Dorothy read on: "'Many of the Corinthians hearing believed and were baptized.' Isn't it strange? Every time it is those that believed that were baptized. Here is another: 'Then Simon himself believed also, and when he was baptized he continued with Philip.' And again: 'Then they that gladly received his Word were baptized.' They do not use the word 'believe' in that passage, but the words 'gladly received his Word', and these are practically the same; they not only heard his Word, but received it, and received it gladly."
"Oh, they were genuinely converted," said the Doctor. "There can be no doubt about that. It occurred on the day of Pentecost and those converts continued in the apostles' doctrine and bore good fruit."
"You see, Doctor," said Dorothy, "that those who were baptized in New Testament times first believed. You say that infants ought to be baptized because they have the heavenly and converted nature; but the Bible does not say that. Those who were baptized first believed. Now an infant cannot believe. I do not feel, Doctor, that I know a hundredth part as much of the Bible as you know, but don't you think that Christ meant by those words about little children and the Kingdom of Heaven that they must cultivate the qualities of a little child and that the child nature was a type of the heavenly nature? He did not connect this with baptism."
"Did you know that whole families were baptized?" asked the Doctor. "Many times baptisms were administered in homes not simply on those who believed, but on the whole family, young and old."
"But are you sure, Doctor, that there were infants in those families?"
"Not absolutely sure, but almost; at any rate the burden of proof is on those who deny that infants were in any of those families."
"Show us some of the accounts of family baptisms," said the father. "It does look a little curious, daughter."
They turned first to Acts 16:13-15: "'And a certain woman, named Lydia, a seller of purple of the city of Thyatira, which worshiped God, heard us, whose heart the Lord opened that she attended unto the things that were spoken of Paul. And when she was baptized and her household she besought us, saying.'"
"How do you know there were any infants in her household? It does not even say she was married," said Dorothy. "She was a seller of purple and maybe she was an unmarried woman working for her living. At any rate I do not see that you can prove that she had any infants in her household."
"It looks to me," said the father, "as if that woman was a working woman and as if her household were her fellow-workers, and that there were probably no infants among them."