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covenant of grace, as any penalty of the covenant of circumcision. Corrective punishments are not penalties.Nothing is worthy of the name of penalty, but eternal damnation. And this has been the unhappy fate of many under the legal and the evangelical dispensation-Mr. C's. comment on penalties, would lead us to view all the punishments inflicted on the subjects of any state professing Christianity, as penalties of the covenant of grace. [Here there was a mere repetition of his remarks made during the two periods he had last spoken, and a renewal of his assertions on the spiritual import of circumcision, which led me briefly to propose the following queries.] Mr. Walker will please answer the following queries,

viz.

What did circumcision seal to Ishmael P

Did circumcision naturally and primarily refer to a change of heart?

Did circumcision signify any thing 600 years after its institution, that it did not signify at its first appointment ?

With regard to Mr. Walker's observations on penalties, I merely observed, that his views must be peculiar to himself that no man acquainted with the meaning of the world penalty could say, that nothing short of eternal damnation could be called a penalty of a divine law.→ According to him there can be no degrees of comparison of penalties-no great no small penalties.-Now the term penalty, or its corresponding word punishment, is, in laws civil and divine, proportioned to the real or supposed degrees of demerit contained in crimes.-Hence the penalties of the infraction of certain laws, are fines, imprisonment, confiscation of goods, penitentiary, exile and death. What an absurdity would it be, if I should affirm, that neither fines, imprisonments, confiscation of goods, or exile, were any penalty or punishment inflicted on trangressions, that unless a man was killed he was not punished. Such is the import of Mr. W's objection to the views I have given of the penalties of the two covenants. But to settle the matter at once, I would ask, is there any thing less than eternal death in the sacred scripture called penalty, or punishment? I answer Yes-and quote the words of an afflicted man-Jer. 3, 39" Why should a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins!"I presume that no man will deny that this sa temporal affliction that is here called-" poena," per

alty, or punishment.-Excommunication from the church. is called-penalty or punishment, by the Apostle, 2 Cor. 2, 6" Sufficient to such a man- (the excommunicated fornicator) is the penalty or punishment inflicted of many." It may not be amiss here to observe, that in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, and English, the same word denotes both penalty and punishment. The word penalty, is obviously derived from "poena," and the first meaning of "poena" is punishment; (see Schrevelius' Greek, Stokii Clavis linguae Sancta Veteris Testamenti, and Lyttleton's Latin Dictionary, on this word."

To Mr. W's answers to my last queries, I shall briefly reply. He denies that Abraham, by covenant, was`constituted the father of a twofold seed, a natural and a spiritual seed-He expressly declares that he was the father of the faithful alone." That is the most flat contradiction of plain scripture testimony, I have heard from the lips of a professed teacher of religion. "I have made thee (by covenant) the father of many nations," saith God to him, Rom. 4th, 17th, and in the same chapter, saith the spirit (verses 11, 12)-" And he received the sign of circumcision that he might be the father of all them that believe though they be not circumcised" and the father of the circumcision"-not only as their natural father--to such of them as walk in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham."

I presume there is no man who ever read the Bible once through, that has not discovered that Abraham is both a natural and a spiritual father, according to the covenant that God made with him. That he was the natural father of the whole Jewish nation; and the spiritual father of all true believers, whether Jews or Gentiles-Mr. Walker himself, I am convinced, has often observed it; and it is now owing to the confusion of his mind, and the pernicious tendency of a corrupt system, that he does not confess it.

His answer to my eighth question is the first correct and scriptural answer that he has given-I admit it without any exception-And it is nearly as strange to me that he should now answer one question correctly, as that he should have answered seven erroneously!!

His answer to my ninth query is as unscriptural as any of his first seven answers. He says, that the covenant of circumcision belonged equally to the natural seed and the spiritual seed of Abraham, i. e. to believing Jews and

Gentiles, as well as to the whole nation of Israel-I should wish to hear him explain, how we Gentiles, who profess to be among Abraham's spiritual seed, are interested in the promises of Canaan, and in a numerous offspring, &c. If this be so we should set on foot another holy crusade, and attempt to rebuild the holy city and the temple!!!But I forbear to comment further on his answers.

Mr. Walker then proceeded-Observing, that he was ready to say that circumcision sealed every thing to Ishmeal that it had sealed to Isaac, or to any of the circumcised nation. That circumcision had a reference, primarily, to the renovation of the mind; and that it had the same import 600 years after its institution that it had at, or upon, its first appointment. My opponent has laboured much to destroy infant baptism, a rite of sacred import, and of great antiquity. Yesterday he insinuated that the rite was borrowed from the Church of Rome, and that the arguments I have used to support it, are chiefly borrowed from the same source. In reply to these insinuations, which should not pass unnoticed, I have to say, that I am able to shew, that infant baptism existed before the Antichristian system of which he speaks, and that it was practised from the earliest antiquity-In order to accomplish this I will read some extracts from the primitive fathers, the successors of the Apostles.*

Justin Martyr, as early as the year 140, alludes to the fact of infant baptism, in these words, which are taken from his Apology: "Several persons among us, of 60 and 70 years old, and of both sexes, who were discipled or made disciples to Christ in their childhood, do continue uncorrupted." In his dialogue Trypho, the application of baptism to persons of every age, is very clearly implied, thus: "We, also, who by him have had access to God, have not received this carnal circumcision, which

The book from which Mr. W. read these extracts, was a Treatise lately published by John P. Campbell, of Kentucky, in support of infant baptism. The extracts read by Mr. Walker from this writer, were such as are usually argued by the pedobaptists, in support of the antiquity of their cause. I do not recollect, nor do I find it in any of the notes taken on the occasion, in what order, or to what extent, the citations in John P. Campbell's book were read. But in the course of this work they shall all be attended to. In the mean time, I take up such as are most in favor of the pedo-baptists.

Enoch, and those like him, observed. And we have received it by baptism, by the mercy of God, because we were sinners: and it is enjoined to all persons to receive it in the same way"-namely, by baptism. And in another work we meet with this question: Why, if cir cumcision be a good thing, we do not use it as well as the Jews did?" This question he answers: We are circumcised by baptism with Christ's circumcision."

About the year 176, and probably about 167, Ireneus who had been bred in Asia, under the instruction of Po lycarp the disciple of St. John, but was then bishop of Lyons in France, delivers a very convincing testimony to the practice of baptizing infants. Ireneus against Hereses, lib. 2, c. 39: He (Christ) came to save all per sons by himself; all, I say, who are regenerated unto God, (baptized) infants and little ones and children and youths. The phrase regenerated unto God, was, in the language of this Father, and all other writers of that age, descrip tive of the fact of having been baptised. Justin Martyr more than once uses the word regenerate for baptise thus" Then they are brought by us to some place where there is water, and they are regenerated according to the rite of regeneration, by which we ourselves were regene rated; for then they are washed with water in the name of the Father and Lord of all things, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit."

Tertullian, who flourished from the year 194 till 216, thus speaks of infant baptism: "Therefore the delay of baptism is the more expedient, as it respects the condition and disposition as well as the age of every person to be baptised; and this, moreover,holds especially in refer ence to little ones; for what occasion is there, except in cases of urgent necessity, that the sponsors be bro't into danger, who are alike liable, through death, to fail in accom plishing their promises and to be deceived by the evolution of some evil disposition? Our Lord indeed says, Do not hinder them from coming to me; but then let them come when they grow up-let them come when they are informed and understand, i. e. the nature and design of the ordinance; when they are instructed, for what end they should come: let them be made Christians when they shall have become able to know Christ. Why does this innocent age hasten to the remission of sins, i. e. to baptism? Men act with more caution in secular concerns, than that

Divine interests should be confided to any one to whom it is considered improper to allow the disposal of earthly property. Let them know how to seek this salvation, that you may appear to have given it to one that asketh. For a reason no less weighty, unmarried persons should also have their baptism delayed on account of their being exposed to temptations; as well virgins by reason of their maturity, as widows by their wandering mode of life, until they either marry, or arrive at a confirmed continence. They who understand the great weight of baptism, will dread rather the too hasty reception, than the delay of it; and a genuine faith is secure of salvation.”

"Tertullian believed, or it was the decided judgment of this Father, that, in the article of Baptism, the soul was regenerated unto God"-his words are," Why dost thou,

Soul, (speaking of the resurrection) contemn the body? None is so near to thee whom thou shouldst love next to thy God; none more thy fellow than that which, along with thee, was regenerated unto God." To make his meaning still more plain, as respects infant baptism, we shall cite his words in I Cor. 7th, 14, "So there is no child born clean, that is, among the heathens." And hence, indeed, the Apostle says, that when either party in the married state is sanctified, the offspring are born holy, as well by the prerogative of birth, as by the discipLine of religious institution. "Else, said he, they should be born unclean; intending that the children of believers should be considered as if designated to holiness, and by this also to salvation" consequently deciding that by the pledges of this hope, those marriages might be defended, which he himself conceived ought to remain undissolved. Indeed, deciding differently, he had been admonished by the definitive sentence of our Lord, "except a man be born of water, and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." "Thus every soul is accounted, as in Adam, until it is enrolled in Jesus Christ, and is still un clean until it is so enrolled, and sinful because unclean." Thus far Tertullian.

Origen thus speaks, Homilia 8, in Levit. C. 12- Here, David speaking, I was,' said he, conceived in iniquity, and in sin did my mother bring me forth; shewing, that every soul that is born in the flesh is polluted with the filth of sin and iniquity-and that therefore that was said which we mentioned before, that none is clean from pot

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