And will God in very deed dwell on earth? Will the adorable Trinity be present at such a scene as this? Present! "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." He will not appoint this ordinance, and fail to be present; the God of redemption is a party to that transaction by which an immortal soul, with an existence commensurate with his own, is consecrated to him by its natural guardians, acting in the place of God, and for the child, and joining them in covenant.
"Shall we ever forget this?" said the husband to his wife, as we were riding along that beautiful afternoon.
"Never," said she; but she added, sensible woman as she was, "the beauty and sentiment of the place seemed to me nothing, compared with the privilege of covenanting with God, and having him covenant with us for the child. After all," said she, "I would have been glad to have had the baptism in our little church at home, and to have secured good Mrs. Maberry's prayers, and those of our church, for the child, at its baptism. I must write to her, and get her to tell the Maternal Association about it, and ask them not to forget little Philip."
"What would you have named it," said my wife, "had it been a girl?"
"O," said she, smiling, "I was thinking on the hill, that, if it had been a girl, I should have called it Candace, for the Ethiopian queen."
"And Canda, for shortness and sweetness, I suppose," said her husband, his eyes twinkling and sparkling with love, as he looked at her, and from her upon us.
"He's a sweet little thing, you know he is," said the mother, burying her face in the child's bosom, and giving it something between a good long smell and a good long kiss, or both; a thing which mothers alone know exactly how to do.
"Suppose," said I, "that, instead of little Philip, it had been you, sir, and Mrs. Blair, who had needed to be baptized.
"Here you are, on a journey. You do not know that you will be able to avail yourselves of religious ordinances, in your new home, for a long time to come; and, besides, regarding baptism not merely as a profession of religion, but as an act of Almighty God, sealing you with his appointed sign of the covenant, you have strong desires to receive it, here in this 'way unto Gaza, which is desert,' from my hands.
"'See, here is water,' in rich abundance. But, alas! there is no pond, nor pool, no lake, nor river!"