If indeed there had been a different religion introduced; if christians were not engrafted into the old stock; if they worshipped some other than the God of Israel; if there was another moral law, another Christ than he whose day the fathers anticipated, and another faith; this privilege of receiving infants into the church might have been interrupted; and in that case unless expressly again enjoined, it ought not to have been regarded in practice. But if the christian religion is founded upon the prophets; if the peculiarities of the Jewish worship were but shadows of gospel things; if both were directed to the same glory of God and salvation of men; if they both enjoined the same holiness and presented the same object of faith; if those who were saved under the Old Testament shall be associated with those who are saved under the New; the privileges formerly granted to children will remain the same; and it is not wonderful that the first christian should obey the dictates of parental tenderness; and that desiring the salvation of their children as well as their own, should cause their households to be baptized as well as themselves. To have affirmed in the gospel history expressly, that children were a part of the household, could have answered no purpose in the first days of christianity, but would have been thought repetitions and unmeaning until modern times. In the fifth, in the third and even so early as in the second century, the baptism of infants was the established usage of the church, and it was then thought, and not disputed, to have been the practice of the apostles themselves.
[69]. Μαθητεισατε.
[70]. Vid Whitby in Loc.
[71]. This then is a repetition; go, teach, baptize, teach. This commission was to disciple the world, baptizing and teaching are the specification, and are participles agreeing with the nomination.
It is no inference from the position of baptizing before teaching are that adults might be first baptized. This was the institution of the ordinance of baptism as well as the apostolic commission; yet it neither contains any direction either as to the mode or subjects; because Christ spoke to Jews, who knew that adult proselytes were carefully examined, whilst infants were circumcised with their parents without such examination. They also knew the various modes of religious purifications among the Jews; both John the Baptist, and they having under that dispensation baptized. Neither is faith essential to the validity of baptism, nor is the profession of it required of such as are incapable of making it.
[72]. To be brought into the visible church, is a high privilege, of which infants are as capable now, as under the former dispensation. Consent is not necessary; for infants receive inheritances. This is by force of municipal laws. But are not the laws of God of equal force?—Baptism implies obligations, which can be founded only on consent. Then it will follow that infants are not bound by human laws, for they have not assented to the social compact; they are under no obligation to obey parents, guardians, or masters, because they either did not choose them, or were incompetent to make such choice; they are not bound by the laws of God himself, which is this very case, because they have not consented to his authority; and if they never consent, they will be always free equally from all obligations, and all sin. Such are the consequences of the above objection.
[73]. The dictates of nature, uncontrouled by revelation, are the will of Christ, and our rule of duty. The will of Christ, expressed in these dictates, requires us to benefit our children as they are capable. Baptism, as the initiatory seal of God’s covenant, is a benefit of which infants are capable.—This evidence is not eclipsed, but brightened, by scripture authority, as we shall see in the sequel of this chapter.
Let the reader carefully notice, that we do not suppose, by insisting on this argument, the insufficiency of direct scripture evidence: for this has been frequently urged with advantage, to satisfy persons of the best dispositions and abilities. That is, reader, “some of the most eminent Pœdobaptists that ever filled the Professor’s chair, or that ever yet adorned the Protestant pulpit.” But since our opponents insist, that what has been so often urged, is not conclusive; and modestly affirm, it is only calculated to catch “the eye of a superficial observer;” they are desired once more impartially to weigh this reasoning, and then, if they are able, to refute it. Let them know, however, that hackneyed phrases without meaning—principles taken upon trust—and empty declamation—must not be palmed on us instead of solid arguments.
Were it necessary, it would be easy to shew, that the principles above urged are no novelty; but are perfectly agreeable to experience,—and to the practical judgment of the most serious Pœdobaptists, both illiterate and learned. But waving this, we proceed next to another corroborating proof of the main proposition.
What we contend for is. That it is the will of Christ we should baptize our infant children. In proof of this we have shewn, first, that the dictates of right reason require us to benefit them, and consequently to baptize them; as baptism is always a benefit when administered to capable subjects. We come, secondly, to shew—That God has constantly approved of this principle, in all preceding dispensations. In other words—That the principle of the last argument is so far from being weakened by scripture evidence, that the Lord’s approbation of it, in his conduct towards the offspring of his professing people, in all the dispensations of true religion, is abundantly illustrated and confirmed.