) "that all these terms are expressive not of any quality of mind--not of any personal attribute of body, soul, or spirit; but each of them represents, and all of them together represent a state or condition." By state or condition Mr. C. appears obviously to mean what the old Divines used to call a relative change, in contradistinction to what they called a real change: that is, a state in which the subject stands in a new relation;--not including, in the meaning of the term, any moral change or alteration in the subject himself."

      Before we remark on the preceding, we shall hear him speak his apprehensions of these preliminary propositions--

      "It appears to be in substance as follows:--

      "That the converts or disciples of the New Testament are represented as pardoned, justified, sanctified, reconciled, adopted, and saved; and they being [6] the only persons in such a state, all others, of course, are in an unpardoned, unjustified, unsanctified, unreconciled, unadopted, and lost state.

      "That there is an act (meaning an external or bodily act) by which the state of a person thus condemned is changed: and that this act is baptism or christian immersion."

      Such is the ambiguity of even the most definite language, when taken from its connexions, that it may, by a little art or ingenuity, be made to speak a meaning at which the mind of its author revolts. Hence our friend is more successful in his No. 1 than in any other part of his pamphlet. But let us, in the spirit of candor and godly sincerity, reconsider this matter. The radical mistakes or misapprehensions of our examiner appear to be the following--

      He supposes the terms justified, pardoned, sanctified, reconciled, adopted and saved, to represent not all of them together, nor apart, simply a state or condition, but as indicating moral qualities. That I do not misapprehend his meaning will appear from his calling this an "assumption" of mine, and from his saying, p. 8-9--

      "If all these terms express only the idea of state, none of them representing quality, or moral attribute; then I must own that I have been greatly in the dark as to the meaning of some of them; and so, it would seem, must have been all the theological writers whose works have been under my perusal.

      "Let us see. "Pardoned, justified, sanctified, reconciled, adopted, saved." Does the reader observe nothing in any of these terms, which, according to his acceptation of them, conveys the idea of quality or attribute of body, soul, or spirit? What does he think of the term "sanctified?" of the term "reconciled?" of the term "saved," involving in it the idea of a deliverance, not merely from guilt, but from the polluting power of sin? Do these terms represent no moral change--no quality of mind? We shall attend to them more particularly presently. The fact appears to be, that some of the above mentioned terms are indeed expressive of a mere relative state; but others involve the qualities of mind which belong to that state. And in this we see a beautiful fitness and propriety. It is perfectly fit and proper that so it should be:--that the privileges and the character of the disciples of Christ should both be represented, and often combined;--their relative and their real change both expressed, in the addresses and terms by which they are designated."

      Thus I have placed him fairly before our readers. Now let me ask, what proof has he adduced to show that all this is not gratis dictum, a mere gratuitous assumption. He asks his reader, what does he observe in all these terms!! And in the following pages, 10, 11, & 12, admits that pardoned, justified, and adopted, represent a state; while sanctified, reconciled, and saved, frequently represent the intrinsic character of believers.

      These distinctions are, I must say, in all candor, apparently made to suit a theory. But that I may expose fully the mistake in the mind of our friend, I will first strike at what I call his radical error. He supposes that "Mr. Campbell appears obviously to mean by the term state what the old Divines used to call a relative change, in contradistinction to what they called a real change." Now if I may be allowed to explain myself, I must say that I mean a real change; and let me add, there is no writer of any note, among either the old or new Divines known to me, that ever contrasted relative with real. Outward [7] and inward are proper contrasts, but relative and real are not. But I may, perhaps, become still more bold and affirm that there is no change more real than a relative change. My friend will tell me this is an assumption. So my using any word in the English language according to its proper meaning is an assumption, on his premises. Of such assumptions I will always be guilty; and I submit it to all persons of discernment, whether there can be any thing said or written intelligibly unless we assume that words represent the stipulated ideas which lexicographers have assigned them.

      But I must prove that there is no change more real than a relative change. Have enemies become friends, real friends? Is not this a real change? And pray what is it but a relative change? They now stand in the relation of friends; formerly in the relation of enemies, But a change, a real change in their minds, words, actions, has taken place; and what is it but in relation to one another? No other change in their feelings, thoughts, words, and actions, but in relation to one another, has taken place; consequently it is a relative change. Their powers, physical, mental, moral; their faculties of understanding, their passions and affections, are the same as before; but not in relation to one another. The change is wholly relative, and yet no change is more real. I hope I shall be excused from multiplying comments or proofs upon a point which all must see. Has a woman really changed her state by entering into the bonds of matrimony? Has a citizen really changed his political relations, his country, or his government? Has a person really changed from debtor to creditor, from enmity to love, from serving the devil to serving the Lord? All these are real changes, and they are all relative. It will be relieving the mind of Andrew to correct him on this one point, for I see him entangled in the meshes of this net, curiously wrought from his Alpha to his Omega.

      But a more subtle sophisma termini, a more subtle mistake of the import of the term state has greatly bewildered him. He regards the term state as only meaning outward relation, as not at all expressive of any thing inward or spiritual. "Justified, pardoned, adopted, express (he says) a state merely relative"--but sanctified, reconciled, and saved, represent "characters," "intrinsic quality;" and the word "holiness" represents "a principle possessed;" and the actions flowing from that principle called holiness, are "called holy actions"?--"reconciliation is with Mr. C. one of the outside things;" yet in the next breath he says, "our author does not distinguish between the internal and the external." And why does my friend distinguish for me, and tell his readers that with me all is external, while he declares I make no such distinctions!! I wish he had saved himself, the reader, and me, the trouble of examining a set of distinctions which I never made, and which no wise man will ever make. All this grows out of the mental confusion superinduced by a too respectful attention to the whole host of "evangelical writers from the era of the Reformation." A person of my friend's usual perspicuity could not have been so completely confounded with unmeaning distinctions, had he acted more [8] independently, and paid less regard to evangelical writers nursed and cherished in the bosom of Popery.

      But to set this matter in its true light, and to define words which I thought unnecessary to define in the Extra, No. 1, not supposing then that even the obliquities of system could so far bewilder any person on the words state and character as is now apparent in the pamphlet before me, I will now approach the root of this confusion.

      State, in the religious acceptation, means relation. It applies to men and things in all the attitudes in which they can stand to one another. If we classify human relations into natural, political, and moral, then we classify the states into natural, political, and moral. There are, then, natural, political, and moral states. Hence, among all writers and speakers it is applied to things mental, physical, moral, religious. Nothing more common than the phrase, state of mind state of health, state of religion, state of morals, state of slavery, &c.

      Every state in which man exists permits him, and, indeed, requires him, to form the character and to cultivate the qualities which comport with that state. Hence we have character, good, bad, and indifferent, applied to magistrates and subjects, masters and servants, husbands and wives, parents and children, brothers and sisters, &c. &c. The standard of perfection in character is conformity to the nature of the state. He that acts conformably to the state or relation of a son is a good son, and he that does not is a bad son; and so of all the others.

      Now the terms pardoned, justified, adopted, sanctified, reconciled, and saved, represent states or relations. They apply to persons as moral or rational agents. They are sometimes, also, figuratively applied to things. Thus we are said to adopt an argument, to justify an action, to sanctify a day, to reconcile an assertion, to save the crop, &c. But when applied to persons they represent states, natural, political and moral. But in relation to God they represent religious states only. In this sense did we use them. Hence they all represent spiritual relations. The relation in which my soul stands to God, who is a spirit, must of necessity be a spiritual relation: for standing before him the moral governor as a moral agent, I stand in a moral relation. To call these "outward or external relations" is at variance with fact and the proper use of words. But we shall relieve the reader by letting him hear our friend speak a paragraph from page 9 on these terms--

      "That the terms pardoned, justified, adopted, express a state merely relative, is readily admitted. They represent something done for us, not in us. They are expressive of extrinsic acts in our favor, which, in their nature, do not affect the qualities or exercises of the mind, though in their tendency and effect they may do so. Thus, a criminal may be pardoned; a man wrongfully accused may be justified, a stranger may be adopted; while, in each case, the subject may remain, as to personal character, the same; for these acts produce only relative change, or what Mr. C. calls a change of state. But the case appears materially different with regard to the other terms, sanctified, reconciled, saved."

      How arbitrary this dividing of six terms into twice three, and giving to the first three and to the last three different meanings! The first [9] three represent only a state; but the last, having a double meaning, represent both relation and character! How suitable to the theory! How happy it is that three words should be chosen in the first case which have but one meaning, and three in the second case which have double meanings, applicable to both state and character!

      The first three represent some things done for us, not in us; but the last three represent something done in us! In the old King's version I think I was wont to read of six things done for us: "Sanctify them through thy truth;" "he saved us;" "he hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ." These are the last three; and my friend A. B. remembers the first three things done for us. But it only appears to him that sanctified, reconciled, and saved represent qualities and characters. I confess this whole disquisition is one of the newest pieces of criticism I have met with.

      To sanctify is to separate to God, whether it be body, soul, or spirit. This all critics, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, will, and do affirm. It is applied in both Testaments to persons, places, things, animate and inanimate, and always means the same thing.

      God is said to sanctify persons. He sanctified Jesus, who was holy in the vulgar sense. "Say you of him whom the Father has sanctified," said Jesus. He has sanctified all the brotherhood. "But you are washed, justified, sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God." "Our food is sanctified by the word of God and prayer," &c. God is sanctified in the hearts of the saints: "Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts." When we separate any thing religiously, we are said to sanctify it; and when God sanctifies any thing to himself, he separates it. God is called the most holy, because he is infinitely separated from all impurity. Christians are as instantaneously sanctified as they are justified, adopted, or reconciled. They are sanctified when their whole person, body, soul, and spirit are separated to God. It is like proving that red represents a color, to prove that sanctification means separation to God.

      My friend Andrew relies upon such phrases as, "I am less than the least of all saints," "he comes with his saints;" to prove that saint represents qualities, or attributes of character; but as rationally might he adduce "I am the least of all the children--He comes with all his children," to prove that the word child represents not a state, but a quality or attribute of character.

      There is, let me observe, a character suitable to every state, and qualities compose this character. He that is in a justified state should, and will do justly, act righteously, and establish the character of a righteous man. He that is sanctified, or called a saint, will follow holiness, purity, and will act "as becometh saints," or sanctified persons. He that is adopted into the family of God will cultivate filial dispositions, and aspire after the dignity of a son of God.

      Having dwelt so long on this first of my friend Andrew's mistakes, or misapprehensions, and before finishing my remarks on these [10] terms, I proceed to notice his second great error, or mistake, which has perverted all his reasonings upon this most important topic. It will be found pretty strongly expressed in page 7, already quoted, in the following terms: "There is an act [meaning an external or bodily act] by which the state of a person thus condemned is changed, and that this act is baptism or christian immersion." His views of baptism as a mere external or bodily act, have exerted a very injurious influence upon his understanding. And is it possible that one of our most able and experienced Baptist preachers contemplates baptism in no other light than as a "mere outward bodily act!" No wonder, then, that he ascribes to it so little importance in the christian economy. Bodily exercise profiteth little, says Paul. Now we had been accustomed to consider christian immersion into the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, in water, as one of the most singular of all institutions ever ordained on earth because of many peculiarities, but on account of none more than this, that it was an act of the whole man, body, soul, and spirit. The soul of the intelligent subject is as fully immersed into the Lord Jesus, as his body is immersed in the water. His soul rises with the Lord Jesus, as his body rises out of the water; and into one spirit with all the family of God is he immersed. It is not like circumcising a Hebrew infant, or proselyting to Moses a Gentile adult. The candidate believing in the person, mission, and character of the Son of God, and willing to submit to him immediately, upon recognizing him, hastens to be buried with the Lord, and to rise with him, not corporeally, but spiritually with his whole soul.

      My friend Andrew Broaddus, with all his Baptist brethren, has been contending with the Paidos for many years about nothing but a mere external bodily act! In what a ridiculous plight does this ultraism of Andrew Broaddus place his sect and himself before the universe! Breaking communion with nine-tenths of the justified, pardoned, reconciled, adopted, sanctified, and saved, for, or on account of a mere external bodily act!!!

      If I dare counsel him and my friends Semple, Kerr, Brantly, and Clopton, I would advise them to go to Mr. Converse, the organ of the Presbyterians in Richmond, and say, "Brother Converse, you, with all believing Paidobaptists, Episcopalians, Methodists, and Quakers, are justified, pardoned, reconciled, adopted, sanctified, and saved; and we have been refusing fellowship with you all our lives, and contending about "a mere outward bodily act;" but we see our error, ask your pardon, surrender our arms and munitions of war, and will promise never again to contend with you about such superstitious usages as "mere external, outward, bodily immersion" in rivers, ponds, or baths. We have spent too much ink, paper, and breath already about a mere bodily act; but hereafter we will only plead for the essentials. Come, brother Converse, help us against these watery bigots. We care as little for water as yourself." This is, indeed, virtually doing in all quarters of the land; and by none more than by the author of the pamphlet before me. He deserves the thanks of more than Mr. Brantly. [11] Put these two errors side by side in the mind of any man; and can he say more for the truth than my friend has done in his pamphlet? He represents me as regarding pardoned, justified, sanctified, &c. as terms representing only an outward relation, expressive of no moral change, but mere extrinsic relation; and as agreeing with him that immersion is a mere outward bodily act. No room for the heart in such a scheme! What phantoms may arise to the eyes of him who believes in ghosts and apparitions, "tall and ghastly, that walk at dead of night, or take their stand o'er some new-made grave; and, strange to tell, vanish at the crowing of the cock!"

      But there is yet a graver point of view in which to consider this representation of that most sacred and significant of divine institutions, which is but once to be submitted to in the whole life of man. Indeed, on more mature reflection upon this stigma, this reproach upon the christian institution--immersion, a mere outward bodily act--I scarcely know how to repress my feelings. What! a christian minister to adopt the language of those who scoff at all religion! "What," says Voltaire, "a pretty fable, to damn to degradation in time, and to ruin in eternity, a whole race, with a few exceptions, for the mere outward bodily act of eating an apple! What venom in the teeth of Eve! What malignity in the bite of Adam! A whole race is lost for the sake of an apple! This is another Pandora's box! Angels were hurled to Tartarus for looking at themselves; and men are damned because a woman put her hand to her mouth!!" But the good intention of my friend Andrew comes in to extenuate this offence; and well for us that we are not under a government where a rash bodily act, like that of Uzzah, though dictated by the best intentions, must be avenged with the loss of life. But, reader, be admonished how you speak of bodily acts in obedience to divine institutions. Remember Eve, Adam, and all transgressors on the one hand. Remember Abel, Noah, Enoch, Moses, Abraham, down to the harlot Rahab on the other; and be cautious how you speak of bodily acts! Rather remember the sacrifice of a body on Mount Calvary, and talk not lightly of bodily acts. There is no such thing as outward bodily acts in the christian institution; and less than in all others, in the act of immersion. Then it is that the spirit, soul, and body of man become one with the Lord. Then it is that the power of the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit come upon us. Then it is that we are enrolled among the children of God, and enter the ark which will, if we abide in it, transport us to the Mount of God.

      A third error, of great magnitude, intimately allied to these two, and which runs through the whole system of my friend Andrew, and which I must also notice before I finish my strictures on the two preceding, is, his representing faith at one time as an essence or principle, and at another confounding it with its acts or fruits.

      My friend Andrew is occasionally enamored with, and speaks in glowing terms of faith by itself, without any act whatever: of pure [12] unmixed faith--a mere principle of action, working all the wonders of pardon, justification, adoption, &c.

      I am not metaphysician enough, nor have I got a pair of hair balances of such metaphysical correctness, and standard weights, to ascertain the gravity and value of sheer faith, stark naked faith, without body, parts, or substance; a principle of such ethereal purity as to have neither passion, action, nor affection in its nature, wrought into the heart too, without human or angelic hands, as the infusion of life from the breath of God into the red earth which constituted the body of Adam. I know this refined and pure abstract principle, yclep'd faith, is said to work by love; but the work of love is not the principle, but the operation, whether mental, moral, or physical, which flows from it. This pure faith is a pure metaphysical essence, fabricated by metaphysical machinery and curiously wrought into the heart without the interposition of eyes, ears, or hands; and yet it changes a man's relations towards the whole universe the instant it is created in the mind, before it has operated to will or to do!! This is the scholastic view of the matter, of the justifying, pardoning, sanctifying, adopting, reconciling, and saving essence or effluence of an essence increate.

      Reader, understandest thou this? If thou dost, thou canst shake hands with angels and handle spirits with exquisite sensibility. Now we vulgar, terrene, and earthly beings, who soar not on winged horses beyond the eagle's eye, cannot conceive of this impalpable, imperceptible essence; but faith with us is the belief of testimony apprehended and understood; and this testimony when apprehended induces us to receive the Lord Jesus as our Prophet, Priest, and King: for he is the object testified, and this testimony believed puts our souls in motion towards him; for the first motions of this truth believed are towards Jesus, into whose embrace we rush with all impetuosity so soon as we know where to find him. The consummation of the first motions of our souls is in our immersion into his death. Before immersion the soul has not found rest in him.

      A child opens its eyes and beholds its long absent mother. The instant it sees her, its whole person, soul, body, and spirit, is put in motion. It rises, walks, runs into her embrace. Its greetings, salutations, caresses await the encircling of her arms, and are never consummated till it lays its head upon her bosom. Thus with me stand faith and immersion. A sinner opens his eyes, and the light of the Sun of Righteousness fills them. He sees [or believes in] Jesus. This sight [belief] puts his spirit in motion. He hears his promises, rises, walks, runs to embrace him. He apprehends that he has been pleased to make the assignation, the meeting place, where he has first recorded his name. Into the name of the Lord he rushes; goes with him first into his grave, lies down with him in the mansion of the dead, rises with him, and follows in his affections his ascension into heaven. How morally beautiful are the espousals of a sinner to Jesus! O Lord! remove the veil from the eyes of those who read the New Testament! [13]

      And Mr. Brantly calls this the pernicious doctrine of A. Campbell! Lord, anoint his eyes with the true eye salve that he may see! And O that Andrew may become more like Simon Peter's brother!!

      But although Andrew would seem to make the essence or the principle of faith infused, the justification and sanctification of a sinner, he appears unwilling to rely upon it in his argument, and in practice he goes for all that he opposes: I say, in practice he will have a sinner justified by the acts of faith; and in argument, too, he virtually--yea, formally, goes for the act of faith as that which justifies. Of this I shall now attempt to convict himself and convince the reader. Reader, I feel no concern in convicting him, nor in convincing you, that in this pamphlet he establishes the principles which he labors to oppose for the mere purpose of fastening an inconsistency upon him, but for the sake of showing that in his own mind there is a lurking suspicion of his own reasoning, and frequently an open avowal of principles subversive of all his reasonings. It cannot be otherwise. Truth alone is consistent all through.

      Now let me only premise before introducing his definitions of justifying faith, that faith is faith, that love is love, and that hope is hope. In other words, faith is not its acts; the grape is not the vine; nor the apple the tree. If we confound pity and alms, faith and love, faith and embracing, faith and its exercise, there is an end to all reasoning, thinking, or speaking correctly upon the subject. Either a man is justified by stark naked faith alone, or he is justified by faith with its concomitants, adjuncts, or acts. One of these is true; the other is false. They are two propositions toto cœlo distinct. He that affirms that God approbates the person who simply pities the poor, affirms one proposition; and he that affirms that God approbates the man who not merely pities, but performs the bodily act of giving alms, affirms another proposition. They are not the same. He that is justified by faith, and he that is justified by the exercise of faith, are justified upon different principles. Now the latter appears to be the view of my friend Andrew. I shall permit him to speak for himself:--

      "God has inseparably connected a state of favor and acceptance with a holy change of heart, or the exercise of that faith which works by love." p. 15. The exercise of my eye is not my eye; the exercise of my tongue is not my tongue; the exercise of faith is not faith And is it possible we are agreed after all!!

      In the same page he affirms, "There is an inseparable connexion between the exercise of such faith and a state of favor and acceptance with God." To this I cordially assent. Only let the exercise of faith be according to the commandment. But, reader, observe the exercise of faith--the act of faith. What differs exercise of faith from act of faith? That is just, in this instance, the whole difference between Andrew and Alexander. And yet the former is orthodox, and the latter heterodox!

      But, reader, that you may have yet fuller evidence, I quote his great position which he opposes to the capital one in the Extra, page 16:-- [14]

      "In substance our position is this: That where the heart is changed to love the Saviour, or where the faith exists that works by love--there a change of state does ensue: in other words, that there is an inseparable connexion between the exercise of living faith, and a state of acceptance with God."

      Here are three efforts to exclude naked faith: 1st. "Where the heart is changed to love the Saviour." A curious definition of faith! 2d. "Where the faith exists which works by love." This is nearer what would suit his theory; but this is a new definition of faith. This is a combining of a scripture phrase with a human distinction. There is no faith thus defined in the New Testament. "Faith works by love;" but he that prefixes the article the, adds to God's word, and makes a new faith in contrast with one that works by some other principle or does not work at all; which is not found in the connexion where this phrase occurs. But he not only precedes this clause with an explanatory definition, but follows it up with his finishing developement. 3d. "There is an inseparable connexion between the exercise of living faith and a state of acceptance with God." Agreed again!! Yes, reader, Andrew and Alexander are one in this great matter. Show me the exercise of living faith, and I will show you something done; show me a living faith, and I will show you a motion of faith; for life without motion belongs not to our globe. The controversy now is not about naked faith, but the exercise of faith--about the motions of a living faith.

      In passing along I may remark here, that the above proposition is the only one which Andrew attempts to prove by scripture testimony, as directly contravening the whole scope of the Extra. In proof of it the quotes John v. 24. vi. 47. Acts xiii. 39. Romans v. 1. 1 John, iv. 7. not one of which applies to his definition, as the reader may see by comparing them with the words of the proposition. Not one of these texts speaks of the exercise of a living faith; not one of them mentions a change of heart, or an inseparable connexion between the exercise or the principle of faith, and a state of acceptance. The connexion was in the mind of Andrew, not in the words quoted. But I am not about to examine every period and to detect every sophism in 56 pages. This would require an octavo of 300 pages. I strike at the two or three pillars; and these demolished, each reader may make his own use of the ruins.

      To return. I might quote many sayings in the pamphlet to show that the exercise of faith is always in the mind of my examiner, and that while he admits that faith is the belief of the truth, he discards this in the article of pardon of sin, and substitutes for it the exercise of faith.

      In page 37 he makes his meaning plain: "But though I do not deny that a belief of the truth may properly be said to he faith," [for so the Holy Spirit defines it,] "yet according to the New Testament use of that term," [rather he should have said my use of that term,] "evangelical faith" [what liberty men will take with God's word!] Evangelical faith! Why not angelical faith? "evangelical faith is such a belief as involves [yes, involves!] "or takes with it a receiving of the truth in [15] the love of it." But "it takes with it" implies that this is not of it. If my hand receives or takes with it my cane, it will not follow that any cane is a part of my hand! But let us hear him out and his proof: "And when justification, when salvation is promised to faith, or a belief of the gospel, belief in these connexions," [but not in other connexions!!!] as Mr. Fuller says, is not to be understood exclusive of receiving the Saviour, coming to him, or trusting in him, but as supposing or including these exercises." Both the Andrews (Broaddus and Fuller) and Alexander are one again!! Strange, indeed!! What somersets! The faith that justifies includes these exercises--"trusting in," "coming to," and "receiving the Saviour." This is all my ground. "To as many as received him to them gave he power to become the sons of God"--which were born of God; and that, as defined by the Great Teacher, is to be "born of water and the Spirit." Faith, even if it be the belief of the gospel, will not obtain remission of sins, or justify a person, unless it includes three acts or exercises--trusting in Christ, coming to him, and receiving him. Three acts. Well, agreed again. "As many of you as have been immersed into Christ have put him on." This is Paul's union of three acts. I will go for Paul's one as including these three. But rather than treat the two Andrews as heathen men and publicans, I will go with them and affirm that faith must have, or include, or take with it, three exercises before it justifies a sinner!! And have the mountains again brought forth a mouse? What a smoke! What a noise! What a confusion of figures for nothing!

      My brother Andrew, (for it appears if unity of opinion constitutes brethren, we are, after all, brethren,)--my brother Andrew gives me great credit for "tact, ingenuity, and fertility of mind." Would that I deserved them! But, really, I must return him the loan with usury: He has exhibited no little of the three [what charms in the number three!] in writing 56 pages of examinations and cross [enough] examinations, while in heart we are one all the while.

      Happy to find myself with the two Andrews, each kindly sustaining an arm, the one on my right and the other on the left, I will now let Andrew Broaddus tell the whole story over again by quoting a part of three pages.--p. 45, 46, 47.--

      I do not like the meagre quotations which my friend has given in his "Extra Examined." He seems afraid, on sundry occasions, to let me be fully heard. I think we owe the same politeness to an author in reviewing him, we do to a gentleman in conversing with him. We ought to let him do justice to himself--to permit him to explain himself. The only retaliation which I shall inflict upon my friend Andrew in this case will be to give him a larger space. He shall have full measures.

      "But what is that faith which performs these wonders;--which is necessary to salvation;--which entitles the subject to the privilege of baptism, and renders it a duty incumbent on him, as an avowed subject of the King of Zion? Something has been said on this point, in a former part of this work; but the importance of the matter may render it expedient that we pay to it some further attention. With a few remarks on this subject, we shall draw to a close: and I shall trust to the reader's indulgence, if, in substance, I repeat some of the [16] ideas which were before advanced. What, then, is the faith of which we speak? Is it merely the assent of the mind, upon historic testimony, to the fact that Jesus of Nazareth lived, and died, and rose again; and gave evidence that he was the Son of God and the true Messiah? No: for while experience testifies that we have really assented to all this, while destitute of the exercises and fruits of true religion; the Scripture gives evidence that persons may believe on Christ, who have not that genuine faith which is connected with salvation. John xii. 42, 43. "Among the chief rulers many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the Synagogue; for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God." Again: is such an assent to be considered genuine saving faith, even when accompanied by an external course of morality, and an orderly, religious deportment. I answer, No: unless there be no regard due to the state of the heart, in the sight of God, and to the principles whence our actions flow.

      "The question then recurs, In what consists that faith, the object of our inquiry? We shall not encumber this question with the lumber of the schools, nor with the metaphysics of "mystic Doctors." Simply, then, I would say, this evangelic faith consists in a hearty belief of the gospel method of salvation--involving a cordial reception of Christ, and an unreserved dependence on him as the appointed Saviour. See Romans x. 10. John i. 12. 2 Tim. i. 12. This faith, however, is accompanied by certain exercises of mind, which, in the nature of the case, are necessary to its existence. We cannot perceive the fitness and glory of Christ's character as the Saviour, without a conviction of our own sinful and needy condition. We cannot cordially receive the Saviour without repentance and abhorrence of sin; nor shall we ever trust in him until we renounce all vain dependence. Hence the necessity of these exercises of mind, as inculcated in the Scriptures; exercises (I may add) which are witnessed by the experience of every vital christian.

      "Such is the faith which we consider requisite to acceptance with God,--such "the things which accompany salvation." But as to the manner in which these exercises are effected; whether rapidly or more gradually; whether by impressions of a more powerful or more gentle character; these are circumstances which we think do not affect the essence of the matter. Confident we are, that some who are the subjects of these exercises, are waiting, through a mistaken calculation, for some marvellous display of power which they have never experienced; when they ought to arise and obey the Saviour, and thus find their strength increased. And confident we are, that too many, who have not this faith and these exercises, though they assent to the facts of the gospel, and feel, in some measure, the awful force of divine truth,--are presumptuously delaying the concerns of their salvation, while they endeavor to persuade themselves that they are waiting for divine influence. No! they are not waiting for divine influence, but resisting that force of truth which they already feel. Reader, if thou art one of this description, remember there is enough of divine influence already for thy condemnation. Awake and repent!"

      This is better, far better still. Thrice happy am I now in the parting scene. This is the close of the review of the Extra. What a closing scene!

      Mark you, reader, I answer NO, exanimo, to all the questions which he thus answers. There is a great improvement here in his finishing touch, in the last tint given to faith. It consists in a hearty belief of the gospel method of salvation, faith, repentance, immersion, remission, the Holy Spirit, the resurrection, and eternal life through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. It is not faith simplex, but that faith which justifies, which regards the whole gospel method of salvation--"involving a cordial reception of Christ and an unreserved dependence on him as the appointed Saviour." This goes the whole. If [17] any controversy remains, and yet there remains a little, it is upon, such sayings as the following, which just succeed the above quotation:--

      "Bow down and pray. Arise and believe! Though not possessed of saving faith, you have a measure of incipient faith; and God can give you to believe effectually. Though not a penitent at the feet of Jesus, as you ought to be, divine grace can bring you there. And though, at present, not "pardoned, justified, sanctified, reconciled, adopted, nor saved"--these rainbow colors shall be stampt by the Sun of Righteousness on the darkness of a beclouded soul--the earnest of eternal sunshine in the presence of God. Then we would say, "Arise and be baptized;" and in the liquid, emblematic grave of Jesus, "wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord.' Live to his glory, die in his favor, and be happy with him for ever."

      This reminds me of Jacob's blessing pronounced on Issachar. Gen. xlix. 14, 15. I do not like to quote it, There is something curious in it about "couching down between two burdens." "Bow down and pray." "Arise and believe." This is staggering between two burdens. Another effort, and we have him upon his feet! Alas! for "incipient faith"!!! "Though not a penitent." Worse still! But it will not do to end with "Bow down and pray," nor with "Arise and believe." But let him have breath, he will speak out just now. Here it comes: "Arise and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling upon the name of the Lord." How are the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished!!!

      While we express an essential agreement with the two Andrews on the premises before the reader, it is not to be understood that we approve their definitions because of their biblical, logical, or grammatical accuracy; but because when they come to explain themselves upon what they mean to include in that faith, to which they say salvation from the guilt, pollution, power, and punishment of sin is annexed, with which a change of all relations towards God and the moral universe is connected, they include in it, or add to it, such acts and exercises of the understanding and heart as subvert all their reasonings against the obedience of faith; and establish such premises for us as enable us to demonstrate that the only difference is about the quantity, or extent, or meaning of these acts and exercises of faith.

      We choose to say with James that faith is not perfected until it works according to the command. Perfect faith justifies; but imperfect faith does not. "By works was the faith of Abraham made perfect." Telio, the word here used, is from telios, a perfect man; a word always used by the Greeks to contradistinguish a man of mature age from a strippling. James ii. 22. "Kai ex ton ergon he pistis etiliothe"--by works was his faith perfected. No man's faith is perfected, according to the christian institution, until he puts on Christ according to the commandment, "Arise and be immersed," or "Be immersed for remission." Andrew's "incipient faith" is not enough, himself being judge. Let him, then, teach the people to consummate or perfect their faith by obedience."¹ But let him remember that the [18] principle or feeling called pity, is not the alms which it bestows. Alms, however, is efficient pity--perfect pity. Neither is faith and love, nor any exercise of faith, one and the same thing with faith. Faith must be contradistinguished from repentance, reformation, baptism, and every act which it works out. But "as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith alone, or without works, is dead."

      Having now shown the wanderings and labyrinths into which my friend Andrew has conducted himself and his reader upon immersion, viewed as an outward bodily act, (a phrase which occurs in almost every page of his pamphlet,) upon the subject of state and a change of state, as an outward relation, as not a real, because a relative change; and upon faith as including such acts or exercises as are equivalent to all that for which we contend, we have, we think, really and fully reviewed his "Extra Examined;" and we leave it to the reader himself to say, whether we have not thoroughly refuted his theory, so far as it stands opposed to the meaning of the Extra. But to close our remarks upon these three palpable errors, as we conceive them, we submit the following remarks upon the whole premises now before the reader:--

      1. There are no acts of worship, or of religion, ordained by Jesus Christ, that are at all to be regarded as outward or external bodily acts. "God is a spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth." Vocal prayer and praise, though they arc, exercises of the larynx, the tongue, and the lips; the bending of the knee, or the standing erect, or falling upon the ground; the eating of bread, the drinking of wine, or any other exertion of one, or more, or all of our organs, mental or corporeal, are not to be regarded as acts of religion except they are exercises of the understanding and the heart; and no man of any sense ever pleads for these as bodily acts as of any importance whatever.

      2. But the spirit of man cannot act at all without the body; it cannot think, if the brain be not exercised; it cannot speak, unless the tongue be moved; it cannot feel, but by the nerves; it cannot move, but by the organs of the body. How unreasonable, then, to separate, or to regard human action in reference to the particular organ which operates. Immersion is as spiritual an act, when proceeding from faith in God's promises, as any act in which a person is either active or passive. FAITH IS AS MUCH A BODILY ACT AS IMMERSION. No man, without the exercise of his senses, can believe any thing. "Faith comes by hearing," says a Master in Israel.

      I doubt not but my friend Andrew will both perceive and feel this to be as true as the gospel. And I need not tell him in what an attitude these two remarks place all his reasonings in this pamphlet.

      3. A change of state is never outward in the christian religion. I know of no such thing. In a political religion it may, perhaps, be so; but never in relation to God through Jesus Christ. God reconciles, pardons, justifies, sanctifies, adopts, and saves sinners through Jesus Christ. Not one of these in the christian economy exists alone. Andrew, on page 12, attacks this position. Reader, hear him:-- [19]

      "Strike away one of these links, then, and Mr. C's chain is broken: attach one of these privileges or blessings to the unbaptized believer, and his argument is gone. Allowing, then, for instance, (what we really think ought now to be allowed) that a penitent believer is reconciled to God--he stands, of course, in all the other favored relations, and so none of these privileges depend for their existence on the act of immersion. Aware of consequences, our author is not for allowing that any one of these privileges belongs to a believer as such; and so the believer, as far as we can see, is in just as bad a state as the unbeliever, only that he is prepared by faith for the all-prevailing influence of baptism."

      This, I suppose, he calls reasoning and proof!! A penitent believer reconciled without the remission of his sins! What an idea! A guilty soul will as soon love God perfectly as any penitent be reconciled without the tender of pardon. I can conceive a case illustrative of the reconciliation which may precede the actual enjoyment of pardon; but yet pardon is secured even in this case before reconciliation. Simon was convicted and condemned to be beheaded for the murder of Edwin. A mediator interposes, and the governor promises pardon on condition that Simon will sign a certain covenant. The proclamation is tendered to him by a minister of law. He rejoices and is reconciled even before he signs the covenant. But mark you, reader, it is because he is resolved to sign, and because he considers the pardon as secured upon his signing. Until he has written his name in full he is not actually pardoned; but from the moment he believes the messages he rejoices, because he is determined to obey the requisition. This is not an analogy in the case: for the parties at variance are not Simon and the governor, but it represents how a man may rejoice in any blessing, and be reconciled to any person prospectively, because he is secured of the blessing sought, by having it put within his power.

      But no sinner has been reconciled to God but by having pardon put within his own power. Nor can he be justified until he receives pardon. Reconciliation is as intimately connected with pardon and the other blessings as thinking is with the healthy exercise of the brain.

      When I turn my face to the Sun at high noon, I look to the South; the East is on my left hand, the West on my right, and the North is behind me. In these four attitudes to the cardinal points I stand. If I place myself in any one of these attitudes I stand at the same instant in all the others. I cannot face the South but I stand in these positions to all the cardinal points. No matter which I seek first, second, or third: so soon as I have the East on my left hand I stand in all these attitudes. This is an illustration drawn from local position. It illustrates moral relations in the sense before my mind. When I am justified, all the others follow. When I am reconciled, all the others follow. No matter which I seek or place first. But these are moral relations. Hence they are all found in Christ--not out of him. He is my sun and my shield. In him I have light and safety. My soul bless thou the Lord! "In the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and in him shall they glory." [20]

      Talk not about internal putting on. "As many as have been baptized into Christ have put him on." We put him on our whole person, we clothe ourselves with him. It is not mental, nor corporeal--it is personal. We give him the head, the heart, and the hand The Lord separates to himself our body, soul, and spirit. May the Lord preserve them unblamed until he comes in all the glory of his Father!

      4. Relative changes are the only real changes we know any thing of. I never saw any thing changed but relatively. Are birth, marriage, death real changes? They are all relative. When a change relates to matter, it is corporeal; when to God, it is spiritual, moral.

      5. Qualities belong both to states and characters; but there are no degrees in the former: there are in the latter. Matrimony it called a holy state. Adultery is a state, too; but it is an unholy state. A person is as perfectly married after the vow is made according to law, as when he has been a husband forty years. He is perfectly sanctified in state when he enters into the new institution. But there are many degrees in the holy qualities which adorn the heart and life. Yet holiness applies to character, and qualities as it does to state; only with this difference that the state is perfect at once, but the character admits of many degrees. "Be holy as I am holy," says the Lord. It means the same, however, whether applied to state or character; i. e. a separation from all and every thing common, unclean, or impure. "'Let no unclean communication proceed out of your mouth." "Lay aside all filthiness of flesh and spirit, and perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord." "Without holiness no man shall see the Lord."

      6. The Lord's plan of reforming men is very different from all human plans. They attempt to change and improve a man's slate by reforming his character; but God reforms the character by changing the state. "Your sins are forgiven you: go and sin no more." This single sentence speaks a volume.

      All the changes of the natural world are the consequences of the change of position. The attitude in which the Earth stands to the Sun in every part of its orbit, is the cause of all the changes in the animal and vegetable kingdoms of nature.

      Gentle Spring, with all its ethereal mildness, unbinding the earth, waking to life, music, and melody, now clothing the fields with vivid verdure, and the juicy groves with buds and flowers; refulgent Summer with its full-blown beauties, its flowery leaves covered with tribes of evanescent insects, which mock the calculating eye; golden Autumn, with all its teeming harvests of fruits and grain; and stern Winter, with all its clouds, its storms, and tempests, owe their existence and influences to state, or the Earth's relation to the Sun. So stand we in the moral universe to the great moral centre, the Sun of Mercy which has arisen upon a dark and frozen world. To produce all these countless and wonderful changes in our globe, the Creator has nought to do, but to place it in new attitudes to the Sun. So by an act of grace, by moral attraction, he changes our state to the Sun of Mercy, [21] and in this new relation we are clothed with moral beauty and excellency, and filled with joy and melody.

      Not yet is the analogy carried out. Motives in the moral world resemble momentum, gravity, or attraction in the natural. On minds arguments, which are motives, operate as attraction upon matter. Attraction presents the earth in all her 365 attitudes to the Sun, and is that which changes her position. Arguments of love and pity falling in the rays of the Sun of Mercy upon the mind of man, turn the heart to the Sun of Righteousness, or changes our relation to him, and from moral position or relation come all the fruits and flowers, all the fragrance and beauty which adorn and bless human character. But I shall forget that this is a piece of "polemic theology;" and that not analogies or illustrations, but arguments triangular, acute, and pointed, are expected. Be it so; but let us look up and around us, and admire the fair temple of the universe, where nature, grace, and glory stand to each other as the outer court, the holy place, and the most holy.

      Here I open the Larger Catechism, on which I hummed and hemmed some thirty years ago. And what does it say?--"Justification is an act of God's free grace"--"Adoption is an act of God's free grace"--'Sanctification is a work of God's free grace"--"Effectual calling is the work of God's almighty power and grace"--"Justifying faith is a saving grace," and "Repentance unto life is a saving grace." Ah me, in what bold relief does my friend Andrew appear in all that is said in this good old system.

      7. All these terms, expressive of states, have respect to the present salvation, and not to that which is to be revealed when the Lord comes. Reconciliation, pardon, justification, sanctification, adoption, and salvation from the guilt, power and pollution of sin, are not parts of the future salvation of the body, or the new creation which will be the result of the resurrection unto eternal life. This is a salvation which belongs to the kingdom of grace. My friend Andrew does not discern this reign of God as contradistinguished from the kingdom of glory; at least so I think from the piece before me, for he will have all sent to ultimate perdition who are not justified, sanctified, adopted, &c. in this present life. Hence the frequency of the repetition of this obnoxious sentiment in the 56 pages. It serves admirably to awaken not only the odium theologicum, but all the charitable laity, who have got Abraham, Mahomet, and Caiaphas, together with all the Popes and Prelates of many centuries, now sitting side by side in heaven. My friend is "right good" at stirring up these religious charities against him who says "he that believes and is baptized shall be saved." and contends that this is just what Jesus Christ meant.

      I think in a population, the majority of which was deistical, I could make myself very popular by the use of such tools. Let me see--I would go to work in this way:--Christianity is too contracted for the exigencies of men; it is not of that sublime and comprehensive compass which, like deism, takes in all climes and all ages. How few scores of the human race are benefitted by Jesus Christ and the [22] gospel in comparison of the myriads of millions which are, if it be true, "stamped with the black seal of condemnation"! There are too many preachers, rags, ink, and presses necessary to its plans and operations. How few can read, and how few can hear the gospel! and of these few how many are governed by it! And what virtue is in its institutions? Some talk of prayer, and of repentance, and of baptism, and of being baptized in fire! Now what is prayer but words? and what are words but wind? and what is repentance but sorrow and grief? and what is baptism but water or fire? What can wind, water, fire, or groans do to save the soul of man forever? How much more rational it is to put eternal life beyond the reach of the possibility of such accidents! I ask for neither words, signs, sacraments, water, fire, books, or preachers. The light within; this is the common grace, the true grace, the universal grace. I will not mark every wretch to perdition who cannot read or find a preacher. Nor will I rest a man's eternal doom upon either fire, air, earth, or water.--I shall close this digression with a few words, perfectly unique, from my friend Andrew--

      "In some cases it must be attended with extreme inconvenience and exposure to obtain the benefit of baptism, immediately on the exercise of faith. But this, according to the view we have been examining, ought to be done, through all difficulties. In other cases it is not only almost, but altogether impracticable. And in this state of things, the person dying, could not, consistently with his case as represented in the "Extra," be admitted into the felicity of the blessed. He must perish; for he is without holiness; and without holiness none can see the Lord."

      Hear him again, page 19:--

      "The principle without the act (it seems) is nothing. Suppose, then, a person to be physically unable to be baptized. What provision does this doctrine make in such a case?--None! It sternly demands, over the head of impossibility itself, the performance of the act. And though this person may have the faith which works by love, it leaves him stampt with the black seal of condemnation: for, the principle without the act is nothing. Credat Judæus Apella!"

      Yes; over the head, ears, and shoulders of impossibility! This is too churlish for thy liberal soul. How kind art thou, my good friend! "Let it be neither mine nor thine, but divide it"! Timothy Dwight, D. D. avers, and we are as uncharitable as he, that he who refuses baptism, understanding it, shall never enter the visible nor invisible kingdom of God.--vol. 4, p. 302.

      I repeat that these things are affirmed of the present salvation. But here I thought it necessary to take up the Extra and read it once over, the first time, too, since it was issued from the office, to see what I had written on this subject. I dare not tell the reader all my convictions and feelings on the re-examination of that pamphlet of 60 pages. With all its imperfections, and like every thing which proceeds from the same head, heart, and hand, it has its imperfection, I feel assured before God that no man, as far as I have seen, has weakened in the least a single fundamental point in that essay. I did not think it was so full, so precise, so well stored with arguments and illustrations, as I now find it is; and moreover, every objection of note which I have now read against it, either in the pamphlet before me, or published from any quarter during 15 months past, is fully met. [23] and, in my judgment, fully removed in the Extra itself. I am willing to put it into the hands of any man, and my friend Andrew Broaddus' examination of it with it, and leave the result to his own judgment. He has not, in the candid judgment of its author, even shattered a single stone, much less a column in its walls or towers. He has in one or two places knocked a little of the mortar out, and the smoke of his powder has done infinitely more damage than his lead--it has blackened the walls, while his metal lies shattered around them. So much for metaphors. But it is for the impartial to examine this matter for themselves. Fathers, we know, have much affection for their own children.

      But my labor in reviewing is much lessened in consequence of this reading; and the candor of my friend Andrew has lost fifty per cent. in my market since I have read his piece the second time, and the Extra a second time, both of which have been done since October commenced. For I never opened his pamphlet from the first glance until two or three days ago. I am astonished to see how much is said by Andrew about little matters, when the great arguments of the Extra are only hinted at, and the very objections he has made, anticipated without his seeming to have noticed it. The four-fifths of the pamphlet before me is refuted on pages 52, 53, and 54 of the Extra. To these we request the attention of the reader.

      These remarks are occasioned from my opening the Extra to see what was said on the Kingdom of Grace, and on Regeneration. I had written some pages in reply to Andrew's remarks on these two points, thinking that I was furnishing new matter; but on opening the Extra I found that all this was before said, and that my friend had paid no attention to it. I then resolved not to repeat what he had not considered, and now dismiss this part of my labor with a few periods--

      In the Extra, Regeneration is shown to belong to the Kingdom of Grace or the New Reign, sometimes called the Reign of Heaven. No attention is paid to the fact that the first time, and indeed the only time in which our Lord spoke of being born again, was in reference to his kingdom. This matter is wholly overlooked by Andrew and all other opponents, and it is a fact of vast importance, as many of the intelligent have felt and acknowledged. The doctrine of infant regeneration with a reference to the future and everlasting kingdom of glory, and all the speculations about infant, Jewish and Pagan, salvation, in which Monks and Anchorites so much delighted, are exploded by the apprehension of this fact and its bearings. But having now more than examined the three capital errors of the pamphlet before me, and having appended such general remarks as we thought necessary to correct other mistakes in the mind of our friend, we shall now pay some attention to Regeneration.

      The first and all-important enquiry with me, in reading the oracles of God, has long been, is now, and, I presume, while I live, will be, [24] what were the exact ideas that the writers of the New Testament associated with the terms which they used. This ascertained and we cannot err. There is something now called regeneration, and there was something then called regeneration; but are these the same thing? I think they are not. But, reader, here is my most serious complaint against all my opponents, candid and uncandid; while I contend that regeneration in the New Testament acceptation meant simply immersion, they hold me up as ascribing to immersion their ideas of regeneration. Suppose I refuse to call an apple an orange, is it just for any person to represent me as denying the existence of any such thing as an orange, or as ascribing to an apple all the attributes of an orange? This is precisely the trick they practise upon the community. This is the sophism which they employ against my reasoning. While I contend that an apple is not an orange I do not deny that there is an orange, and that it has its proper attributes. I contend that there must be all they call a moral change; that there must be a renovation of the human heart to constitute a christian; but I call that "the renewal of the Holy Spirit," and not "regeneration:" because, as I will soon show, this is the style of the New Testament. But here let me again state that we regard the true meaning of the words used by the Apostles as the doctrine of Christ, as the true orthodoxy.

      I am happy to introduce here the concurrent testimony of one of the most learned Rabbis and most renowned Biblical Critics now living on this continent. Professor Stuart, of the Andover school, in confirmation of this saying--

Mr. Stuart to Doctor Channing.

      "The claims of the Bible to be authoritative, being once admitted, the simple question in respect to it is, what does it teach in regard to any particular passage? What idea did the original writer mean to convey? When this is ascertained by the legitimate rules of interpretation, it is authoritative. This is orthodoxy in the highest and best sense of the word; and every thing which is opposed to it, which modifies it, which fritters its meaning away, is heterodoxy, is heresy; to whatever name or party it is attached. After all, it is a principle by which, if I have any knowledge of my own heart, I desire forever to be guided, to "call no man master on earth." I would place the decision of Scripture, fairly made out, immeasurably above all human opinions. I regard the one as the decision of an unerring God: the other as the opinions of fallible men."

      This is with me an oracle of reason, a decision of common sense, against which, we think, no man of sound mind can object. While on the subject of interpretation, I will introduce a few quotations from the standard writers of this age, showing that we have all literary authority for our procedure in ascertaining the meaning of this phrase, and every other on which we rely. The judicious reader is aware that the whole jet and pith of this controversy must be decided by the meaning of John 3 & 5, and Titus 3 & 5. Soon as we ascertain the meaning of these two savings, the doctrine of the Extra is sustained or refuted. Because if God saves men "by the washing of regeneration and the renewal of the Holy Spirit," through his mercy, then we understand the present salvation when we understand these terms which Paul employs to define it. This definition, reader, [25] exhibits the present salvation. But let us first attend to the rules of interpretation.

      Melancthon says, "the scriptures cannot be understood theologically until it is understood grammatically?" Luther also avers "that a certain knowledge of the sense of scripture depends solely on a knowledge of the words."

      Ernesti and Moros, whom I quote together because the latter was a commentator upon the former, and because agreeing on the principles and rules of interpretation, and because the translation of this work by Professor Stuart of Andover is now made the text book on the subject of interpretation in the most respectable schools is this country, give this definition:--

      "The art of interpretation is the art of teaching what is the meaning of another's language; or that faculty which enables us to attach to another's language the same meaning that the author himself attached to it." p. 2.

      "Every word must have some meaning. To every word there ought to be assigned, and in the Scriptures there is unquestionably assigned, some idea or notion of a thing which we call the meaning or sense of a word." p. 7.

      I need not pronounce a panegyric on Thomas Hartwell Horne's "Introduction to the critical study and knowledge of the Holy Scriptures," a work so well known to the American literati, and so highly commended as exhibiting all the literature of the present age on the subject of interpretation, and on the critical study of the Holy Scriptures. I shall content myself with a quotation from vol. 2 p. 504 on the signification of words:--

      "Since," says he, "words compose sentences, and these form senses, it is necessary to ascertain the individual meaning of words before we proceed farther to investigate the sense of Scripture. In the prosecution of this important work, we may observe, generally, that as the same method and the same principles of interpretation are common both to the same volume and to the productions of uninspired men, consequently the signification of words in the Holy Scriptures must be sought precisely in the same way in which the meaning of words in other works usually is or ought to be sought. Hence, also, it follows that the method of investigating the signification of words in the Bible is no more arbitrary than it is in other books, but is in like manner regulated by certain laws drawn from the nature of languages. And since no text in scripture has more than one meaning, we must endeavor to find out that one true sense precisely as we would investigate the sense of Homer or any other ancient writer; and in that sense when ascertained we ought to acquiesce, unless by applying the just rules of interpretation, it can be shown that the meaning of the passage has been mistaken, and that another is the only just, true, and critical sense of the place. These are the principles and rules to which we inflexibly adhere." But many preachers and some writers seem to prefer the following maxims:--The Rabbinic maxim is, "On every point of the Scriptures hang suspended mountains of sense." The Talmud says, "God so gave the law to Moses that a thing can be shown to be clean and unclean 49 ways." "Most of the Fathers," says Moros, "and a multitude of the commentators in later times, were infected with these principles. Little more than a century ago the celebrated Cocceius of Leyden maintained the sentiment that all the possible meanings of a word in the Scriptures are to be united. By his learning and influence a powerful party were raised up in the Protestant church in favor of such a principle. The mischiefs resulting from it have not yet ceased to operate." (So say I.) "Ernesti denies the possibility of truly interpreting any book by other means than those which are philological." "Those fanatics, therefore are not to be regarded, who, despising literature and the study of the [26] languages, refer every thing merely to the influence of the Spirit; not that we doubt the influence of the Spirit, or that men truly pious and desirous of knowing the truth are assisted by it in their researches specially in those things that pertain to faith and practice." [This I quote to show that the writer is orthodox.]

      We could fill a little volume with such quotations in proof that we have the concurrence of all the learned who have either translated the scriptures or guided students in ascertaining the meaning of them, who are now regarded by the present generation as worthy of esteem. So that our opponents cannot accuse us of adopting novel rules of interpretation while they accuse us of educing novel conclusions. They are the innovators on established principles of interpretation, not we. Indeed nine-tenths of the popular declaimers have no standard of interpretation whatever but their own conceits.

      What, then, means the word regeneration in the New Testament? I have shown this in the Extra, and what does my friend Andrew allege against it? No criticism upon the term. He opposes, however, the opinion of Dr. Scott as a commentator against Macknight as a critic and translator!! He tells us that "if several judicious and evangelical writers" "agree in considering Titus 3-5 as referring to baptism, none of them, I am confident, exclude a spiritual regeneration." If he had said "the renewal of the Holy Spirit" instead of "spiritual regeneration," he might have placed me among them: for I exclude not "the moral or spiritual change," if I may use these scholastic terms, while I contend, with all critics, not with all commentators, (for the half of them are mere retailers, or system-builders, or dreamers) that the washing of regeneration is another name for baptism. I exclude not the renewal of the Holy Spirit, the renovation of the soul of man by the Holy Spirit; but this I cannot call spiritual regeneration, because it is a barbarous, unscriptural, and confounding distinction. Mr. Brantley and my friend Andrew often talk of "baptismal regeneration" as contemptuously as the orthodox or Hicksite Quaker speaks of "water baptism." The Quaker ridicules "water baptism," but extols his "spiritual baptism," with precisely the same logic as these gentlemen speak of "spiritual regeneration" in contrast with "baptismal regeneration." I regard them as equally unscriptural distinctions; I will not say as equally fanatical and enthusiastic, because this might savor of their spirit--but I must say equally unscriptural distinctions. There are a respectable army of ifs arrayed in the remarks of my friend Andrew on the subject of the 10th proposition in the Extra.--"If there be an allusion to baptism"--"if several writers of this class"--"if the term regenerated"--and these are followed by such phrases as "allowing," "be it so," &c. Why did he not manfully concede the thing at once, or if he thought it ought not to be conceded, why not defend some proposition, or wholly oppose ours? "But why," says he, "did not Mr. C. undertake to show some analogy between the "wind blows where it listeth" and being "born of the water?" Very shrewd, indeed! Because being born of the Spirit is one thing to which that phrase alludes, and being born of the water is another thing to which that phrase does not specially or [27] specifically belong. But he is so full of "spiritual regeneration, and so opposed to "water regeneration," that he cannot see that to be "born of water" is one thing, and "to be born of the Spirit" is another, though both may be contemporaneous.

      To be born again, however, with him, means only and wholly a spiritual change. A person, with him, can be born again, or regenerated, without any water, font or basin. With him, the phrase "born of water" means nothing; for a person is born again, on his theory, before, and indeed without immersion, or even sprinkling.

      We are aware that few figures will bear a universal accommodation to fact; but to lose sight of the subject altogether, and to have no accommodation, is the other extreme. Our author here makes himself merry at my accommodation of this figure, as he supposes, beyond all analogy. It is true, if he were to be my interpreter it would seem as if I had transcended the bounds of just accommodation. But he does not consider me as using the phrase "begotten of God," and "impregnated by the word," as two expressions of the same idea. This he ought to have seen from the very page from which he makes the quotation. On page 29, we say--"Provided that he has been begotten of God; OR, that he has been impregnated by the gospel." This observed, and the laugh is on the other side. The same inadvertance is observable in his note on the "still born." We supposed not the application of the whole analogy in reference to one and the same subject. It was on our part a mere accommodation of the figure, with a simple reference to the act of being born, regarding the immersion as another name for the new birth, and not to the whole analogy of begetting, quickening, &c. A laugh, however, is good for the nervous; and, no doubt, it was necessary at this crisis of the review, as our author was evidently much perplexed with "if" and "be it so."

      While I am noticing those places in which our author has surpassed me in ingenuity and wit; where he has evidently, in his own judgment, and, doubtless, in the estimation of a majority of his readers, corrected my use of some figures, I must not pass over the note on the bottom of page 40, where he has brought out "Campbell versus Campbell." In my debate with Mr. Walker and Mr. McCalla, I objected to the substitution of the word regenerated for immersed in the Extracts from Ireneus, and other of the primitive Fathers, as they are called, on the ground of their not being exactly representations of the same idea universally. I admitted that sometimes they used the term regenerated for baptized, but not always; and, indeed, not at all, in the popular sense of regenerated. Well, now it comes to pass that I represent all the primitive Fathers as using the term regenerated as equivalent to the term baptized. All this is true. And what then? Why, at that time I used the word regenerated as expressive of a spiritual change, and found that these Fathers spake of a spiritual change as well as we. I could not, therefore, reconcile this to the exclusive application of the term regenerated to the act of immersion; but on a more accurate and strict examination of their writings, and of the use of this term in the New Testament, I am assured that they used [28] the term regenerated as equivalent to immersion, and spoke of the spiritual change under other terms and modes of speech--just in the style we now speak, contrasting "the washing of regeneration" with "the renewal of the Holy Spirit." Such is the victory gained in this instance, by my friend Andrew, and thus has he damaged the mortar in the walls of our fortress. Having, then, given to my ingenious opponent the credit which is due to his superior penetration in these striking instances, I proceed to the subject.

      The doctrine of the Extra on the definition of the term regenerated is no farther impaired than these notices of the ingenuity of my friend indicate. That regeneration in Titus 3-5, and that "being born of water," John 3-5, mean immersion, the proper subject of examination according to the proposition submitted, is not only evident from the reasons, arguments, and testimonies adduced in the Extra, but from additional documents of the highest authority.

      It is a question to be decided before the tribunal to which Professor Stuart alleges all great questions of religious faith and practice are to be brought--an accurate and critical knowledge of the terms used by the Apostles. It is not the feelings, taste, creed, experience, or religious education of a person, which is to decide the meaning and acceptation of the words and sentences of the sacred writings. To the canons of criticism, to the laws of interpretation, all such matters must be submitted.

      Since writing the Extra I have added to my library one of the most learned and critical works in the world upon all questions connected with the interpretation of the New Testament. I allude to the "Introduction to the New Testament, by J. D. Michaelis, late Professor in the University of Gottingen--Translated from the fourth German edition, and augmented with a Dissertation on the origin and composition of the three first Gospels, by Herbert Marsh, D. D. F. R. A. S. Lord Bishop of Petersborough, in 6 volumes--Fourth London edition, 1823."

      This work is, as far as I know, by common consent in the literary world, placed at the head of the list of critical works on the New Testament. I found, the other day, the following remarks, which the reader will please compare with what I wrote in the Extra on this subject some 15 months ago--

      "But there are instances where the understanding the Rabbinisms is of still greater importance. Regeneration paliggenesia, admits in the Greek of several signification, viz. 1. The Pythagorean transmigration of a soul into a new body, which, in the proper sense of the word, is a new birth. 2. The resurrection of the dead. 3. A revolution, such as took place at the deluge, when a new race of men arose. 4. The restoration of a ruined state. The word is used in one of these senses, Matth. xix. 28. but not one of them is applicable to Titus iii. 5. or the conversation of Christ with Nicodemus in the third chapter of St. John, who has used, instead of the substantive, the verb gennhqhnai anwqen.--In both these passages the regeneration is ascribed to water, which circumstance alone might have led a commentator, acquainted with the language of the Rabbins, to the right explanation: especially as Christ himself implies, by his answer to Nicodemus, ch. iii. 10. that he is speaking of a regeneration, that might be expected to be understood by a Rabbi. Various have been the [29] conjectures on the meaning of this expression, and opinions have been formed on so important a subject and so unusual an expression, without knowledge of the language of the Rabbins, or a due regard to the connexion. It has been imagined that Christ intended to express a total alteration of religious sentiments and moral feeling, that was to be effected by the influence of the Holy Spirit and of baptism. But how could Nicodemus suppose that this was the meaning? By what motive could Christ have been induced to have used a term not only figurative, but even taken in a new sense to express what he might have clearly explained in a literal and simple manner? And with what justice could he censure Nicodemus for his ignorance on a subject, of which, according to this explanation, he could never have heard. It would occasion a long and tedious inquiry to enter into a minute detail of the various explanations of this passage; and it will be sufficient to mention that which naturally follows from a knowledge of the Rabbinical doctrines. In the language of the Rabbins, 'to be born again,' signifies 'to be accepted by God as a son of Abraham, and by following the example of his faith to become worthy of this title.' In this sense the connexion is clear, the language is such as might be expected towards a master in Israel, and the water to which Christ alludes, is that used in the baptism of a proselyte, to which the Rabbins ascribed a spiritual regeneration."

      Next to Michaelis, or according to others, in the same desk with him, is Thomas Hartwell Horne, on Titus 3 & 5, vol. 2, p. 498. He says--"In this passage baptism [by immersion in water, probably--candid for a Paidobaptist Doctor, truly] is said to signify not only the moral ablution of sin, but also the death and burial of guilty man, and (by his emersion from the water) his resurrection² to a pure and virtuous life; or in other words, our death unto sin, and our obligation to walk in newness of life."

      Timothy Dwight, D. D. the author of the most popular system of Theology in the United States--one of the greatest of "American Divines," whose works are stereotyped even in old England, says: "To be born again," vol. 4, p. 301. "is precisely the same thing as to be born of water and of the Spirit." And what is it to be born of water? "To be born of water is to be baptized." p. 300.

      Those Presbyterians who accuse us of uncharitableness had better read the declaration of this their great Nicodemus, vol. 4, p. 302--"It is, however, to be observed here, that he who, understanding the nature and authority of this institution, refuses to be baptized, WILL NEVER ENTER THE VISIBLE NOR INVISIBLE KINGDOM OF GOD." I request my friend Andrew to read this twice, and to recollect, while accusing me as the most uncharitable of men, there was at least one great man as uncharitable as me. Thus spoke the President of Yale, the Rabbi of American Presbyterianism.

      My friend Andrew has an easy and cheap way of replying to such matters. He can ask the reader, as he does, p. 8, "Is this his acceptation of the word?"!! Or he can throw Thomas Scott, or old Flavel's Husbandry Spiritualized, into the scale, and write upon the beam--"One man's opinion is as good as another's," and so the business is done. I could add to this extract many others, from the most renowned Biblical critics, all expressive of the same view. Bishops Bennet and Pierce, in addition to the names in the Extra, I have since [30] examined, and may enrol with Michaelis and Marsh. But I will give one hundred and fifty-one testimonies of high repute, among whom are one hundred and twenty-one Divines, ten Lords, and twenty Commoners of the British Parliament, who have decided that John 3 & 5, "born of water," and Titus 3 & 5, "the washing of regeneration," allude to baptism. This decision is found in the Larger Catechism, made in and by the above assemblage of Divines, approved by the British Parliament, and sanctioned by more than one hundred thousand preachers, which in Britain and America, for one hundred and eighty-nine years, have bound it on the conscience of millions of human beings.--"Question 165. What is baptism?" "Answer. Baptism is a sacrament of the New Testament in which Christ has ordained the washing with water, &c. to be a sign of engrafting into himself, of remission of sins by his blood, and regeneration by his Spirit:" "as proof see," say they, "John 3 & 5, Except a man be born of water, &c. and Titus 3 & 5, He saved us by the washing of regeneration, &c." That this refers to baptism is, in the judgment of all this learned host, most certain. To sum up the authority for the criticisms offered on these phrases, we shall just state--

      1. In the Extra I have shown that all "the Apostolic Fathers" and "primitive writers," as they arc usually styled, to a man, concurred in this.

      2. I have adduced many of the greatest scholars, critics, and translators, as also asserting it: and I know not of one critic or translator, of any acknowledged literary eminence, who does not assert it.

      3. And in the third place, we have now adduced the Westminster Divines, the Parliament of England, and a hundred thousand preachers, since that time, asserting it.

      Now let me ask, will the experiences, or feelings, or guesses, or criticisms of Messrs. Clopton, Brantley, Semple, and perhaps John Taylor, G. McConnico, and Silas M. Noel, D. D.!! with some of the present opponents of reform, be an offset to all this!

      But we go for the plain common sense interpretation in these passages, and would not have arrayed this formidable band, had our friend presumed to examine my Extra on its own merits. This authority weighs only when it sustains the plain grammatical construction, and coincides with the whole scope of the context, and the tenor of the whole book; otherwise we have no use for it at all. It is an argumentum ad hominem. It is not, however, urged by us in proof of an opinion, or an article of faith, but in confirmation of a verbal criticism. How plain, then, must be the allusion to baptism in these passages, when so anciently, so uniformly, and so generally in our own times, perceived by all critics! This, however, would not be urged by me did I not discover a fondness on the part of our opponents to set aside all criticism, not only to discredit mine, but to appeal to some other tribunal than that which ascertains the meaning of the words used by the Apostles.

      I know, indeed, that some critics like Adam Clark, with a system in their eyes, assert this to be the meaning of John 3 & 5, and Titus [31] 3 & 5. But no sooner do they assert it, than they set it aside to make room for their system. Thus on Titus 3 & 5, he, with some regard to the literal import of the words "washing of regeneration," asserts "UNDOUBTEDLY the Apostle here means baptism." Very true: what next? "Baptism is only a sign, and therefore should never be separated from the thing signified." This is pretty good. But what next? "It is a rite (a rite!) commanded by God himself, and therefore the THING SIGNIFIED should never be expected without it." Very true, and well said, upon the whole. Now if we hold Adam Clark to this saying, he will be as great a sinner as we in the eyes of spiritualizers. But he was too fearful and too prudent to stop here, and concludes by saying, "They who think baptism to be regeneration, [i. e. the renewal of the Spirit, for so he has just defined it] neither know the scriptures nor the power of God"! This will save Adam from reprobation. Now we are as far from confounding baptism and the renewal of the Holy Spirit as he can he; but we do not, ought not, and shall not call the renewal of the Holy Spirit the washing of regeneration, just because Paul has made them two things, connecting them by and. Moses and Aaron, we are simple enough to think, means two persons; not one person called both Moses and Aaron. Those who contend that Moses and Aaron mean only Aaron, may say that the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit mean only the renewal of the Holy Spirit.

      Much more than enough has, we think, been said on this topic, and more than any man, we think, can set aside; and indeed my friend Andrew has not made a single effort to set it aside, except we take for criticism and argument his remote allusions to other passages, such as "being born again of incorruptible seed," &c. which reach not the case before us. We have shown how we understand all these expressions, and he has not corrected us of any error on that subject. But notwithstanding all that has been here said on Titus 3 & 5, I beg, leave to conclude this article by an analysis of the passage--

      "We also," says Paul, "were formerly foolish, deceived, disobedient," &c. but "when the philanthropy of God our Saviour shone forth," according to his mercy he saved us, not by any work of righteousness (for we had none to show) which we had done; but he saved us by washing away our sins in immersion, and by giving us his Holy Spirit, or by renovating our souls by his Holy Spirit. A real remission, and a real holiness of spirit, are to be two great items constituting the present salvation. Faith and immersion put us in possession of the former, and the Holy Spirit produces the latter. It is not a typical or shadowy remission and sanctification, like that bestowed before the philanthropy of God in the gift of his Son shone forth; but since the Sun of Mercy shone forth, he saved us by a real remission, the washing of regeneration--and by a real holiness, the renewal of the Holy Spirit. Such, according to all the rules of interpretation, is Paul's meaning, receive or reject it who may. And here are the two sayings of the Saviour verified--"Except a man be born of the water," and except "a man be born of the Spirit," he cannot enjoy a real and [32] certain remission of his sins, or a real holiness in state, in principle, and character; he cannot enter the kingdom of God, the kingdom of righteousness, peace, joy, and the Holy Spirit.

      Immersion, therefore, only regenerates the believer; but the holy Spirit promised renews his spirit and temper, creates him anew in knowledge, righteousness, and real holiness; transforms his spirit, and induces him, as a new born babe, to desire the unadulterated milk of the Word, that he may grow thereby. To be regenerated is only to be born again; and what is it to be born in comparison to being educated in the Lord? The birth is soon accomplished; but the education, the new creation of a person, is not the offspring of an agony, of an effort, but the entire transformation of the man--the result of the Monitor, the Spirit which proceeds from the Father and the Son.

      Immersion is only the washing of regeneration; it is only the putting off the old man, laying aside the filthy garments; it is only the purgation of moral pollution through faith in the blood of the great sacrifice. This, however, is necessary previous to our adoption into the family of God, our introduction into the kingdom of Jesus, our enrolment among the pupils of the great Teacher. But "the renewal of the Holy Spirit" is the entire purification of the heart, the decoration of the character, the fitting of the separated for an inheritance among the sanctified. To call the latter regeneration, is most derogatory to its dignity and importance. Hence they who so denominate it have low and unbecoming ideas of the christian's life, character, and true dignity. They make all his dignity to consist in mere birth. 'Tis education and not birth makes the christian, as it makes the man: but yet, unless a person is born he cannot be educated; unless he enter the kingdom of Jesus he cannot enjoy the rights of a citizen.

      How little of this matter, as we have discussed it, my friend Broaddus understands, will appear from his remarks on my dialogue on political regeneration. He says--

      "The ingenious dialogue on political regeneration, p. 33-4. might be happily accommodated to the visible kingdom of Christ, and its peculiar privileges, but from the application of it in the "Extra," to illustrate the argument, that the spiritual or divine birth is no other than baptism; and thus to resolve an internal, spiritual operation, into an external, bodily act, from this application of the figure, we must enter our unhesitating and absolute dissent."

      This is just all we meant by it. And strange that our Examiner did not before perceive that we regard, and did remark in the Extra, that the phrase "born again," and regeneration, had exclusive respect to the present kingdom of Jesus Christ, and not to the future and eternal kingdom!!! Our Lord who introduced it; at that time had respect to his kingdom and its privileges, and never gave it any other meaning. I trust by this time our friend Andrew will perceive what injustice he has done our views, and will be disposed to make reparation. His scheme makes every thing of the new birth, or regeneration; we only make a birth of it, and lay all emphasis upon the subsequent renewal of our hearts by the Holy Spirit. To be noble born, of a royal line, is no doubt a great matter; but very little in comparison to a divine [33] education. The having a character "internal and external," (pardon this use of a popular phrase) formed by the Holy Spirit, is a much greater matter. A few remarks now on conversion will, I hope, correct his misrepresentations of this subject.

      I trust the reader will not expect me to notice every little remark in this little pamphlet of 56 pages. This would be a work of supererogation. I have now, in my judgment, fully defended the Extra, and fully corrected my friend Andrew on all the great matters in it; but for the prejudiced, and the slow of apprehension, we have to make many repetitions under new forms of speech--such must be my remarks on conversion.

      Conversion and regeneration are in some important points two names for the same thing, as shown in the Extra. But when we change a figure, we must speak in accordance with the change. When Christ says "I am the true vine," it would not do to say my Father is the king, or shepherd, but the vinedresser. When he says he is the good shepherd, it would not do to say his disciples were children, but sheep. This explains my meaning. When we speak of conversion, we cannot speak of begetting, quickening, or being born; for these belong to another figure: and though conversion in the history of a returning sinner may denote that same act in another figure, called being born, or regenerated, yet it will not accord with propriety to speak of it in all, or any of the same terms, warrantable under another figure. This remark apprehended corrects sundry mistakes in the minds of those undiscriminating sectaries who must always speak in the set phrase of orthodoxy.

      The prodigal son first reflected, reasoned, and determined in his heart to turn his face to his father, before he made one step homeward. But his first step would, in all propriety, be called his turning or conversion, being the consummation of his resolutions, and made in pursuance of a change of mind; and without which all his thinking, grieving, resolving, &c. would have left him among the swine. So it is in conversion to God. The sinner convinced of his lost and ruined condition, realizing it, reflecting and resolving through the belief of the Divine testimony to accept the tendered pardon and salvation, determines first in himself to turn and live. His first step under this figure is into the grave of Jesus, he descends that he may rise with the Saviour. This is his turning to God; this is the overt act which is the consummation of his previous change of heart, and without which his faith would have been imperfect, and his repentance without that evangelical reformation leading into life. This is the constitutional reformation or conversion to God which was taught and practised in the age of the Apostles. Now-a-days it is out of fashion with the Quakers, and metamorphosed into infant sprinkling or infant immersion by the Greek and Roman Churches and their descendants They all show their regard for water, and lay so much emphasis upon it as to apply it in a few drops, in many instances without faith in [34] the subject, provided they can find faith in a natural father, or even in an artificial father called a godfather. They, not we, lay an undue emphasis on water. With them a few drops, without any knowledge or faith in the subject, becomes, according to the creed, a sign of engrafting into Christ, of remission of sins, and of regeneration. This is the ultraism of mystic Babylon. These are "the watery bigots," if such there be. With us immersion is nothing in infant or adult unless preceded and accompanied by a "living faith," in the Son of God. But with that it is the scriptural "washing of regeneration," or conversion to God; but no more. The renewing of the heart by the Holy Spirit, and the transforming of the soul by the powers of "the world to come, or the reign of Jesus Christ, is the great matter as respects the enjoyment of eternal life in the first fruits on earth, as preparatory to the fulness of joy and the eternal pleasures in the presence of God forever. Conversion is, then, according to the Extra, the actual turning of a sinner to God, in his institutions. Hence the command convert the nations, immersing the believers into the name, &c, teaching them to observe all that the Lord has commanded.

      If we compare the christian life to a race, or to a campaign, we find the same regard to the propriety of figures is necessary; and, indeed, the Apostle alludes to these as useful analogies. In a race there is the starting point, the prescribed course, the laws of the race, and the goal. If in a race, says Paul, any one contend for the mastery, he receives not the crown unless he strive according to the laws of the race--(for I quote the, meaning, not the words.) He must start according to law, run according to law, and touch the goal according to law, or he receives not the prize. "So run that you may obtain." Conversion is just the entrance, or starting point in this race. If a soldier would receive a crown, he must first enlist; but this only brings him into the army. "Sure I must fight if I would reign." "The conqueror shall inherit all things." But yet no man is according to law a soldier who has not received the bounty, or given and received the pledge stipulated in such cases. But why multiply illustrations? Conversion is neither internal nor external. It originates in the mind, as all rational acts do. (A man, according to our American and English Grammar sense, cannot be guilty of murder unless it begin in the heart.) But it cannot be perfected there. "With the heart man believes into righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made into (eis in both cases) salvation. Confession is always made in the act, or at the time of immersion. "If you believe with all your heart you may be immersed." I do believe, said the Eunuch. Then Philip immersed him into the Lord Jesus. He was then converted according to the New Testament. I know those who plead for camp meeting conversions, anxious seats, and mourning benches, will denounce this as heterodox. But whom the Lord commends will be justified in the last day.

      But my friend Andrew is very ingenious at times; and while we say Paul was sent to convert the nations, Andrew quotes these words from Paul, "Christ sent me not to baptize, but to proclaim the [35] gospel." If we had forgotten this, it would have doubtless been considered an unanswerable argument. Paul was sent to preach the gospel, and not to baptize; but he did baptize. Hence we infer Paul baptized without any authority! Good logic! Is it not? If Christ authorized him not to baptize, and he did baptize some, as he positively affirms, must he not have baptized without authority!! This proves too much for Andrew; for he will not allow any person to immerse who is not sent to baptize and duly authorized.

      If, then, Paul immersed without authority, who dare condemn any disciple, unlicensed by a church, for doing that which Paul did without any commission either from Jesus or the church!!! Perhaps this will bring my friend to reflect a little more closely upon the reasons why Paul was not commanded to baptize. He found himself authorized to baptize when he pleased; the exemption, then, must have been out of some particular regard to Paul's person or mission. He was no fisherman like the Twelve. He was not of that robust constitution. My bodily presence is weak, says he: and history gives him not size enough to baptize. But as he was the Apostle to the Gentiles, and the only one, his baptizing might have been represented as into his own name. At all events, on this account he thanked God that he had baptized so few in Corinth. But he always had companions with him, Paul and Silas--Paul and Timotheus--"Paul, and the brethren with me"--"I would have kept Onesimus to have ministered to me, Philemon; but as he was your servant, I would not do it without your consent." These obeyed his orders as faithfully as the Jews at Cesarea obeyed Peter when commanded to immerse the Gentiles. It is nothing to the purpose to urge the fact that Jesus Christ, either from a regard to Paul's personal weakness, stature, or great labors, exempted him from this service so long as he said, "Repent and he baptized for the remission of sins." When any repented and desired immersion, he put the labor on others, only when it happened, as in the Philippian jail, or in some families in Corinth. But, really, it looks like trifling to answer an objection of this sort; and the more so because it bears equally against all except the Quakers. Thus many make a sophism out of it. But my friend Andrew cannot; for if Paul could accomplish every thing necessary to the salvation of the Gentiles by simply preaching, Why does Andrew baptize? His answer to this question will show how impertinent it is to his purpose, to allege it either as an objection or a difficulty lying at my door. It lies rather at his, on more accounts than one.

      Before alleging any thing in favor of the testimony of "the Apostolical Fathers," we shall permit our good friend to make his charge:

      "But will Mr. C. indeed say, that he considers the title of "Apostolical Fathers" to be justly due to those writers? I think not. Will he candidly avow that he believes any of those writers whom he has quoted, were the "contemporaries or the pupils of the Apostles?" I am persuaded he will hardly do this. Was it fair, then, to present them in this imposing light, even though [36] they are so considered by some? "Yet (says he) the views and practices of those who were the contemporaries, or the pupils, of the Apostles and their immediate successors, may be adduced," &c. Alas! alas! to what lengths may the love of a man's own theory drive him!"

      If this was not ad captandum vulgus, to inveigle the unwary, or to excite the indignation of the orthodox, it looks very like it. I call the writers quoted "the Apostolic Fathers," prefixing these words, "as they are usually called." This is in conformity with all antiquity and with modern usage. I neither defend nor impugn their title to this character. I found them, as lawyers say, tenens locum, in possession of the title, and found it unnecessary to inquire into the records. But one sentence which he ought to have quoted to do me justice in the esteem of those who never read the Extra, and which indeed would have neutralized his censure, is that immediately preceding the extracts from Barnabas' Epistle. I shall now quote it from the Extra, page 42. "Whether the writing be genuine or spurious, it is on all hands admitted to be a fragment of the highest antiquity." This was all that was necessary to my purpose, and the only use I make of it. It was not necessary for me to settle any question about the authorship, because their testimony was not urged as having any authority upon the faith of christians then or now; but only as a collateral document--as a circumstantial evidence that in the first ages all writers, of every reputation, either for talents, piety, or intimacy with the converts made by the Apostles, unequivocally and unanimously attest that such was the meaning of certain words, phrases, and usages among all called Christians, orthodox or heretical, in those early days.

      But would it not have been more in accordance with reason and more satisfactory to his readers to have adduced, or attempted to adduce some contradictory testimony, or some document to set aside or impair my eleventh proposition. Is all antiquity so silent on the views of my opponent as not to furnish one document, hint, nor allusion in vindication of his views of the points at issue?

      My 11th proposition is in the following words: "All the Apostolical Fathers, as they are called, all the pupils of the Apostles, and all the ecclesiastical writers of note, of the four first centuries, whose writings have come down to us, allude to, and speak of, christian immersion as the "regeneration" and "remission of sins" spoken of in the New Testament." This proposition I have sustained, Andrew Broaddus himself being judge; for he has not brought a shadow of proof to the contrary. But there is a paragraph preceding this proposition in the Extra, which I must transcribe for the sake of those who may not have it to refer to. It explains the use, the sole use we make of the numerous and decisive witnesses we summon to sustain this proposition. It reads thus:--

      "Though no article of christian faith, nor item of christian practice, can, legitimately, rest upon any testimony, reasoning, or authority, out of the sacred writings of the Apostles, were it only one day after their decease; yet the views and practices of those who were the [37] cotemporaries, or the pupils of the Apostles, and their immediate successors, may be adduced as corroborating evidence of the truths taught, and the practices enjoined by the Apostles; and, as such, may be cited; still bearing in mind, that where the testimony of the Apostles ends, christian faith necessarily terminates." Candid reader, does not this preliminary remark show how uncalled for were the censures of my zealous friend Andrew?

      To discredit the testimony of these "venerable ancients," as they are called, my friend alleges their opinions on other matters, showing how whimsical they were in some things. Grant it, and what then? Does any man's private opinions discredit his testimony on any question of fact? If so, how do we receive the canonical books of the New Testament? Upon the very testimony here adduced, so far as we regard human testimony at all. Andrew does not see where his imputations terminate! But he admits them to be competent witnesses of facts, and would take them out of our hands by this question, "When Origen testifies that infants were baptized for the remission of sins, does he not as clearly testify to the fact that infants were baptized, as that they were baptized for the remission of sins?" I say, Yes, and who says No! And have I not always admitted that in Origen's time infants were immersed? Have I not affirmed, upon the testimony of Tertullian and Origen, that in Tertullian's time infants in some cases began to be immersed!! How impertinent to the subject are these allegata against the formidable host of witnesses during four hundred years! And is this all that can be offered upon or against my 11th proposition!

      The 12th also is passed by with little less formality. All the orthodox creeds attest in words fairly construed all that we allege on this subject. Andrew would except only the Regular Baptist. Though it differs not in any material point from the Presbyterian, he says it confirms his views. I say it confirms mine; and so the account is balanced. "Baptism is the sign of remission of sins," says the Creed, I say so too. So is my seal to a bond a sign that it is valid; so is giving the hand a sign of marriage. But if we must use the word sign, I will say with Adam Clarke, as before quoted, "THE THING, SIGNIFIED SHOULD NOT BE EXPECTED WITHOUT THE SIGN." So ends the examination of my 12th proposition.

      The first six propositions are admitted by my examinator as fully proved. The seventh he will not controvert. The eighth is admitted, and a question stated, "What is the command by which the gospel is obeyed?" He assumes the command to be faith. I have reviewed this, and shown that naked faith never can be both the principle and the act of obedience. There is no obedience without the will; and the command must be apprehended, heard, or believed before obeyed. [38]

      My ninth proposition our Reviewer would admit if qualified. The proposition is, that "it is not faith, but an act resulting from faith, which changes our state." He would thus qualify it, p. 19: "If our author had been willing to qualify his position; if he had said a faith that is not active is nothing: or a profession of the principle is nothing without the proper action, allowing for circumstances; then we think we could have met him here on scriptural grounds." I accede to all this. I object not to the qualification. So, then, there is no dispute upon the ninth proposition. Yet after all this, Andrew sets himself to disprove his own qualification of the proposition, and quotes Gen. xv. 6. to show that faith in the promise found in the sixth verse, including no doubt the great blessing promised, Gen. xii. 3. was accounted to Abraham for righteousness, without any obedience, any act resulting from faith. "Here," says he, "no external act is interposed between the act of believing and the imputation of righteousness" How short the vision! how near-sighted the eye compressed with a human system! This flatly contradicts both Moses and Paul, Heb. xi. 8, 9, and 12. Abraham was called before Isaac was born, and he obeyed that call before what is recorded Gen. xv, 6. occurred. So Paul and Andrew may settle this matter when they meet, Paul says, By faith Abraham when he was called obeyed. This was when he was 75 years old, twenty-five years before Isaac was born, and more than forty before he offered up Isaac upon the altar! To quote the words of Andrew on this same proposition, "We have satisfactory evidence, at least, that the justification of the soul is by the immediate act of faith." p. 20. So he disposes of the 9th proposition.

      The tenth proposition is, that "Immersion and Regeneration are two Bible names for the same act, contemplated in two different points of view." This proposition he would seem to controvert; but in fact has to admit it, because the only place where regeneration occurs in the New Testament on which there is any controversy is Titus iii. and 5. It was not, as my friend affirms, upon the authority of M'Knight's translation and explanatory note, and the opinion of some other commentators, that I apply Titus iii. and 5 to baptism. These are only corroborating and collateral evidences. I rest it upon the passage itself, and upon a great variety of evidences in the Extra, and in the preceding pages. He concedes it with this qualification, that none of these writers "exclude a spiritual regeneration." If by "spiritual regeneration" they mean the renewal of the Holy Spirit, I agree with them; but this I have already proved to be an unscriptural use of the word. I have, I think, abundantly proved this to be a mistake of the question altogether. Regeneration and the renewal of the Holy Spirit are not one and the same thing--Paul being judge, for he makes them two. Reader, attend! He makes them two things as distinct as Moses and Aaron.

      Some Methodistic visionary in a Lexington newspaper, a year ago, if I mistake not, attempted to substitute for regeneration the word baptism in every place where it occurs, to explode the meaning assigned in the above proposition. This was as fanatical as if I had said [39] that Christ and Jesus represent the same person; and he to explode this substitutes the word Jesus for the word Christ in every place where it occurs in the Greek Testaments, Old and New. He can find many passages where other persons are called Christs or Christ, and thence infers it is not true that Jesus and Christ represent the same person!! He may have his exceptions as a reward for his ingenuity!!

      The fate of the eleventh and twelfth propositions we have already showed. They cannot be opposed. They cannot be disproved. And where is the strength and jet of the controversy? Reader, I will tell you: it lies upon the 2d edition of the ninth proposition, page 13 of the Extra. There we propose to prove, not analogically, but from the apostolic writings, that "an act of faith, and not the principle of faith, changes our state;" in other words, that remission of sins is now promised through an immersion into the name, &c. resulting from faith in God's promise.

      But before attending to Andrew's objections to this, let me premise: Having paid so much attention to those preliminary matters, and having been at so much pains to show that not one proposition yet cited from the Extra has been refuted by its examiner; the reader will, perhaps, by this time, have fallen into an error, which I beg leave to correct. From the attention paid to all the prominent matters quoted, and my defence of the Extra from all these imputations, the reader will suppose that the doctrine of the Extra is essentially resting upon the premises to which Andrew has objected, and which I have now defended; and that the reason why I have endeavored to show that all my propositions stand erect as the pyramids of Egypt, is because the doctrine of the Extra rests upon them as a house rests upon its foundation: than which nothing can be much more remote from the truth. From this error I beg leave to relieve the reader. The doctrine of the Extra is no more dependent on these preliminary matters than the constitution of the United States depends upon the will of the Court of St. James.

      These propositions were the avenues through which we chose to approach the great proposition. But if these avenues were, or could be all blocked up, we could have approached it through many others; or, to speak without a figure, if my friend Andrew had swept from the arena every thing which he has questioned or impugned, the arguments on which we rely are the explicit declarations of the Apostles, and these yet remain unscathed.

      This great question, For WHAT is the penitent believer to be immersed? or What is the meaning or design of the christian immersion? is to be decided neither from analogy, inference, nor figurative expressions, though all these may either illustrate or confirm the decision; but from the clear and express declarations of the New Testament. We arrange the evidences, direct and unequivocal, under the following heads:--

      1. The commission to the Twelve, as recorded by Matthew, Mark, and Luke [40]

      2. The four discourses of Peter recorded in the Acts of the Apostles--the Pentecostian address, the speech in Solomon's Portico, the speech to the Highpriest and Senate of Israel, and his address in the house of Cornelius.

      3. The commission given to Saul, and Ananias' mission to him.

      4. The comments on the gospel, or baptism and salvation, found in the Epistles of Paul.

      5. The allusions and comments found in the Epistles of Peter and John.

      6. The peculiar and discriminating genius and privileges of the Kingdom of Heaven, or Christian Institution, as explained in the whole New Testament, contradistinguished from every antecedent economy under which sinful man was placed.

      These testimonies and evidences have, in another arrangement, been chiefly exhibited in the Extra; and how are they rebutted by Andrew Broaddus? Admitting that some of them clearly express immersion for the remission of sins, he attempts to show that a sinner is pardoned by faith, and this being "testimony that cannot yield to another construction," all the testimony showing that baptism is the medium of remission must be explained away, or shown to be figurative. This he alleges is accordant to a sound canon of interpretation. But he forgot that he assumed the thing to be proved. The previous question is not settled, whether is remission of sins more literally and unequivocally connected with baptism than with faith? He assumes the latter, and proceeds to apply his canon of interpretation.

      We will take his canon of interpretation and show that the most literal, direct, and frequent allusions to remission, oblige us, upon his own rule, to understand the passages quoted in the Extra literally. No man is commanded to believe for the remission of his sins, in the whole New Testament; but he is commanded, when he has faith, "to reform and be baptized for the remission of his sins." Now a more literal passage than this is not to be found in the whole New Testament.

      But "a man is said to be justified by faith." The question then is, Is justification and remission the same thing? This requires some discussion; and when agreed that they do mean the same thing, then another question arises which of the two is the most literal. This is all necessary to make way for his rule of interpretation, which says--"When a point has been established by explicit testimony, testimony that cannot yield to any other construction, in such a case no apparently contravening matter," [an unhappy expression] no apparently contradictory testimony "which can be rationally explained away, ought to be brought, forward." But the question is to be decided first which is the most explicit testimony. I say Acts ii: 38--he will say Rom. v. 1. But this with him is begged, not proved.

      In examining the New Testament we find that a man is said to be "justified by faith," Rom. v. 1; Gal. ii. 16, iii. 24--"Justified freely by his grace," Rom. iii. 24; Titus iii. 7--"Justified by his blood," Rom. v. 9--"Justified by works," James ii. 21, 24, 25--"Justified in [41] or by the name of the Lord Jesus," 1 Cor. vi. 11--"Justified by Christ," Gal, ii. 16--"Justified by knowledge," Is. liii. 11, as applied to persons in the New Testament. "It is God that justifies," says Paul, "by these seven means--by Christ, his name, his blood, by knowledge, grace, faith, and by works." Are these all literal? Is there no room for interpretation here? He that selects faith out of seven, must either act arbitrarily, or show his reason; but the reason does not appear in the text. He must reason it out: he must infer it. Why then assume that faith alone is the reason of our justification? Why not assume that the name of the Lord alone is the great matter, seeing this name "is the only name given under heaven by which any man can be saved," and men "who believe receive the remission of sins by his name," Acts x. 43; and especially, because the name of Jesus, or of the Lord, is more frequently mentioned in the New Testament in reference to all spiritual blessings than any thing else!! Call all these causes, or means of justification, and what then? We have the grace of God for the moving cause, Jesus Christ for the efficient cause, his blood for God's instrumental cause, faith an instrumental cause, knowledge an instrumental cause, the name of the Lord for the immediate cause, and works for the concurring cause. For example; a gentleman on the sea shore descries the wreck of a vessel at some distance from land driving out into the ocean, and covered with a miserable and perishing sea drenched crew. Moved by pure philanthropy, he sends his son with a boat to save them. When the boat arrives at the wreck, he invites them in. A number of the crew stretch out their arms and seizing the boat with their hands spring into it, take hold of the oars, and row to land; while some, from cowardice, and others because of some difficulty in coming at the boat, wait in expectation of a second trip; but before it returned, the wreck went to pieces, and they all perished. The moving cause of their salvation who escaped, was the good will of the gentleman on the shore; his son, who took the boat, was the efficient cause; the boat itself was his instrumental cause; their hands and arms were their instrumental cause; the seizing the boat with their hands and springing into it was the immediate cause, and their rowing to shore, under the guidance of his son, was the concurring cause of their salvation.--Thus men are justified or saved by grace, by Christ, by his blood, by faith, by knowledge, by the name of the Lord, and by works. But of the seven causes, three of which are purely instrumental, why choose one of the instrumental, and emphasize upon it as the justifying or saving cause, to the exclusion of, or in preference to the others? Every one in its own place is essentially necessary.

      If we examine the word saved in the New Testament, we shall find that we are said to be saved by as many causes, though some of them differently denominated, as those by which we are said to be justified. Let us see: We are said to be "saved by grace," Eph. ii. 5; "saved through his life," Rom. v. 9, 10; "saved through faith," Eph. ii. 8, Acts xvi. 31; "saved by baptism," 1 Peter iii. 21; or "by faith and baptism," Mark xvi. 16; or "by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit," Titus iii. 5; or "by the gospel," 1 Cor. xv. 2; or by "calling upon the Lord," and by "enduring to the [42] end," Acts ii. 21, Rom. x. 13, Matth. x. 22. Here we have salvation ascribed to grace, to Jesus Christ, to his death and resurrection--three times to baptism, either by itself or in conjunction, once with faith, and once with the Holy Spirit; to works, or to calling upon the Lord, and to enduring to the end. To these we might add other phrases nearly similar, but these include all the causes to which we have just now alluded. Saved by grace, the moving cause; by Jesus, the efficient cause; by his death and resurrection and life, as his instrumental cause; by faith, as an instrumental cause; or by faith and baptism, or by baptism, as the immediate cause; and by enduring to the end, or persevering in the Lord, as the concurring cause.

      Are six of these less explicit, less literal than the seventh? This must be assumed, on his principles. And he does assume it: for he attempts not to prove that justified, or saved by faith, is more literal than "be that believes and is immersed shall be saved," or that "immersion does now save us," or "be immersed for the remission of sins." We shall now leave it to the reader to decide whether this rule of interpretation is applicable in the case as argued by my opponent or by me, feeling confident that if he doubt its applicability in my favor, he must be assured of its inapplicability in favor of my friend.

      This is his effort to elude the positive and explicit declarations in the New Testament relative to remission of sins, as at all connected with baptism.

      His next effort is to mend the king's version, and all others. Be baptized for the remission of sins, is into remission of sins!! That is, that Peter meant don't be afraid, you new believe and repent, you are forgiven, justified, and saved, &c. only be immersed into remission. You are remitted, but you have not got into remission. But by being immersed, you will be admitted into remission, being now remitted!! Credat Judæas Appella non ego! The reader will excuse me for pushing this matter further, for showing that a man in heaven need not do any thing to get into it!!

      My friend, p. 25, very kindly commutes immersion for disposition. He is willing to accept of the disposition for obedience; for "alms are accepted according to what a man hath." Reader, why not also say that a disposition to believe will just do as well as faith, provided a man cannot believe? This would relieve many: for there are more who say they wish to believe than who wish to be baptized, because of the want of ability. As he has accepted disposition for baptism, why not accept it for faith? According to this version, it should read--"He that believeth and is baptized, or has a disposition to be baptized, shall be saved." But I would recommend another version, to carry this commutation out: "He that believeth, or has a disposition to believe, and is baptized, or has a disposition to be baptized, shall be saved." That I may do him the greatest justice here, I will quote the passage which authorizes these remarks--p. 25. The query is: "Does not the connexion of the ordinance (baptism) in Acts ii. 38 and Mark xvi. 16 with repentance and remission of sins, and with faith and eternal salvation, represent a compliance with the institution as being requisite as an evidence, at least, of the blessings of forgiveness and an interest in the promise of eternal life?"

      "Answer. It does appear so; or rather, a disposition of heart to comply: for the gracious King of Zion accepts according to what a man hath, and not according to what he hath not."

      He gives us a page of very curious theory by way of illustration why our Lord so intimately connected salvation with baptism, and why Peter connected it so intimately with remission of sins. When the theory is examined, it appears that our friend discovered that it was because in the first age, in the times of persecution, it was necessary to prove the sincerity of the professors. It was only as a proof of sincerity, because of the troubles of that age; but now, persecutions having ceased, and the time expired for which this connexion was established, it is not so intimately connected as in the first century. This is the philosophy of his new theory!!

      The train of things which has carried our examiner into these extremes, I [43] doubt not, is his benevolent desire to avoid the grievous conclusion which he so frequently alleges against me, as the direct tendency of affirming baptism for the remission of sins. That, I need not now tell the reader, is his inference, that all the unbaptized are in an unpardoned, unjustified, unsanctified, unreconciled, unadopted, and unsaved state. He maintains that all who do not now believe in Jesus are in this state; he also teaches that it is much easier to be immersed than to believe. Hence he attaches salvation to the more unattainable of the two items connected with salvation in the commission, Mark xvi. 16. His scheme is but little more benevolent or charitable, (pardon the abuse of these words,) himself being judge, than that which he opposes. But, perhaps, he does not make even faith necessary. Disposition will do. But can there be a disposition to believe that which we think is not true! This is a question which, if justly answered, makes shipwreck of his theory of faith. But let us not wander from the subject. He has to force the bars of his own castle to admit into heaven all he thinks ought to be there without even faith. But my showing that he is inconsistent will not prove me consistent nor correct in this matter, and therefore we shall proceed.

      I have repeatedly asserted and shown that regeneration has respect only to the present kingdom of grace in its scriptural import, and that faith and baptism are indispensable to admission into it; also, that the terms justified, sanctified, pardoned, &c. have respect to the present enjoyment of salvation. Hence infants, idiots, and all those who can neither hear nor understand the gospel, are excluded from the present salvation equally with those who wilfully despise and reject it. But this does not decide the eternal destiny of infants, idiots, pagans, or those who reject the gospel. Their destiny must be decided by other sayings in the book. Of one class the book speaks most distinctly: "They who know not God, and obey not the gospel, shall be destroyed with an everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power." But even this is restricted to them who hear it. Indeed, the commission itself limits its promises of life and condemnation to those who hear it. When fully expressed in its full scope it reads thus: "Proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Every one who hears it, believes it, and is immersed, shall be saved. Every one who hears it and believes it not, shall be condemned." This is its full meaning and scope. Now as respects those who do not hear it, whether infants, idiots, pagans, &c. we only affirm that they cannot enjoy the present salvation. But whether they can enjoy the future is another question, which lies no more against immersion than against faith. If my friend Andrew can prove the future salvation of infants, idiots, pagans, without faith, I will undertake to prove it without immersion. All that he can save without faith, I will (to speak in the same style) save without immersion. But where he requires faith I will require immersion.

      But still up comes the delicate question, What comes of all the pious Turks, Jews, Pagans? No; that is no concern of ours, says my friend Andrew: but what comes of all the pious Catholics, Greeks, Protestants? The Greek and Roman Church say, "We believe in one baptism for the remission of sins;" and they believe that infants are sinners, and therefore the former immerse and the latter sprinkle them; and that is baptism with them. All christendom either immerse or sprinkle, except the Quakers, and they go for spiritual sprinkling or spiritual immersion. "What havoc does baptism for the remission of sins make among all these!!" I simply say, they are not in the kingdom of grace; because Jesus said, "Except a man be born of water and of the spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God." But he may accept the will for the deed, and admit them into the future kingdom, such of them as are merely mistaken, who are disposed to obey, or who think that they have obeyed, as he may accept infants and idiots into the future kingdom without faith or baptism.

      George Whitfield, writing on John iii. 5. says, "Does not this verse urge the absolute necessity of water baptism? Yes, when it may be had. But how God will deal with persons unbaptized we cannot tell." vol. 4. p 355. I say with him, we cannot tell with certainly. But I am of opinion that when a neglect [44] proceeds from a simple mistake or sheer ignorance, and when there is no aversion, but a will to do every thing the Lord commands, the Lord will admit into the everlasting kingdom those who by reason of this mistake never had the testimony of God assuring them of pardon or justification here, and consequently never did fully enjoy the salvation of God on earth. But I will say with the renowned President of Yale, that "he who, understanding the nature and authority of this institution, refuses to be baptized, will never enter the visible nor invisible kingdom of God." By the "visible and invisible kingdom" he means the kingdoms of grace and glory. He adds on the same page, "He who persists in this act of rebellion against the authority of Christ, will never belong to his kingdom." vol. 4. p. 302. If there be in this any contradiction or opposition to the doctrine of the Extra on Remission, I perceive it not. If my friend Andrew perceives it, I wish him to ask himself whether he does not perceive that it lies equally against his own doctrine of faith alone; and that the only question is not about the principle, but the number excluded. If he excludes the pious Turk, Jew, and Pagan, without faith, and finds it compatible to save infants and idiots without faith, is not the contradiction as difficult to remove from his door as from mine?

      Upon the whole, this is reasoning after the manner of men. Jesus said, "Except a man be born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." Also, "He that believes and is baptized shall be saved." Is it not safest, wisest, and best to plead for what is written, and to urge this upon all the unbaptized? What harm, or what 'pernicious consequences' will follow from it? "He that teaches men to violate or neglect one of the least of God's commandments, shall be of no account in the reign of God." Let my friend consider this once, twice, three times. Jesus said this, and I beseech him to consider whether this be not the drift and tendency of his pamphlet.

      If human authority is to decide the truth or propriety of his views or mine, we have an overwhelming vote on our side. We have all antiquity for four hundred years. Not only does Wall assert and prove this, but Vitringa also. His words are, "The ancient christian church, from the highest antiquity, after the apostolic times, appears generally to have thought that baptism is absolutely necessary for all that would be saved by the grace of Jesus Christ." Tom, 1. 50. ii. c. 6. 9. Dr. Owen also. "Most of the ancients concluded that baptism was no less necessary unto salvation than faith or repentance itself." On Justification, c. ii. page 183.

      The Reformers, too, are theoretically on our side. We have before shown this. Even the last of them, John Wesley, asserts that "by baptism we enter into covenant with God, an everlasting covenant, are admitted into the church, made members of Christ, made the children of God. By water as the means, the water of baptism, we are regenerated or born again." [Preservative, page 146-150.] All creeds, the Greek, the Roman Catholic, and all the reformed assert it. The Roman Catholic and the Greek Church say, "We believe in one baptism for the remission of sins. The Protestants say the same, as quoted in the Extra. And to these we add--

      The Confession of Bohemia.--"We believe that whatsoever by baptism--is in the outward ceremony signified and witnessed, all that doth the Lord God perform inwardly. That is, he washeth away sin, begetteth a man again, and bestoweth salvation upon him: for the bestowing of these excellent fruits was holy baptism given and granted to the church."

      The Confession of Augsburg.--"Concerning baptism they teach that it is necessary to salvation, as a ceremony ordained of Christ: also, by baptism the grace of God is offered."

      The Confession of Saxony.--"I baptize thee--that is, I do witness that by this dipping thy sins be washed away, and that thou art now received of the true God."

      The Confession of Whittenburg.--"We believe and confess that baptism is that sea, into the bottom whereof, as the Prophet saith, God doth cast all our sins." [45]

      The Confession of Helvetia.--"To be baptized in the name of Christ is to be enrolled, entered, and received into the covenant and family, and so into the inheritance of the sons of God; that is to say, to be called the sons of God, to be purged also from the filthiness of sins, and to be endued with the manifold grace of God, for to lead a new and innocent life."

      The Confession of Sueveland.--"As touching baptism, we confess that it is the font of regeneration, washeth away sins and saveth us. But all these things we do understand as St. Peter doth interpret them. 1 Pet. iii. 21."

      Westminster Assembly.--"Before baptism the minister is to use some words of instruction--showing that it is instituted by our Lord Jesus Christ; that it is a seal of the covenant of grace, of our engrafting into Christ, and of our union with him, of remission of sins, regeneration, and life eternal."

      But while Protestants and Catholics, who differ so much on other matters; agree in this, it is no trivial proof of the plainness and fulness of the Holy Scriptures on this great subject. But as it is on them alone that we build, I shall now sum up the evidence they contain according to the outline proposed, page 41.

      I shall give the three versions of the commission from the pens of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. "All authority is given to me in heaven and upon the earth. Go, convert all the nations, immersing them into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; teaching them to observe all the things that I have commanded you: and, behold, I am with you always, even to the conclusion of this state." Matth. xxviii.

      "Go throughout all the world; proclaim the good tidings to the whole creation. He who shall believe and be immersed, shall be saved; and he who will not believe shall be condemned." Mark xvi. 16.

      He commanded that "reformation and remission of sins should be proclaimed in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem " [Luke.] Matthew details most minutely all the things to be done in converting the nations--preaching to all nations, baptizing the believers, and teaching them the christian institution. Mark gives a summary view of it and states the results:--He that shall believe and be baptized, shall be saved. Believing the gospel and being baptized has salvation connected. This is placing faith and immersion in the most conspicuous light. But Luke substitutes reformation for believing; the gospel as the effect, or concomitant; and remission of sins for immersion as its effect or concomitant. Thus the commission is fully developed and the effects of preaching and baptizing unfolded, and we left at no loss to understand it. Luke shows us why he said that he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved. The order of things exhibited in the three versions is preaching, faith, or reformation, immersion, or remission of sins, or salvation. "What God has joined together let no man put asunder." This is our first argument. 2d. Peter, in his first discourse, when the question. "What shall we do?" was proposed by thousands of believing penitents, when he first stood up to execute the duties assigned him in his commission, Acts ii. 38,--answered them in these words, "Reform and be immersed, every one of you, by the authority of the Lord, for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." In this way he understood that reformation and remission of sins should be proclaimed among all nations. This was his sense of "He that believes and is baptized, shall be saved," This is our second argument.

      3. In Solomon's Portico, in his second discourse, he was not asked by the audience what they should do. He mentions neither faith nor baptism, but substitutes such terms as he thought equivalent on that occasion: "Reform and be converted that your sins may be blotted out, that seasons of refreshment from the presence of the Lord may come, and that he may [again] send his Son" to consummate the whole. Here the blotting out of sin is made attendant on reformation and conversion, which word we have shown in the Extra was equivalent to baptism, because Jesus said, "Convert the nations, baptizing them," &c. Matth. xxviii. This is our third argument. [46]

      4. In his third discourse before the Senate, Acts v. 31, Peter represents the object of Christ's exaltation in accordance with the commission as explained by Luke, the writer of the memoirs of Jesus and the historian of the Acts is of the Apostles. He says, "The God of our fathers has raised up Jesus, whom you slew, hanging him on a tree. Him has God exalted at his right hand, a Prince and a Saviour to give reformation to Israel and remission of sins. In the style of the same writer we again see reformation and remission connected, as in his account of the commission. This is a fourth argument.

      5 In Peter's sermon to the Gentiles, he concludes, "To him gave all the Prophets witness, that every one who believeth on him shall receive remission of sins by his name." "Can any of you forbid water?" He then commanded the believers to be immersed by the authority of the Lord. Thus faith, the name of he Lord, and forgiveness of sins is announced to the Gentiles. Thus God made no difference between the Gentile and the Jew, purifying their hearts alike by faith, and granting to the Gentiles "reformation unto life." This is our fifth argument, and thus ends the preaching of Peter recorded by Luke.

      But next comes the commission to Paul. "I send you," says Jesus, "to the Gentiles, to open their eyes, to bring them by the faith that is in me from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive the forgiveness of their sins, and an inheritance among the sanctified." The forgiveness of their sins is made consequent on their translation from the kingdom of Satan to God.--Acts xxvi.

      Ananias' mission to Paul gives him instruction how to proceed: for this purpose he was sent to him to Damascus. He taught Paul in his own person how he was to act to others. "And now," said he, "why do you tarry? arise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling upon the name of the Lord." Paul, in all probability, would never forget this lesson. This is our sixth argument.

      In Paul's writings we have a full developement of his views of this matter. To the Romans he says--"So many of us as were immersed into Jesus Christ were immersed into his death. Baptism is not only for the remission of sins, but it is a death to sin. A dead person sins not; so christians should reckon themselves dead to sin." How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer in it, baptized into his death, into the efficacy and power of his sacrifice? A strong figure, truly! but it is a figure of the truth.

      To the Corinthians Paul says--"You were once idolators; but now you are washed, you are justified, you are sanctified, by the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. To the Galatians, "As many of you as have been immersed into Christ, have put on Christ." In baptism, then, the believer confesses the Lord; puts him on, assumes him as Prophet, Priest, and King. To the Ephesians he says--"The Lord cleansed the church by the washing, or a bath of water, and by the word." It was not a cleansing of the flesh, but of the spirit, from pollution as well as from guilt. Therefore he says, to the Hebrews, "Having our hearts cleansed from a guilty conscience, and our bodies washed with clean water, or water that makes clean " To the Colossians be is still more full: "By the circumcision of Christ"--"a circumcision made without hands"--we put off the body of the sins of the flesh," "buried with him in immersion." "Therefore, having risen with him, seek the things which are above."

      We need not again cite his words to Titus. But from all these passages, on each of which a distinct argument may be grounded, may we not ask--Is not the washing of regeneration, as well as the renewal of the holy Spirit, clearly, uniformly, and forcibly taught, both literally and figuratively? These we can only recapitulate, in this place; we have often expatiated on them before.

      Peter, in allusion to immersion, says of certain characters, that they appear to forget "that they were purged from their old (or former) sins;" that others, like the washed hog, had returned to wallowing in the mire; and, stronger still, he affirms that as eight persons were saved by water in the ark, so the [47] antitype, or thing corresponding, "baptism, also now saves us," by the resurrection of Jesus.

      With Peter we began, and with Peter we shall end. Jesus gave him the keys of the kingdom of heaven; he appointed him to announce the commencement of his reign, and told him, when he gave him the keys, "Whose sins soever you remit, they are remitted; and whose sins soever you retain, they are retained." We see how he remitted and retained sins when first he promulged the gospel. We need no other testimony than what Peter gives, on this whole question. Were we to expatiate on these passages as we have on Titus 3 & 5, what, and how many arguments might be adduced! But this we judge unnecessary here, and our prescribed limits forbid it. Such are the documents which teach us the meaning and design of Christian Immersion. It is on these we rely, and not on inferences, analogies, or remote reasonings. These all may illustrate and confirm, but the bare testimony of the Book, without note or comment, constitutes our plea; and on these alone we join issue with every opponent.

      I have given a full specimen of the attempt of my Examiner to escape from their literal and figurative import. Some of them he professes not to understand; some of them he passes by; and with what point and logic he has attempted others, is now with the reader to judge.

      Before we conclude, we shall cross-examine Paul and Peter on one question as a sample how easy it is to meet all objections tendered from the frequency of commanding men to believe with a reference to salvation--

      Thousands ask Peter, What shall we do? The Jailor asks Paul, What shall I do? TO BE SAVED, if the reader pleases. Peter says, Reform and be baptized, everyone of you, &c. Paul answers, "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, with thy family." How is this, Paul and Peter? Why do you not preach the same gospel, and answer the same question in the same or similar terms? Paul, do you preach another gospel to the Gentiles than that Peter preached to the Jews? What sayest thou, Paul? Paul replies--"Strike, but hear me. Had I been in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, I would have spoken as Peter did. Peter spoke to believing and penitent Jews; I spoke to an ignorant Roman jailor. I arrested his attention after the earthquake by simply announcing that there was salvation to him and all his family through belief in Jesus." But why did you not mention repentance, baptism, the Holy Spirit? "Who told you I did not?" Luke says nothing about it; and I concluded you said nothing; about them. Luke was a faithful historian, was he not? "Yes, very faithful: and why do you not faithfully hearken to his account? Does he not immediately subjoin, that as soon as I got the Jailor's ear, I spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all that were in his house? Why you reason like a Paidobaptist. You think, do you, that the jailor's children were saved by his faith! I spoke the whole gospel, or word of the Lord, to the jailor and to his family. In speaking the word of the Lord I mentioned repentance, baptism, remission, the Holy Spirit, the resurrection, judgment, and eternal life: else why should I have baptized him and all his house, and why should he have rejoiced afterwards with all his family!!" Paul, I beg your pardon. I will not now interrogate Peter, for I know how he will answer me: he would say "Had I been in Philippi, I would have spoke to an ignorant Pagan as Paul did, to show that salvation flowed through faith in Jesus; and when he believed this and repented, I would then have said, Be baptized for the remission of your sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

      Reader, what sayest thou: will Paul and Peter, or the Master of Paul and Peter, condemn me? Then do not thou condemn me. Adieu.

      P. S. My friend Broaddus has both an Appendix and a Postscript to his examinations of the Extra. These treat of his views of divine influence, and contain his strictures on some pieces in the Harbinger. These we shall allude to in regular order, in our numbers, but it would be out of place here. [48]

[The Millennial Harbinger, 2 Extra No. 3 (October, 1831): 1-48.]