but had the evil of our fallen nature adhering to us, that not by any frail will, or purpose, or faith of our own, but by GoD's strong hand, we were plucked out of the depth of misery in which we lay, and out of the deep mire of sin, and our "foot set upon the Rock," "in a large," free, disentangled "place," where "our goings are ordered?" Is it no cause of thankfulness to our Heavenly FATHER, to have to look back upon a definite Act of GOD, whereby He" placed us in a state of salvation '," there by His grace to continue; that, independently of any feelings of our's, which may not be so vivid as they once were, antecedently to all of error, infirmity and sin, which there may have been in our course hitherto, and the imperfections which have cleaved, and (it is to be feared) do cleave to all our acts, marring our repentances, our faith, our works of love, there is still one bright spot whereon to look back, when GOD the FATHER chose us to be His sons in His SON, and the HOLY GHOST Sanctified us and sealed us as His? Is it nothing to bear His mark upon us, which His mercy has been more powerful to retain, we trust, than our sins to efface? Would not the faithful among the Israelites, in their wanderings through the wilderness, look back often to the Red Sea strand, where "the waters overwhelmed their enemies, and there was not one of them left, and He saved them from the hand of him that hated them, and redeemed them from the hand of the enemy 2?" And shall not we, in our pilgrimage through our wilderness, look back with a thankful yearning to that day, which the deliverance of Israel but shadowed out, when we were "saved from the hand of him who hates us, and redeemed out of the hand of the enemy," and "believing His words, sing His praise "?" We are formed to look back and forward, and from looking to the past to derive strength for the future. Those whose natural feelings have not been spoiled by subsequent artificial habits, look back with an inexpressible longing to the bright days of childhood and of youth,

1 "And I heartily thank our Heavenly FATHER, that He hath called me to this state of salvation, through JESUS CHRIST our SAVIOUR. And I pray unto GOD to give me his grace that I may continue in the same unto my life's end." Church Catechism.

2 Ps. cvi. 10, 11.

3 lb. v. 12.

and God's guardian arm around them, and the peaceful home, which, perhaps, knows them no more, and the comparative innocence which intercourse with the world and life's downward course has in whatever degree defiled; and the bright visions of that past cheer them on amid life's sorrows and strifes. It is not then in vain, surely, that throughout His whole Church He has blended with that early past, one brighter spot which sheds its lustre over all, and from which the light of their sun shines seven-fold1, our Baptismal morn; an Oasis, it may be, in a wilderness, but a spot, on which our memory may, without misgiving, repose, because all its brightness comes directly from Him, and in it "the light of His countenance" shone, and still shines upon us, if we look back for it. No! our Baptism is of inexpressible value and comfort, even because it is the act of GOD; it has nothing earthly mingled with it; it was simply His, who chose us, according to His eternal purpose," to the sprinkling of the Blood of JESUS CHRIST "," and "predestinated us unto the adoption of children by JESUS CHRIST unto Himself3," making us "in the Beloved 4," His own sons, members of His CHRIST, heirs of the kingdom of heaven. Our comfort, our joy, our peace, our consolation, our glory, is, to have, what we have, purely from Him, to have the foundation of our hopes, out of ourselves, and conveyed by a formal act of His, whereby," not according to works of righteousness which we did, but according to His mercy HE SAVED US, through the washing of regeneration and of the renewal of the HOLY GHOST," that " Baptism saves us, through the resurrection of JESUS CHRIST, Who is on the right hand of God."

It might have sufficed, perhaps, to have noticed one passage in which, through our depreciation of our Blessed SAVIOUR's ordinance, we have lost the support, the strength, the cheering hope, which He provided for us. For our mode of understanding any passage of Holy Scripture is not to be considered as something insulated resulting, as it does, from our general frame of mind, our habits of thought and feeling, and the character of our religious

Is. xxx. 26.

2 1 Pet. i. 2.

3

3 Eph. i. 5.

4 Ver. 6.

belief. Our insight into Scripture, as it is an instrument in forming our minds, so is it in part the result of the mind formed. within us our character of mind is a condition of understanding God's word according to what we ourselves are become, does that word appear to us: it is given to us according as we have: our present, is in proportion to our past, profit. No misunderstanding then of any portion of Holy Scripture; (I speak—not, of course, of words or expressions, but-of the general tenor of passages of Scripture ;) no shallowness of conception; no false spiritualism, or sluggish resting in the letter of any place, can stand singly; for, whatever be the defect which dims our sight in the one place, it will obscure our understanding of other passages also. This, as before said, we readily admit in gross and palpable cases we know, indeed, from authority, of "the veil on the hearts" of the Jews, and of " the god of this world," who "blindeth the understandings of the unbelieving :" we readily admit that one who has, practically, vague notions of justification by faith will understand but little of St. Paul: but we fail often to apply the test to our own case, and thoroughly to examine what is wanting to our own mental character, and how that deficiency prevents our more fully understanding God's word. What our dull eyes see in large and flagrant instances, exists, we may be sure, where they are too heavy to penetrate: so that no one wrong habit of mind, or faulty principle can exist, in however slight a degree, without affecting our views of Scripture truth.

To examine, then, the other passages wherein Baptism is spoken of, may have uses even beyond the immediate purpose of impressing upon ourselves the greatness of God's gift therein; for these will, in their turn, open to us the meaning of other Scriptures also, which the failure to apprehend these has closed to us. A right understanding of Baptism, as the entrance into the kingdom of Heaven, is essential to the understanding of the nature of the kingdom of grace, its duties, its comforts, and its privileges; and a faithful apprehension of the fulness of one Scripture sets the mind in the frame, to which GOD discloses the meaning of others. The passages of Scripture, then, relating to Holy Baptism, may be considered under the following heads. 1. Passages in which

Scripture speaks of high privileges and Divine gifts, involving duty as the ancient Church saw, but in which moderns have lost sight of the privileges and gifts, and see only duties. 2. Passages in which moderns have appropriated to themselves the privileges, without thought of the means whereby they are conveyed. 3. Passages, in which moderns see that Baptism is mentioned, but without attaching any especial notion to it. In all, it is remarkable to see, how for the most part we have lost not only the original meaning of Holy Scripture, but even all suspicion that we are in error.

1. Passages in which Holy Scripture speaks of gifts of GoD, moderns see only duties of man.

In these passages the question is, not whether they enjoin not duties conformable to our calling, but whether they contain not more than duties,-GoD's gifts actually conferred upon us, whereby we are enabled to perform those duties: whether they be a mere setting forth of persuasive motives to influence our will, or whether they contain also an account of God's Power imparted to us, whereby that will has been influenced, and a free will has been given us; whether they only put our duties in connexion with our SAVIOUR'S Life, Death, or Resurrection, and show the light cast upon them from His Cross, or Grave, or whether they state that the virtue of that Cross, precious Death, and glorious Resurrection, has been communicated to us, and that light infused into our own hearts, "according to the working of His mighty power, which He wrought in CHRIST, when He raised Him from the dead';" whether, in a word, they be outward motives, or inward power. The difference is very essential; for if it be found that Holy Scripture speaks uniformly of a power imparted to us, then, when for this, men would substitute "influential motives," and the like, they are, in fact, unconsciously substituting "Gospel motives" for the Gospel, man's will for CHRIST's Power, the tendency of truths to excite love, for" the love of CHRIST constraining us," persuasiveness of man's preaching for the "demonstration of the SPIRIT, and of power;" and as soon as they trust in the inherent power of Gospel truths to work their effects upon the soul,

1 Eph. i. 19.

they do in fact make an idol, substituting a statement of truth for Him who is "the Life" as well as "the Truth." Such a procedure may readily degenerate into a practical Pelagianism; for extolling the efficacy of certain motives', when faithfully set forth, to move and win men's affections, may easily be, and is frequently, taken to imply the power of the unrenewed will to act upon those motives. It matters not whether the motive so proposed be in itself the very highest or the lowest; the deficiency in man's condition before the Gospel was not the lack of motives, but of power to act upon them; it matters not whether it be present comfort, or the Elysian fields, or the beauty of virtue, or the love of God, or thankfulness to the Incarnate SoN; so long as it be an external motive proposed to the will, the will is as little, rather it is less able to appreciate or act upon that, which, to a purified spirit, were the most persuasive, than upon the most carnal. The more carnal, the more fitted for it; the brighter the sun's rays, the less fitted is the weak and disordered eye to behold them. So, then, under the older dispensation, carnal ordinances and carnal promises harmonized together, and that which was evangelic gleaming through both; in the Gospel, spiritual and life-giving Ordinances, and spiritual promises and motives.

To the unconverted the Apostles set forth judgment to come 2, repentance from dead works, remission of sins through Baptism upon faith in CHRIST JESUS; then on conversion followed Baptism, conveying remission of sins, uniting them with CHRIST, imparting to them the SPIRIT; and then those baptized they urge to use the power thus imparted to them; to them they apply the Gospel

1 Hence the unconscious tendency to Rationalism among many of our evidence-writers, who set forth the inherent efficacy of the great Christian doctrines, and thereby teach others to substitute the doctrines of the Gospel for the operations of the HOLY SPIRIT. To take a passage of this kind from a popular American work: "A knowledge of the death of CHRIST, with the explanation of it, given in the Scriptures, touches men's hearts; it shows the nature and tendencies of sin; it produces fear of God's displeasure, and resolution to return to duty; and thus produces effects by which justice is satisfied."-Mr. Abbott's Corner Stone, p. 174. See further the Tract whence this extract is taken, "On the Introduction of Rationalistic principles into Religion," Tracts, No. 73.

2 St. Peter, Acts ii. 20, 21. 38. iii. 19. x. 42. 47. (cp. xi. 14. 16. 18.) St. Paul, ib. xvii. 31. xxiv. 25.