AN APOLOGY 
 
 ^Slain £>en$e of tin Stortrtne of t!)e draper £oofe 
 
 HOLY BAPTISM. 
 
 
 REV ALEXANDER WATSON, MA. 
 

 
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AN APOLOGY 
 
 v<fc> 
 
 PLAIN SENSE OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRAYER BOOK 
 
 ifeolg Baptism, 
 
 IN ANSWER TO THE 
 
 KEV. W. GOODE'S LETTEE TO THE BISHOP OF EXETEB. 
 
 BY THE REVEREND 
 
 ALEXANDERi/WATSON, M.A. 
 
 CURATE OF ST. JOHN'S, CHELTENHAM. 
 
 rji<7Tor it o Btot, on o Xd-ycx ii/iSiv 6 wpoc vuat ovk tycvero vat aa't ov." — 2 Cor. i. 18 
 " IHIOY2 XTISTOE x^t ""'• oi lf xtpov 'O AYTOX, Kal fit tow aiwva?."— Heb. xiii. S. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 JOSEPH MASTERS, 33, ALDERSGATE STREET, 
 AND 78, NEW BOND STREET. 
 
 1850. 
 
 Sc 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2011 with funding from 
 
 Princeton Theological Seminary Library 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/apologyforplainsOOwats 
 

 
 ■ * » v . \ » « ^ 
 
 AN APOLOGY, 
 
 None who have read Mr. Goode's Letter to the Bishop of 
 Exeter, can suppose that his Lordship will reply to him. 
 Had it heen likely that his Lordship would recognise 
 any other opponent in this matter than his Grace the Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury, the tone and temper in which Mr. 
 Goode has written, render it quite impossible that the Bishop 
 whom he assails could treat him otherwise than with silence. 
 For the like reason, a defence of that Bight Beverend Brelate 
 from the attacks of so unscrupulous an assailant, might 
 seem to be unnecessary. At the same time the cause of 
 truth seems to call for some refutations of Mr. Goode's mis- 
 statements and aspersions, more especially as they affect 
 the character of those by whose pious labours our Book of 
 Common Prayer was brought into its present form, and of 
 those whose memory we honour as our standard divines. 
 If Mr. Goode's alleged facts really deserve the name — if his 
 inferences be just — his arguments sound — his theory of the 
 Church's doctrine correct, then it follows that those who 
 imposed the Prayer Book on the Church, were " double- 
 niinded" men, and that no confidence is to be placed in their 
 meaning what they say, and therefore that there is no assur- 
 
 B 
 
ance that they thought and held as the Church Catholic- 
 has in all ages believed and taught. 
 
 It will be my aim in these pages to show that those great 
 men to whom our Church, under God, owes so much, were 
 not thus " unstable in their ways ; that in their hands the 
 " trumpet" gave no " uncertain sound ;" but that when they 
 enunciated the doctrine of " One Baptism for the Remission of 
 Sins," they asserted the primitive faith in respect of that Holy 
 Sacrament, and maintained that it is in and by Baptism that 
 the grant of Divine forgiveness is vouchsafed to the sinful 
 race of man. I shall seek to show that the anxiety winch 
 the Church manifests, for the christening of children at the 
 earliest possible period, in the first rubric preceding the office 
 of Private Baptism, had its origin in the universal belief of 
 Christian people, that in and by Holy Baptism God's favour 
 is first shown to infants, and that that favour is universally 
 conferred in that Sacrament upon every infant who is bap- 
 tized with water in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, 
 and of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 I trust that in what I shall write I shall not suffer indig- 
 nation to be without measure, nor mistake the call to vindi- 
 cate truth as an apology for virulence and abuse of those 
 who differ from me ; and if the exposure of Mr. Goode's 
 strange inaccuracies should have the appearance of showing 
 that he is wilful in his mistakes, I can only say that nothing 
 is further from my mind than any wish to impugn the 
 motives of an adversary. It does, however, become the 
 duty of one who has it in hand to vindicate others from 
 what he deems injurious attacks — to enquire as Mr. Goode 
 does (p. 46), Quis vltwperavit ? Who is the accuser ? — to 
 examine the character possessed by him who brings the 
 charge, so far, at least, as that character can be ascer- 
 tained from the context in which those charges are found. 
 I should, indeed, be sorry to resort to such shifts as Mr. 
 
Goode has done,* in order that he may damage an opponent, 
 but to somewhat of that which his own book furnishes 
 of self-condemnation it may be well to refer. 
 
 Mr. Goode first addresses himself to the question of the 
 Archbishop of Canterbury's part in the great controversy 
 which is now so rife ; and he claims that his Grace shall be 
 considered as writing wholly in an uncontroversial way. 
 How far this claim can be made out, it is for others to say : 
 my first business is to show that Mr. Goode's opening page 
 contains evidence of his unfitness to act as the censor of 
 others. After having wished his readers to believe that he 
 is undertaking a " calm review" of the Bishop of Exeter's 
 statements, he charges that fearless and undaunted Prelate 
 with the cowardice of assailing one who could not defend 
 himself; and then proceeds : — 
 
 " And with your usual accuracy, you have stated that ' in the whole 
 history of the Church of England ' you are ' not aware that anything of a 
 similar kind has before occurred.' Have you never heard, then, my Lord, 
 of Archbishop Cranmer's answer to Bishop Gardiner ? Are you really so 
 little versed in the writings of our Reformers, that such a work as this 
 comes not even within the limits of your recollection ? " 
 
 Had Mr. Goode quoted the whole sentence instead of a 
 part of it, he would have pointed out to his readers that the 
 Bishop had in all probability this very work in his mind as 
 one which differed too widely from the Archbishop's recent 
 Preface, to be adduced as a precedent ; for it is hardly pos- 
 sible that he could by chance have so accurately described 
 the case of the " Answer" to Gardiner as he does, in 
 
 * What can be more entirely in the vile spirit of the journal which 
 was the cause of the action than Mr. Goode's allusion to the trial, and his 
 use of its verdict, in the cause Bishop of Exeter v. Latimer ; or what more 
 pitiful than his insinuations about the number of editions of the Bishop's 
 Letter ? But I forbear from the tu quoque which my publisher informs 
 me is within my reach, on this last point. 
 
 B 2 
 
the words which Mr. Goocle omits to quote, though they 
 follow the colon appended to the passage he cites. The 
 whole passage stands thus : — 
 
 " In the whole history of the Church, of England I am not aware that 
 anything of a similar kind has ever before occurred ; — that the Primate 
 of all England has ever before thrown himself upon the judgment of the 
 world as the writer of a controversial book ; if he have," continues the 
 Bishop, " the statements contained in it must have been so manifestly ac- 
 cordant with the doctrines of the Church, that they carried with them 
 the universal assent of Churchmen." 
 
 Now, without waiting to show how little parallel there is 
 between a Preface written to justify a party whose opinions 
 are only partially adopted, and an " Answer" called forth by 
 a bitter alien attack on the Church's then received doctrine, 
 let us ask what says his Editor, the learned Professor of 
 Divinity in the University of Durham, in respect of 
 Cranmer's controversy with Gardiner ? 
 
 " Such (with the exception of the Disputation at Oxford, which will 
 be noticed hereafter) is the sum of Cranmer's labours in this important 
 controversy. His learning and ability in the conduct of it, have been 
 fully acknowledged both by friends and foes. The high opinion enter- 
 tained by the former, of his publications on the question, may be learnt 
 from the subjoined testimonies to their value, by several of the most 
 eminent men of that day. And the sentiments of the latter respecting 
 them, were sufficiently manifested by the pains with which the leaders 
 of the party combined to produce an answer ; by the weight attached to 
 them in the proceedings against their author and his coadjutors under 
 Queen Mary ; and by the petition presented in that reign by the lower 
 House of Convocation, for placing them in ' the forefront ' of the here- 
 tical books proposed ' to be destroyed and burnt throughout the realm.' 
 
 " They seem, indeed, to have attracted admiration on the one side, and 
 hostility on the other. The English Reformers appealed to them with 
 confidence, as to a standard work, containing not only a clear statement 
 and ample defence of then- own doctrines, but also a complete refutation 
 of the corrupt tenets of their adversaries. And for the same reasons 
 were these writings assailed with the utmost vehemence by the Papists ; 
 it being perceived, that if their credit were shaken, the blow would 
 
 AFFECT THE WHOLE ADMINISTRATION OF THE LORD'S SUPPER, AS IT HAD 
 
BEEN LATELY ARRANGED IN ENGLAND." — Editor's Preface, pp. xcix-c, to 
 
 Z\ 
 
 
 ' 
 
 
 the Remains of Thomas Cranmcr, D.D., by Rev. Henry -J^fiyYNS, M.A 
 Oxford, 1833. 
 
 To this learned treatise, thus called into court hy Mr. 
 Goode, I shall have occasion to refer hereafter, when it may- 
 be well to bear in mind the important testhnonjr which is 
 here borne to its excellence. 
 
 I now proceed to a most unwelcome task, but it is one 
 from which I may not shrink : for it is thus that we shall 
 be best enabled to judge of Mr. Goode's accuracy, and of the 
 seemliness of his attacks upon the Bishop on the matter 
 which follows — attacks to which he recurs again and again. 
 At page 5 of his Letter, Mr. Goode writes, — 
 
 " Or are we really to conclude, that your most solemn asseverations 
 may be uttered in a state of complete and conscious (sic) ignorance, 
 whether they are true or false? your Lordship, it seems, possesses the first 
 edition of the Archbishop's work published in 1815; and having procured 
 a copy, or the loan of a copy, of the ninth edition, published in 1850, you 
 straightway publish a Letter, in which you compare the two editions, and 
 then tell the world of 'the additions and omissions' made ' in this new 
 edition/ and imply that they were made to meet the circumstances of the 
 case of Mr. Gorham." 
 
 And is the Bishop of Exeter to blame for this ? What 
 says his Grace in the Preface to the Ninth Edition, Feb- 
 ruary, 1850?— 
 
 " I take the opportunity of the republication of a work written thirty- 
 five years ago, to repeat what was stated in the original preface," Szc. 
 
 It is but the effect of a common sum in subtraction, to 
 look in an edition of 1815, for words which in 1850 it is 
 said were written thirty-fire years ago. If his Grace had 
 reprinted in this Edition the whole of the " Preface to the 
 Second Edition," a 'part of which he had been in the habit 
 of printing with the different editions up to the present; 
 the Bishop of Exeter would then have known that there 
 were alterations and new matter introduced in the Second 
 
6 
 
 Edition, which were intended " to fill up what might other- 
 wise appear deficient in a system of preaching which con- 
 fined Regeneration to baptismal privileges." And it would 
 have been his Lordship's duty to have examined what cor- 
 respondence there was between the Editions of 1817 and 
 1850. Or had his Grace said " thirty-three years ago," 
 instead of " i^hirtj-five years ago," it would have been an 
 oversight if his Lordship had failed to do so. But as it is, 
 whatever of blame may attach to a comparison of the Edi- 
 tions of 1815 and 1850, certainly no fault can lie at the 
 door of a reader of the Preface prefixed to the latter Edition, 
 for instituting such a comparison. 
 
 But is it true, as Mr. Goode subsequently states, that the 
 Editions of 1817 and 1850 are identical, with the exception 
 of the insertion of the note at page 171, and of the extracts 
 from Bradford, and the omission of the words, " it absolutely 
 nullifies the sacrament of Baptism ?" By no means. Mr. 
 Goode snys :— 
 
 " Every one of the passages (with the exception of a note which you 
 yourself think admits of a sense to which you do not object) which you 
 have quoted as ' new matter,' in this ' New Edition,' occur in every 
 Edition of the work from the second (inclusive) published thirty-three 
 years ago — that is, in 1817." 
 
 Now how stands the fact? In the extract from page 
 183, winch the Bishop quotes from the " New Edition," 
 though he does not speak of it as " new matter," the follow- 
 ing words occur : — 
 
 " The matter is of less consequence, since it is [of] the positive doctrine 
 of our Church, that such renewal and such extent of power [belongs to 
 all who are baptized in the name of Christ.] " 
 
 Now, in the Edition of 1817, and in every Edition, so far 
 as I know, and certainly in that of 1826 and in that of 1839, 
 which was the one immediately preceding the Edition of 1850, 
 the passage stands thus : — 
 
" The matter is of less consequence, since it is the positive doctrine of 
 our Church, that such renewal and such extent of power [is the privilege 
 of Baptism.]" 
 
 Now, here we have, in five lines, two instances in which, 
 as the Bishop says, statements are " materially altered," 
 and this after the corrections which had been rendered neces- 
 sary by the apparent deficiencies of " a system which con- 
 fined Regeneration to Baptismal privileges," had really 
 been at least " thirty-three years before the world, in seven 
 different editions." 
 
 The passage as it stands in the edition of 1850, is one 
 which the Bishop of Exeter might well accept as satisfactory, 
 taken bond fide and per se ; but when we come to look upon 
 it as an altered passage, we have a right to ask Mr. Goode 
 to explain the change. In the passage as it stood from 1817 
 to 1850, two facts are asserted, — viz. (1.), that it is " the pri- 
 vilege of Baptism" to confer a renewed will, and a power of 
 co-operating with God's grace ; and (2.), that this doctrine 
 is the positive doctrine of the Church. Now, by the in- 
 sertion of " of," between " is," and " the," it would seem as 
 if this view is no longer said to be the doctrine of the Church 
 on this subject, but only to be a part of its positive doctrine 
 on Divine subjects generally. And the statement, " the 
 privilege of Baptism," which ties down these benefits abso- 
 lutely to Baptism, in respect of time and circumstance, is 
 exchanged for another passage, which truly affirms that it 
 belongs to Christians, describing them in words of Scripture. 
 Now, though these words suggest no double sense to catholic- 
 minded persons, and are therefore received by the Bishop of 
 Exeter with satisfaction, they do yet afford occasion for the 
 introduction of subtile niceties as to what is Baptism in the 
 Name of Christ* to those who will not accept our Lord's 
 
 * " I do not perceive that this verse is, in the slightest degree, at 
 variance with the view which I have taken of the preceding verse, 
 (Answer .3!),) as representing ' faith ' to be a pre-requisite to beneficial 
 
words to Nicodemns, in the plain and literal sense in which 
 the Church has universally understood them. 
 
 Now, far be it from me to charge the Archbishop as Mr. 
 Goode charges the Laudian divines, with making this and 
 other alterations in a cowardly and covert manner : but I 
 think I have a right to expect more accuracy of statement 
 with respect to these alterations, from a writer who blames 
 the compilers of our Prayer-Book for modifying a document 
 which they were specially concerned to " review," in terms 
 such as these : — 
 
 " In the ' Review,' in 1662, the words ' And grant,' &c, are changed to 
 ' Sanctify this water to the mystical washing away of sin, and grant that 
 this child, now to be baptized therein, may receive,' &c. Here (besides 
 the restoration of the consecration of the water, which is immaterial to our 
 present subject,) an alteration is made in the language of the prayer, 
 the reason of which is obvious. But the alteration cannot effect any 
 change in the sense in which the service is to be understood.* It is 
 a very apt specimen of the way in winch the Laudian divines of 1662, 
 not daring openly to remodel the formularies after then own views, 
 contrived to slip in a few words in one place, and leave out a few in 
 another, and alter a fete in a third, so as to ta/ce off the EDGE OF EX- 
 PRESSIONS that might tell against them, and introduce what might serve 
 as an unsuspected foundation on which to build then doctrines." 
 
 A writer thus keen- sighted as to the value of words which 
 "tell against" liim, cannot claim to treat as immaterial changes 
 which make for him. And we have a right to ask Mr. Goode 
 
 Baptism; but I hold, on the contrary, that it beautifully illustrates it: — 
 ' As many of you ' (not all who make profession by the outward and visible 
 sign) ' as have been baptized into Christ,' (having ' believed with all your 
 heart,' and having thus come to baptism with that lively ' faith in Him' 
 which made you ' the children of God,') ' have put on Christ.' 
 
 " You have been invested with His righteousness, imputed to you for 
 your justification, and you have been clothed with that personal righteous- 
 ness (Rom. viii. 4.) which shows that you are sanctified by his Spirit." — 
 Gorham's Efficacy of Baptism, Note to Answer 61, p. 115. See also 
 Answer 88, p. 169. 
 
 * " Effects of Infant Baptism," by W. Goode, M.A., F.S.A. : London, 
 1850, p. 420. 
 
for an explanation of his assertion in respect of these editions 
 of 1817 and 1850, especially in respect of this alteration, 
 which is made for the first time in 1850 ; for, while the pas- 
 sage, as it stood till 1850, could, the passage as it now stands 
 cannot, when compared with the passage from which it is 
 altered, he quoted against the following assertion in the new 
 Preface (p. vii.) : — 
 
 " It is scarcely necessary for me to add, that I have nowhere insinuated 
 a doubt — which I have never felt — whether a person may be a consistent 
 minister of our Church, who holds a different opinion concerning the effect 
 of Baptism from that which is advocated in this volume, and believes 
 that the grace of spiritual regeneration is separable, and, in fact, often 
 separated from the sacrament of Baptism." 
 
 The next passage which the Bishop quotes is from p. 163 
 of the new edition. The words which immediately follow 
 that quotation stand thus in the respective editions of 1817 
 and 1850 :— 
 
 1817. 1850. 
 
 Page 159. — "While the preacher Page 163. — While the preacher 
 evidently treats them as if it were evidently treats them as if it were 
 possible they might be still unre- possible they might be still unre- 
 generate. generate, without defining the mean- 
 
 ing tvhich he ascribes to the term 
 regeneration. 
 
 And these words in italics * were first added in 1850. But 
 Mr. Goode goes on to assert (p. 6) — 
 
 " And, as to ' omissions,' there is not one, except of seven words in one 
 sentence — an omission which you yourself do not pretend to make of any 
 moment."t 
 
 " Not one omission." — I do not know how many there 
 are such as that at p. 252, 1817, and p. 259, 1850, where, as 
 
 Here, as in most of the collated passages, the italics or CAPITALS, as 
 the case may be, are mine, to mark the differences between the editions. 
 
 t In 1850, the words, " it" [the doctrine of special grace] "absolutely 
 nullifies the sacrament of Baptism," arc omitted. 
 
10 
 
 far as I can see, the quotation is wholly unimportant ; but I 
 have found the four following, which are sufficiently pertinent 
 to the new Preface, especially those from p. 75 and p. 253 
 of the edition of 1817; but pertinent or not, they are 
 " omissions ;" and my controversy is not with the Archbishop, 
 but with Mr. Goode. 
 
 1817. 
 
 Page 75. — By " grace " is to be 
 here understood, as in many other 
 places, the terms of salvation offered 
 by the gospel, i. e., of justification 
 by faith in Christ. So the word 
 is used, Rom. v. 2. " This grace 
 wherein we stand ;" and, 2 Cor. viii. 
 9, " Ye know the grace of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ ;" 1 Pet. v. 12, " This 
 is the true grace of God wherein ye 
 stand." 
 
 1850. 
 
 Page 78.— Nil. 
 
 Note, page 195. — The argument 
 throughout this chapter would have 
 been made much clearer to the 
 English reader, if our translators 
 had observed that, throughout it, 
 St. Paul only uses the article with 
 po/jlos, when he means to specify the 
 Mosaic law, a nicety which he does 
 not observe on other occasions. 
 
 Page 201.— Nil. 
 
 Page 135. — That this notion is 
 favoured by the language of the 
 early reformers, can neither be de- 
 nied nor wondered at. 
 
 They wrote against the corrup- 
 tions of a Church, in which Pelagian 
 principles were not only tolerated, 
 but received and acted ivpon. Their 
 opponents maintained the doctrines 
 of merit and works of supereroga- 
 tion. 
 
 Page 139. — Nor can we either 
 deny or wonder that this notion is 
 favoured by the language of the 
 early reformers, who wrote against 
 the corruptions of a Church, in 
 which Pelagian principles were not 
 only tolerated, but received and 
 acted upon, and whose opponents 
 maintained the doctrines of merit 
 and works of supererogation. 
 
11 
 
 They generally, therefore, argued Nil. 
 
 in the spirit of Luther, who says, 
 in his reply to Erasmus, " If we 
 believe that Christ has redeemed us 
 by His blood, we are compelled to 
 confess that man was completely in 
 a state of perdition, otherwise we 
 make Christ of none effect ; or if we 
 do admit His efficiency, still we allow 
 Him to be the Redeemer of only a 
 very bad part of human natm-e, and 
 maintain that there is a better part 
 which stands in need of no redemp- 
 tion." 
 
 Page 253.— I stop short of the Page 261. — Nil. 
 question as to Demas's subsequent 
 recovery, which seems probable 
 from the Epistle to Philemon. For 
 all practical purposes the argument 
 is incontrovertible : Demas, the 
 faithful convert, was at "peace with 
 God through Jesus Christ." Demas, 
 having swerved from the faith and 
 fallen away, was no longer safe : 
 Demas repenting, and doing again 
 his first works, was replaced in a 
 state of salvation. All beyond is 
 among the " secret things." 
 
 The omission of this passage is the more remarkable 
 from its appearing for the first time in the second edition, 
 it being a note to the chapter on Personal Election, alluded 
 to in the Preface of 1817, as being added to supply " what 
 seemed to be wanting in a system which confined Regene- 
 ration to Baptismal Privileges." And its omission is the 
 more to be lamented, because the statement of the argu- 
 ment, the assumed fact being such, faithfully and suc- 
 cinctly enunciates catholic doctrine on three important 
 subjects. I. That those once at peace with God through 
 Jesus Christ may fall away. II. That the mode of 
 
12 
 
 recovery after such falling away is to repent. III. That 
 one so falling away and so repenting is re -placed in a 
 state of salvation. 
 
 But Mr. Goode goes a step further; not only does he 
 make the assertion, which we have just shown to be in- 
 correct, but he further states his belief that, with the 
 exception of the omission to "which he owns, " the text 
 of the edition of 1850 on this subject remains as it stood 
 in the second edition of 1817, and the only addition con- 
 sists of a few extracts from Bradford in the notes." " So 
 much," he adds, " my Lord, for your charge of change" 
 
 Now, first let us take the additions, though, to see their 
 bearing upon the present question, reference should be had to 
 the context ; but my concern being, as I have said, with Mr. 
 Goode's accuracy as to a matter of fact, this is not necessary. 
 
 1817. 
 Page 33.— Nil. 
 
 Page 49, Nil. 
 
 1850. 
 
 Page 34, Note. — Compare J. 
 Scott's Christian Life, part 2, c. vii. 
 s. 3, II. I. ; Bishop Gibson's Second 
 Pastoral Letter, ii. iv. ; Magee on 
 the Atonement, note xlii. 
 
 Page 50, first added 1850.— At 
 the same time we should observe, 
 that the same consolation winch 
 would encourage the Romish Chris- 
 tians under then- various trials, by 
 assuring them of God's gracious 
 purpose to^\ ards them as a people, 
 would no less give them confidence 
 as individuals. 
 
 It was the purpose of God, who 
 had formerly chosen the Jewish 
 nation to himself, so now to choose 
 a people froni the various nations 
 of the earth, who should come to 
 the knowledge of Him here, and 
 enter into his glory hereafter. 
 
 But they must be brought to him 
 
13 
 
 by the only mode of access, the 
 gospel of Christ. 
 
 " No man knoweth the Father 
 save the Son, and he to whomsoever 
 the Son -will reveal Him." There- 
 fore the gospel must be preached to 
 them ; they must be called. 
 
 And these had listened to the 
 call : as He foreknew ; their hearts 
 had been opened, and they had this 
 abiding proof that " God had pre- 
 destinated them to the adoption of 
 children, according to the good 
 pleasure of His will." 
 
 For this is the due order in which 
 their salvation must proceed. 
 
 Their calling and justification 
 woidd lead to their final glory. 
 
 They might confidently trust that 
 the mercy which had brought them 
 thus far, would accompany them to 
 the end. 
 
 The next passage is at once an alteration and insertion, 
 both the one and the other made for the Jirst time in 1850. 
 
 1817. 1850. 
 
 Page 76. — Who have embraced Who have acknowledged Jesus 
 justification by faith, which is of as the Messiah, and are seeking 
 grace and not of works. The ques- justification through the covenant 
 tion then that remains is this, who of the gospel. 
 
 are the " foreknown " ? what is the According to his custom, he seizes 
 nature of then- election ? the opportunity of introducing a 
 
 We shall soon find reason to con- clause to show, that as it was an 
 elude that the apostle uses this word election of grace, i.e., it was the 
 according to the association inva- free mercy of God which had se- 
 riablv united with it in his mind. lected the posterity of Abraham, so 
 
 now, in this fresh election to the 
 Christian covenant, it must be as- 
 cribed not to works, but to grace, 
 that the eye of a small part of the 
 nation had been opened, whilst the 
 rest were blinded by " the god of 
 
14 
 
 this world." But the context shows 
 that the apostle uses the word elec- 
 tion, according to the association 
 invariably united with it in his 
 mind. 
 
 The following note was also introduced first in 1850. 
 
 1817. 1850. 
 
 Page 106, Nil. Note, Page 109.— Until (/. e. be- 
 
 fore) the law sin was in the world, 
 v. 13; afterwards, when the law 
 given by Moses entered, i. e., was 
 revealed, it did not remedy, but 
 rather aggravated the disease; so 
 generally did sin prevail in op- 
 posing the Divine law. But yet, 
 God's grace was not restrained. If 
 sin was more manifest, so too was 
 God's mercy in providing a way of 
 recovery from that sin. 
 
 The following added passages are appended as a note 
 apparently to qualify the assertion : 
 
 " Another practical evil of the doctrine of special grace, is the neces- 
 sity which it implies of some test of God's favour and of the reconcile- 
 ment of Christians to liim, beyond and subsequent to the covenant of 
 Baptism." (Apostolical Preaching, p. 154, 1817; p. 158, 1850.) 
 
 1817. 1839. 1850. 
 
 Nil. Page 158.— This is Note, Page 158.— 
 
 not meant to deny the On the necessity of a 
 
 necessity of Jesus personal recognition of 
 
 Christ as Redeemer, Jesus Christ as Re- 
 
 as the mind becomes deemer, as the mind 
 
 capable of receiving becomes capable of re- 
 
 the mystery. See ch. ceiving the mystery. 
 
 vii. See the seventh chap- 
 ter. 
 
 1817. 1850. 
 
 Page 222, Nil. Note, Page 228.— See to the same 
 
 purpose Bridges on the Christian 
 Ministry, ch. iv. 
 
15 
 
 But it would be well if this were all. Mr. Goode, how- 
 ever, not only is ignorant of these omissions and insertions, 
 but he expresses his belief that " the text of the edition 
 of 1850, on this subject, remains as it stood in the second 
 edition of 1817." 
 
 And this would seem to be the proper place to draw 
 attention to the fact, that in the New Preface his Grace 
 writes thus, pp. vi. vii. : — 
 
 " My argument, in fact, was not immediately concerned with Bap- 
 tism ; being directed against the Calvinistic tenet of special or indefec- 
 tible grace — a tenet which virtually excludes all spiritual benefit from 
 Baptism, except in the case of those who are selected to final perseverance 
 and salvation." 
 
 Now, so far as I can understand the words, his Grace had 
 asserted in his edition of 1817, that apostolical preaching 
 was " a system of preaching which confined regeneration 
 to baptismal privileges." This system he had broadly 
 avowed in 1815, in a publication to which his name was 
 not affixed. In 1817, a new edition was required. Upon 
 this token of public approval, the book, very materially 
 altered, was re-published, with the author's name ; the 
 former preface was altered and enlarged ; and in the con- 
 cluding paragraph of that new preface, the following account 
 was given of the changes in the book : — 
 
 " As no material exception, so far as I know, has been raised against 
 the general argument which it is my object to maintain, the alterations 
 in the present edition consist chiefly in an enlargement of those parts 
 which are most strictly practical, and in the introduction of an additional 
 chapter to Jill up what might otherwise appear deficient in a system of 
 PREACHING WHICH CONFINED REGENERATION TO BAPTISMAL PRIVILEGES." 
 
 Would that the same notice had been given of all 
 subsequent changes ! but so far from this, in the editions 
 to which I have had access, between 1817 and 1850, the fact 
 of alterations has been as much ignored as it is in the 
 
16 
 
 opening sentence of the New Preface of 1850. It would 
 appear that with each edition, since 1826 at any rate, there 
 has been printed " Preface to the Second Edition," begin- 
 ning and going on just as does the original of which it 
 purported to be a reprint, until the words " single congre- 
 gation ;" but there ending with the date, " Eton, February 
 20, 1817," and wholly omitting the paragraph given above. 
 Whatever may have been the intention of these changes 
 which Mr. Goode ignores, I may point out the importance 
 to be attached to those which I am about to notice between 
 the editions of 1850 and 1817. 
 
 Chapter vii., and considerable additions in chapter iv. 
 (and elsewhere possibly, for I have not collated the edition 
 of 1815 throughout,) were inserted in the edition of 1817, 
 to answer the objections which were urged against con- 
 fining regeneration to baptismal privileges. All, then, that 
 appears in the edition of 1817 on the subject of Baptism is 
 to be regarded as having had full consideration in respect 
 of the objections of those who set up their doctrine of 
 special grace against the Church's theory of sacramental 
 grace. All subsequent alterations will, I think, have to be 
 referred not to a conviction, that what was altered expressed 
 untruly apostolic doctrine, but to a wish to state that 
 doctrine less exclusively, and to imply that the door was 
 open for those who, upon this point, had another gospel. 
 It is remarkable, for instance, that the very passage, in 
 p. 150, to which his Grace himself calls attention, at p. v. 
 of the Preface, is quite altered from the form in which it was 
 put in 1817. 
 
 1817. 1850. 
 
 Page 147. — On the other hand, Page 150. — On the other hand, 
 
 the example of St. Paul authorises the example of St. Paul authorises 
 
 us to believe and argue, that grace us to believe and argue, that God 
 
 sufficient to salvation is given to is no such respecter of persons, and 
 
17 
 
 all who are dedicated to Christ in 
 Baptism. 
 
 that grace sufficient to salvation is 
 denied to none, to whom the offer of 
 salvation is made through faith in 
 Christ Jesus, and who are united 
 to HIM in Baptism. 
 
 To the same effect are the following alterations, some 
 made for the first time in 1850, and they are not all that 
 might be adduced : — 
 
 1817. 
 
 1850. 
 
 Page 21. — The resemblance, on Page 22. — The resemblance, on 
 
 the other hand, is essential, that all the other hand, is essential, that all 
 
 have alike professed. alike profess. 
 
 Page 21.— That all have been Page 22.— That all have been 
 
 called to justification through Jesus called to justification through Jesus 
 
 Christ, and made partakers of the Christ, and are outward partakers 
 
 covenant of grace. of the covenant of grace. 
 
 Page 46. — He first consoles them 
 bv the assurance. 
 
 Page 47. — After enlarging on the 
 first proof of their being received to 
 the adoption of God's children, the 
 indwelling of the Holy Ghost, and 
 the sanctification so wrought in 
 them, he consoles them by the as- 
 surance. 
 
 1817. 
 
 Page 7 7,78. — Now, if the remnant 
 according to the election of "grace" 
 tvere a Iready foreknown and elected, 
 and the rest " blinded"' by the refusal 
 of efficacious grace, St. Paul must 
 have been aware that there was no 
 room left to excite others by the ex- 
 ample of the Gentile converts, and no 
 hope of any but those already chosen 
 being saved : he would have known 
 that there was no propriety in the 
 passionate expression wbich begins 
 
 1850. 
 
 Page 80. — Now, if the remnant 
 according to the election of grace 
 were so foreknown, and elected, as to 
 leave nothing dependent on them- 
 selves, St. Paul must have been 
 aware that there was no room left to 
 excite others by the example of the 
 Gentile converts, and no hope of 
 any but those already chosen being 
 saved : he would have known that 
 there was no propriety in the pas- 
 sionate expression which begin* 
 
 C 
 
18 
 
 the tenth chapter : " Brethren, my 
 heart's desire and prayer to God 
 for Israel is, that they might he 
 saved." 
 
 It is evident, therefore, that the 
 thing which " Israel sought in 
 vain," was the honour of remaining 
 the peculiar Church of God; and 
 that by " the election," the 
 
 WHOLE BODY OF CHRISTIANS is 
 intended, who had obtained that 
 which the Israelites through their 
 blindness had been deprived of. 
 
 the tenth chapter : " Brethren, my 
 heart's desire and prayer to God 
 for Israel is, that they might be 
 saved." 
 
 It is evident, therefore, that the 
 tiring which " Israel sought in 
 vain," and which the election had 
 obtained, was the privilege of being 
 the chosen generation, the holy 
 nation, the peculiar people of God. 
 
 1817. 
 
 1850. 
 
 Page 97. — For that every indi- Page 99. — For that every indi- 
 vidual should he left to suppose vidual should be led to suppose that 
 that he can come to salvation, if he he can come to salvation, if he has 
 will, without the counteracting a good will, without the counteract- 
 clause, &c. ing clause, &c. 
 
 Page 149. — This is evidently Page 1,53. — This is evidently 
 
 saying that the wickedness of the saying, that the wickedness of the 
 
 Corinthians was not owing to the Corinthians was not owing to the 
 
 want, but to the abuse of grace. denial of grace on the part of God, 
 
 but to the abuse of it on their 
 
 1817. 
 
 Page 249. — A preach- 
 er can in nowise take 
 it for granted that it 
 exists in his hearers as 
 the necessary and gra- 
 tuitous consequence of 
 baptism ; but must re- 
 quire of all who have 
 the privilege of bap- 
 tism, that they strive 
 to attain it; that, being 
 regenerate, they also 
 be renewed ; and con- 
 
 1839. 
 
 Page 257.— A preach- 
 er can in nowise take 
 it for granted that it 
 exists in his hearers as 
 the necessary and gra- 
 tuitous consequence of 
 baptism ; but must re- 
 quire of all who have 
 the privilege of bap- 
 tism, that they sti-ive 
 to attain it; that, being 
 regenerate in condi- 
 tion, thev be also re- 
 
 1850. 
 
 Page 257.— That a 
 preacher can in nowise 
 take it for granted that 
 it exists in his hearers 
 as the necessary and 
 certain consequence of 
 baptism ; but must re- 
 quire of all who have 
 the privilege of bap- 
 tism, that they strive 
 to attain it ; that, being 
 regenerate IN condi- 
 tion, thev be also re- 
 
19 
 
 stantly examine them- newed IN nature ; — newed IN nature ; — 
 selves whether they and constantly exam- and constantly exam- 
 have this proof within ine themselves whether ine themselves whether 
 them. they have this proof they have this proof 
 within them. within them. 
 
 The public will judge whether Mr. Goocle, by sending 
 us to the edition of 1817, has justified his abusive remarks 
 on the following assertion of the Bishop of Exeter : 
 
 " Some of those statements, I repeat, still remain, but others of them 
 are in this new edition materially altered ; others altogether omitted ; so 
 that, of the whole, the effect is greatly impaired, not only by these 
 omissions, but far more by the insertion of much additional matter" 
 (ex. gr. The New Preface), "whose whole tendency unhappily is to dilute 
 and weaken what was originally a strong and uniform expression of 
 catholic truth." — Bishop of Exeter's Letter, p. 5. 
 
 Mr. Goode will do well to remember, in future, the words 
 of Holy Writ : " He that is first in his own cause seemeth 
 just ; but his neighbour cometh and searcheth him."* 
 And I and others shall be forgiven, if we warn all readers 
 of Mr. Goode's works not to trust implicitly to Mr. Goode's 
 statements of matters of fact. 
 
 Mr. Goode's exceptions to the Bishop's citation of the 
 first canon of the Fourth Council of Carthage have already 
 been sufficiently answered, f so that I need not recur to them 
 more than to say, that the following passages may serve 
 to show that Mr. Goode's charge of novelty, in respect 
 alike of the authority and the recognition of this canon, is, 
 like so many other of his statements, without foundation. 
 It was quoted by Bishop Burnet. Its authority over East 
 and West, if not recognised by Mr. Johnson, was yet alleged 
 by his learned contemporary, Dr. Brett. 
 
 " The African Code, or Collection of Canons, made by a Council at 
 
 * Proverbs xviii. IT. 
 
 f See Letter in the " Guardian" newspaper, April 30, signed with the 
 honoured initials E. B. P. 
 
 c8 
 
20 
 
 Carthage, a.d. 419, in which Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, and the great 
 St. Augustine, bishop of Hippo, were present, which collection was an- 
 nexed to the Code of Canons of the Universal Church, by the Council of 
 Trullo, A.D. G80, in the 2nd canon of which general council they were 
 confirmed, and consequently made obligatory over the Eastern Empire. 
 
 " But they are also put into Gratian's Collection (Caus. 15. quest. 7), made 
 for the use of the Western Church, and confirmed by the papal authority, 
 which then extended over all this part of Christendom, and particularly 
 over this realm." — Brett on Church Government, p. 268. 
 
 Mr. Goode might possibly have spared some of his indigna- 
 tion that the Bishop of Exeter should refer to this council, 
 had he remembered that a former Bishop of Salisbury, 
 who is in tolerable favour with his school, found in that 
 canon a justification of the reformers in the course they felt 
 it their wisdom to take in requiring subscription to the 
 Articles. Bishop Burnet meeting the objections that the 
 " collection of tenets" in these Thirty-nine Articles is a 
 " departing from the simplicity of the first ages," alleges 
 inter alia — 
 
 " We have a full account of the special declaration that a Bishop was 
 obliged to make in the first canon of that which passed for the fourth 
 council of Carthage. But while by reason of new emergencies this was 
 swelling to a vast bulk, general and more implicit formularies came to be 
 used, the Bishops declaring that they received and would observe all the 
 decrees and traditions of holy councils and fathers."* 
 
 But even had Mr. Goode invalidated the authority of that 
 canon, let him not think he would thereby have got rid of the 
 authority of the Primitive Church. He may rest assured it 
 only requires a little time to produce a catena which shall 
 show, that if there is one disputed doctrine more than 
 another on which tradition is the most universal and most 
 primitive, it is this of Baptismal Regeneration — so universal 
 that there is hardly an early father of any kind who does 
 
 * Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles, by Gilbert, Bishop of Sarum. 
 Introd. p. 3. London, 183(5. 
 
21 
 
 not bear witness to it — so primitive as to reach almost to 
 the time when St. John wrote the words, " Except a man be 
 born again of water and of the Spirit, lie cannot enter into 
 the kingdom of God." 
 
 And I have a word to add in reference to another matter 
 noticed in this same letter in the Guardian. Mr. Goode 
 takes occasion to charge the Bishop with " manufacturing" 
 (a favourite term with Mr. G.) a statement, and in other 
 language equally offensive, because untrue, to cavil at his 
 quoting Titus iii. 5, as calling Baptism " the washing oi 
 Regeneration and of the renewing of the Holy Ghost." 
 The writer of the letter referred to has shown that such 
 is the received interpretation of this text ; but it will 
 doubtless be still more uncomfortable to Mr. Goode and his 
 party to find themselves at variance with John Calvin — 
 than merely confronting the consent of Catholic antiquity. 
 I have before me a folio edition of the " Institutions of a 
 Christian Man," in English, printed in London, 1061 (i.e. 
 two years after the appearance of the fourth edition, of which 
 Calvin says, " I never held myself contented till it was dis- 
 posed unto that order which is now set before you)." This 
 translation claims to be " cum privilegio ad imprimeudum 
 solum" and is to be taken as an authorised exposition of 
 Calvin's teaching At folio 114 of cap. iv. we read — 
 
 " Of which sort is y e title wherewith [Baptisme] is commended of 
 Paule, where he calleth it y* washing of Regeneration and of Renew- 
 ing" 
 
 I hope Mr. Goode will exonerate Calvin and his Trans- 
 lator from " adding most awfully" to Scripture, or at least 
 have the decency to withdraw his charges against the Bishop 
 of Exeter. 
 
 The next matter which I shall call to notice is the follow- 
 ing at page 8 : — 
 
 " According to your Lordship's doctrine, it is entirely in the power of 
 
22 
 
 parents or ministers to prevent any ' moving of God towards' the child 
 at all ; and equally is it in their power to regulate the time when that 
 ' first moving' shall take place. In fact, it is as much in their power 
 to give or withhold, and fix the time for, the first gift of spiritual grace, 
 as if they were its authors." 
 
 This same charge is repeated somewhat more offensively 
 — at p. 27 : — 
 
 " Your Lordship, with the Church of Rome, in effect, though not in 
 words, maintains, that every minister of Christ has power and authority 
 given him hy God to make over to any infant, at his pleasure, l-emission 
 of sins and spiritual regeneration, hy performing upon him the rite of 
 Baptism : and that God's acts are dependent upon those of the minister ; 
 which is, in fact, a daring assumption of the Divine prerogative to for- 
 give sins, cloaked only hy the thin veil of the admission that the perform- 
 ance of a certain rite is necessary for the exercise of that prerogative." 
 
 And again, p. 29 : — 
 
 " Nothing will satisfy you but the absolute power of giving remission 
 of sins to every infant, at your sovereign will and pleasure, by the mere 
 act of baptizing it.'* 
 
 And yet once again more offensively and more falsely at 
 p. 36 :— 
 
 " You make the mere opus operation of Baptism the source of spiritual 
 life to the soul. You thereby place yourself almost in the position of 
 God HIMSELF. You boldly aver that, in the case of all infants, wherever 
 found, and under whatever circumstances, you can give or withhold 
 remission of sins, and spiritual life : that these gifts are so tied to Bap- 
 tism, that until you choose to give Baptism, God HIMSELF cannot (with- 
 out some extraordinary interference) give those gifts ; that you have only 
 to sprinkle the child with water, and utter a few words, and the thing is 
 done. * * * * * You, therefore, can leave in a state of spiritual 
 death, and you can make alive. My Lord, that is of the essence of that 
 apostacy Avhose characteristic is to ' sit in the temple of God, showing 
 himself to be God ;' to be (as the Head of that Apostacy has been called) 
 a Vice-God upon earth." 
 
 If Mr. Goode mistakes this coarse invective for argument, 
 there is at least this comfort, that such language is not 
 likely to commend itself to the common sense, and love of 
 common honesty, for which the English character has 
 hitherto been honoured among the nations of the earth. 
 
23 
 
 But what is the force of these charges ? They assert that, 
 because man can disobey God's command, and can hinder 
 the supervening of God's ordinances on those to whom 
 God's mercy permits and God's love enjoins them to be 
 administered, that therefore God Himself cannot bestow His 
 Grace without them. So far as Mr. Goode's reductio ad 
 absurdum has any force whatever — so far it impugns the 
 justice of the Divine declaration in the Second Command- 
 ment, " I will visit the sins of the Fathers upon the children, 
 unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me" 
 — and so far it charges God with folly, because the evil 
 example of wicked parents acts for evil on their offspring. 
 In one sense, it is true that parents, and those who have the 
 guardianship of infancy, can interfere with the ordinary 
 course of God's mercy, promised to infants. In one sense, it 
 is true that the minister may fix the time for the first gift of 
 spiritual grace ; and so the Church requires him " to often 
 admonish the people, that they defer not the Baptism of 
 their children longer than the first or second Sunday next 
 after their birth, or other holy-day falling between, unless 
 upon a great and reasonable cause, to be approved by the 
 Curate." But so far from his will and pleasure being "sove- 
 reign" or "paramount" in withholding God's grace, of which 
 the Sacrament he has authority to administer is the channel, 
 he is liable to be suspended from his ministry, if he refuse 
 or delay to christen any child brought to him to the Church 
 on the appointed days ; or if, by his neglect, any infant die 
 in his parish unbaptized.* Every lawful minister of God has 
 " power and authority given him by God to make over" 
 " remission of sins and spiritual regeneration" " by perform- 
 ing the rite of Baptism." But it is not " at his pleasure" — 
 it is not as the " author" of grace — it is not with " an abso- 
 lute power," nor because he regards Baptism as the 
 " source" (! !) of grace that he then acts — No, the Sacraments 
 * Canons, 68, 69. 
 
24 
 
 "be effectual because of Christ's institution and promise." 
 It is He who worketh, not man. And although man is en- 
 trusted with the perilous endowment of acting contrary to 
 God's commands, there is no authority given to man to com- 
 pensate for this disobedience by constructing a theory 
 founded on this exceptional anomaly. What God has joined 
 together, it is not for man to put asunder ; and God has 
 joined (as this controversy will by His blessing bring home 
 to many an aching heart in the irresistible majesty of His 
 own truthfulness) entrance into His kingdom and adoption 
 into His family with Baptism by water, in the Name of the 
 Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 It is no further true that a parent or a priest can settle 
 the exact moment of God's mercy moving towards infants, 
 because they can withhold Baptism, than it is, alas ! true 
 that a man can disobey his parents, though God has said — 
 " Honour thy Father and thy Mother." And it is idle to 
 say that it is not in the power of the Omnipotent to compen- 
 sate to one receiving His ordinances whatsoever there may 
 be wanting through delay, in observing the Saviour's com- 
 mand — " Suffer little children to come unto Me, and forbid 
 them not," when such delay does not arise of his own fault. 
 It is one thing to say that when God has tied a specific 
 blessing to a particular ordinance, that blessing is not, so far 
 as we know, given until that ordinance is given : and it is 
 quite another to say that the sinful negligence of parents 
 and sponsors can evacuate the strength of the Divine Pro- 
 mise when that ordinance is ministered in its essential 
 particulars. 
 
 Our Church teaches that the essential parts of the Sacra- 
 ment of Baptism are water and the form of words, in the 
 Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy 
 Ghost. Now, while it is in man's power to frustrate the 
 Divine command in respect of the administration of this 
 Sacrament, as to the time of its participation, it is not in the 
 
25 
 
 power of any to frustrate, in the case of another, the specific 
 benefit which God's promise attaches to the administration 
 of the rite. If it be lawful to baptize infants, then of neces- 
 sity the offering of the prayer of faith by those who bring 
 the child cannot be " expected and taken for granted by the 
 Church," in any such sense that the gift of Regeneration and 
 Adoption is contingent upon the presence of that faith and 
 prayer in those bringing the child. To require faith on the 
 part of those who bring the child, as necessary to the efficacy 
 of the sacrament, is to suspend God's grace on man's inten- 
 tion, and is "a near approach to or absolute identity with an 
 error of late charged — whether justly or otherwise — on the 
 Roman Church." And with respect to the doctrine itself, it 
 seems to be well met in the following passage from St. 
 Augustine : * — 
 
 * The authority of this great Father in the present question, will, I 
 presume, be admitted by all who adopt the view of special grace. It is 
 true the Archbishop of Canterbury has given the following distinct 
 opinions of his worth in the four editions of his works, published in 
 1817, 1826, 1839, and 1850, the last time in the words of another ; but 
 Mr. Goode, and those whom he defends, will not refuse the claims of 
 St. Augustine to a hearing : — 
 
 1S17 & 1826. 
 
 Note, p. 95.— It is 
 quite impossible to ac- 
 count for the authority 
 which this Father has 
 enjoyed, and still main- 
 tains, on any common 
 principles ; or to t un- 
 derstand why St. Aus- 
 tin against the Mani- 
 ehees, might not be 
 consistently quoted to 
 refute Saint Austin 
 against Pclagius. 
 
 1839. 
 
 Note, p. 98. — As a 
 man of piety and learn- 
 ing, this Father has a 
 claim to high consider- 
 ation ; but, as an inter- 
 preter of Scripture, it 
 is difficult to explain 
 the authority which he 
 has enjoyed, and still 
 maintains ; or to un- 
 derstand why St. Aus- 
 tin against the Mani- 
 chees might not be con- 
 sist en tly quoted to re- 
 
 1850. 
 
 Note, p. 98.— "When 
 Augustine fully pro- 
 pounded his own views 
 of election and predes- 
 tination, he was imme- 
 diately charged with 
 innovating upon the 
 ancient doctrines of the 
 Church. 
 
 " He was assm-ed by 
 the complainants that 
 they had never before 
 heard of such specula- 
 lions; he was referred 
 
26 
 
 u Let not that disturb you that some people do not bring their infante 
 to Baptism, with that faith that they may by spiritual grace be regene- 
 rated to eternal life, but because they think they do procure or preserve 
 their bodily health by this remedy. For THE CHILDREN DO NOT THERE- 
 FORE FAIL OF BEING REGENERATED, BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT BROUGHT BY 
 THE OTHERS wtth THIS INTENTION. For the necessary offices are here 
 performed by them, etc. And the Holy Spirit that dwells in the saints, 
 out of whom that silver dove that is but one, is by the fire of charity 
 compacted, does what He does sometimes by the means of men, not only 
 simply ignorant, but also damnably unworthy. For infants are offered 
 for the receiving of the spiritual grace, not so much by those in whose 
 hands they are brought (though by those too, if they be good, faithful 
 Christians), as by the whole congregation of saints and faithful men. 
 For they are rightly said to be offered by all those whose desire it is that 
 they should be offered, and by whose holy and united charity they are 
 assisted towards the communication of the Holy Spirit. So that the 
 whole Church of the Saints does this office as a mother — for the whole 
 Church brings forth all her children, and the whole brings forth each 
 particular." — St. Augustine, quoted by Wall, on Infant Baptism. 
 
 Mr. Goode may spare his indignation at the Bishop inter- 
 preting the Archbishop's language, in respect of the prayer 
 and faith of parents and sponsors, as implying that in his 
 Grace's view they may be necessary to the efficacy of the 
 sacrament. I have before me his Grace's Charge to the 
 Clergy of the diocese of Chester, in May and June, 1844 ; 
 and at pages 30, 31, of that Charge I find it asserted, that 
 
 " Our Church declares further, that ' they which receive baptism rightly' 
 are partakers of the blessings conveyed in Baptism. And who can venture 
 
 fute St. Austin against to the current system 
 Pelagius. of the existing Catholic 
 
 Church, and he was 
 challenged to produce 
 evidence that his new 
 opinions had been ad- 
 vanced as the mind of 
 Scripture by any of his 
 ecclesiastical predeces- 
 sors." — Faber on Elec- 
 tion. Preface, p. xiii. 
 
27 
 
 to decide with confidence whether original sin, unhappily existing in the 
 infant, may not prove a let or hindrance to the ' right receiving ' of the 
 sacrament ? Who can say whether, the absence of faith and re- 
 pentance IN THOSE WHO PROFESS IT IN THE CHILD'S NAME MAT NOT 
 frustrate the grace of God ? Who can answer whether the faith of 
 the child or of the minister shall suffice, though there be no more faith on 
 the part of parents and sponsors than there can be in the infant child ? 
 Upon all these points we may form inferences, offer plausible arguments, 
 pronounce strong opinions ; but we shall never satisfy those who refuse 
 to be satisfied till we can prove from Scripture the unconditional efficacy 
 of Baptism, as plainly as we can show the general necessity of Baptism 
 to salvation." 
 
 Mr. Gorham will tell his Grace that even this last pro- 
 position is " not contained in terms so absolute " as he has 
 stated them in Scripture,* and thus enable us to overthrow 
 the entire argument — the objectors being our judges : but 
 my immediate concern is with the passage I have printed 
 in capitals. It is nothing to the present purpose that his 
 Grace tells his Clergy, three pages afterwards, that there 
 is a blessing to 
 
 " ' be expected,' not ' doubted of, but earnestly believed,' when the in- 
 fant is admitted to the privilege of the Christian covenant, being solemnly 
 dedicated to God in the name of Him who " came to seek and to save 
 that which was lost,' whether infant or adult. His frequent text will 
 be, Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remis- 
 sion of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost." 
 
 It is not for me to say how it is one man's duty to teach 
 a truth, and that yet another in the same Church cannot 
 be silenced for teaching its opposite. But I do say that 
 
 * Mr. Gorham, Answer 1, p. 64. — " Precisely the same conclusion must 
 be drawn from the terms used by our Lord in His express institution of 
 Baptism : " He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved," (Mark xvi. 
 16.) The general connexion between the sign which He has ordained 
 for admission into His Church, and the faith which that sign certifies, 
 is here distinctly affirmed. But om- Lord adds, " He that believeth not 
 shall be damned." Here exclusion from everlasting salvation is grounded 
 not on the omission of Baptism, but with the withholding belief in the 
 Nou of God." 
 
28 
 
 this Charge of 1844 makes it as clear as the sun in the 
 heavens, that the then Bishop of Chester conceived it 
 possible that the absence of faith and prayer in all but the 
 minister representing the Church might destroy the efficacy 
 of the Sacrament, might " frustrate the grace of God," in 
 such sort that the "party can never be absolutely silenced," 
 (p. 30,) who affirm " that the individual now become ac- 
 countable, and evidently not living in the faith of the Son 
 of God, was never really endowed with the Holy 
 Spirit," (Charge, p. ' 30). Whether, with these passages 
 before them, the public will have more than one opinion 
 of the man who can write as Mr. Goode has done on this 
 point, I cannot say ; but what honest men, who are gentlemen 
 (in the Christian sense of that much-abused word) will 
 think of the following passage, I cannot doubt : — 
 
 " You add two objections to what you call his Grace's ' scheme ' of 
 making the efficacy of infant Baptism dependent upon the prayers of those 
 who bring them ; but as the ' scheme ' is your Lordship's, and not his 
 Grace's, manufactured by yourself for the purpose of casting reproach 
 upon your Primate, I leave them at your Lordship's disposal for some 
 other occasion, and am glad to assure you that your fearful anticipations 
 of having to shudder 'when the answer is given,' will not be realised." 
 
 But in repudiating this scheme as set forth in the Charge 
 just quoted, do we then undervalue the faitli and prayers of 
 those who bring the child ? God forbid ! We know too well 
 the frosts and blights to which the tender plant of grace 
 will be subject as it springs up "from the " seed-plot of 
 heaven," as Bishop Jewell beautifully styles the heart of 
 the newly-baptized child, not to desire that those may be in 
 earnest, and may lift up holy hands, who, with one accord, 
 make their prayers unto God that the child may lead the 
 rest of his life according to the "beginning" made in 
 Baptism. We know that God has promised that infants 
 dedicated to Him in Baptism shall be then and there 
 reborn. And as His promise is tied to the Sacrament, we 
 
29 
 
 cannot and dare not limit the application of that Sacrament 
 by making the prayers and faith of sponsors essential 
 parts of that whereof the Church hath affirmed that 
 water and the appointed words are alone that which is 
 necessary. But inasmuch as God's promise does not tie 
 perseverance to Baptism, though it does tie regeneration, 
 and an assurance of sanctification to that Sacrament, we 
 recognise, we thankfully admire that security for faithful 
 prayer which our Church takes in requiring that Godfathers 
 and Godmothers shall be communicants ; and that yet 
 larger one which she provides by ordering that Baptism 
 shall be ministered after the second lesson " upon Sundays 
 and other holy days when the most number of people come 
 together.'' Much need is there to obey God by praying 
 for that which He doth absolutely promise, and still more 
 earnestly, if so be, to ask for that which He doth con- 
 ditionally covenant. While, then, the danger is great that 
 those who are brought without prayer and faith may, 
 from the want of the Christian culture, without which 
 Baptismal grace will pine and die, not " remain in the 
 number of God's faithful and elect children," there is 
 no room whatever to doubt but that a "beginning" is 
 then made, which we are earnestly to pray may have its 
 counterpart in the future life. 
 
 But nothing can be more idle than to allege, as Mr. Goode 
 has done, the passage quoted by him from the Cologne 
 Liturgy, (Letter, p. 7 J as making anything towards this 
 matter, either one way or the other ; nor anything more 
 inaccurate, (if he himself reprints the Liturgy correctly, 
 which I have no means at hand to test,) than to speak 
 of it as put in the mouth of " the minister when 
 officiating at the rite of Infant Baptism." (p. 8.) 
 The passage quoted occurs in an address at the pre- 
 senting of an already baptized child in the congregation, 
 and in the former part of that address the universality 
 
30 
 
 of the grace of Christ's redemption, and the right of 
 infants to His grace, are asserted. So that the minis- 
 ter, having inquired whether the child had heen dedicated 
 to Christ and "engrafted in Him hy Baptism" [eique 
 per Baptismum insertus], and having satisfied himself 
 that the child was baptized with water in the Name of 
 the Father, and of the Soft, and of the Holy Ghost — 
 God having heen first called upon in prayer — he pro- 
 nounces that all is well done according to God's com- 
 mandment, and then, reciting Christ's promise of His 
 Presence with two or three gathered in His Name, he pro- 
 ceeds to call upon the congregation there present to listen 
 to words from the tenth chapter of St. Mark's gospel, that 
 so this faith, which expects God to he present to fulfil His 
 Word in His ordinances, may be confirmed, and that they 
 may be moved to give God thanks for that His great 
 benefit which was conferred upon that particular infant by 
 Baptism [quod huic infantulo per Baptisma collatum est.] ! 
 
 And here I dismiss the Cologne Liturgy and its relevancy 
 to the present question, merely remarking that, writing as 
 Mr. Goode does throughout, ad populum, it shows that he 
 does not, at any rate, want the wisdom of the serpent in 
 printing this Liturgy in Latin. The bulk of its statements 
 tell sorely against his theory. 
 
 But I may not quite as summarily dismiss his sneering 
 appropriation of Bucer as on his side of this question. 
 Mr. Goode will probably, by this time, have received a 
 letter on this subject from the Rev. C. F. Massing- 
 berd.* And therefore, as I have no wish unnecessarily to 
 enlarge this pamphlet, I shall content myself with stating 
 
 * A Letter to the Rev. W. Goode, M.A., showing that the opinions 
 of Cranmer, Ridley, and Bucer, concerning Holy Baptism, were opposed 
 to those contained in a letter of Peter Martyr, lately published by him, 
 with comments on his inferences from that letter, by C. F. Massingberd, 
 M.A., Rector of Orm^bv. 
 
31 
 
 that that able and catholic -minded historian of the 
 English Reformation has, in that letter, shown beyond 
 the possibility of contradiction or doubt, that his reference 
 to and citation of Peter Martyr makes wholly against Mr. 
 Goode, and that Martin Bucer's opinions on this subject 
 have no congruity whatever with those of Mr. Goode. But 
 I will so far corroborate Mr. Massingberd's account of 
 Martin Bucer's opinions as to quote the following passage 
 from Bishop Bull's treatise on Justification, which the in- 
 telligent reader will at once perceive has more bearings than 
 one on the present controversy : — 
 
 I will, therefore, add only one more observation, which may he of some 
 use. From this simile of the Apostle's may he established that distinc- 
 tion of faith which our moderns so greatly blame, merely because used 
 by Roman Catholics, into " imperfect" and " perfected." I must wish 
 that all other distinctions of the schoolmen were as agreeable to the Scrip- 
 tures. For " imperfect faith" is as the inanimated body of the Apostle, 
 and " perfected faith" as the body animated. Thus in both cases the faith 
 is a true one, as in both the body is real ; but as the inanimated body can 
 do nothing, so faith, not animated by good works, cannot promote salva- 
 tion. The moderation, therefore, of the excellent Bucer deserves 
 our praise, ivho thought that in this we had no fault to find with the 
 Roman Catholics. I hesitate not to quote these words, as they are very 
 well worth our notice. They are from his notes on Psalm xi. " I can- 
 not but wish those had a sounder judgment who have given so much trouble 
 with this PARADOX, 'We are SAVED BY FAITH ALONE ;" while it is carried 
 to such a pitch as if righteousness were completed by a mere state of 
 mind. Where, then, is that love, which with one little word would have 
 stopped all this mischief ? They might have said, we are justified by 
 perfected faith, or by faith we obtain the inclination to good works, and 
 therefore, righteousness, or faith, is the foundation and root of a good 
 life, as Augustine said, for no one must be scandalised at the truth." 
 
 I hope, after this, we shall hear no more of Martin Bucer 
 as an apologist of special, in contradistinction to sacramental, 
 grace, and in his hands I might leave Mr. Goode's com- 
 plaint : " that is, like the Romanists* you practically deny 
 
 This is no new trick of Mr. Goode and his party, — it was long since 
 acknowledged as dishonest by Selden, who says : " We charge the prela- 
 tical clergy with popery, to make than odious, though ice know they are 
 
32 
 
 the truth of the eleventh article, that we are justified by 
 faith only." But as he so immediately has the temerity to 
 cite Archbishop Cranmer, as though he did not identify 
 justification with Baptism, it may be well once again to 
 reprint the following passage from the Homily to which 
 Mr. Goode sends us, and to which he tells us the Popish 
 Bishop Gardiner excepted the " Homily on Salvation." 
 In that Homily we read — 
 
 " Insomuch that infants, being baptized, and dying in their infancy, 
 are by this Sacrifice washed from their sins, brought to God's favour, and 
 made His children, and inheritors of His kingdom of heaven. And they 
 which, in act or deed, do sin after their Baptism, when they turn again 
 to God unfeignedly, they are likewise washed by this Sacrifice from 
 their sins, in such sort, that there remaineth not any spot of sin that 
 shall be imputed to their damnation. This is that jtistification or right- 
 eousness which St. Paul speakcth of, when he saith, ' No man is justified 
 by the works of the law, but freely by faith in Jesus Christ.' " 
 
 " First you shall understand that, in out' justification by Christ, it is 
 not at all one thing, the office of God unto man, and the office of man unto 
 God. Justification is not the office of man, but of God ; for man cannot 
 make himself righteous by his own works, neither in part, nor in the 
 whole ; for that were the greatest arrogancy and presumption of man, 
 that Antichrist could set up against God — to affirm that a man might by 
 his own works take away and purge his own sins — and so justify him- 
 self. But justification is the office of God only, and is not a thing 
 which we render unto Him, but which we recieve of Him : not 
 which we give to Him, but which we take of Him, by His free mercy, 
 and by the only merits of His most dearly beloved Son, our only Re- 
 deemer, Saviour, and Justifier, Jesus Christ. So that the true 
 understanding * * * * * 
 
 * of this doctrine,— We be justified freely by faith without 
 
 works, or that we be justified by faith in Christ only — is not that this 
 our own act, to believe in Christ, or this our faith in Christ, which 
 is within us, doth justify us, and deserve our justification unto us ; 
 for that were to count ourselves to be justified by some act or virtue that 
 
 guilty of no such thing. Just as heretofore they called images, Mammets, 
 and the adoration of images Mammetry : that is, Mahomet and Maho- 
 metry, odious names, when all the world knows the Turks are forbidden 
 images by their religion." — SeMen's Table Tails. 
 
33 
 
 is within ourselves : but the true understanding and meaning thereof is 
 that, although we hear God's word, and believe it, — although we have 
 faith, hope, charity, repentance, dread and fear of God within us, and do 
 never so many good works thereunto — yet we must renounce the merit 
 of all our said virtues of faith, hope, charity, and all our other virtues and 
 good deeds which we either have done, shall do, or can do, as things that 
 be far too weak, and insufficient, and imperfect, to deserve remission of 
 our sins and our justification. And therefore we must trust only in 
 God's mercy, and that sacrifice which our High-Priest and Saviour, 
 Christ Jesus, the Son of God, once offered for us upon the cross, to obtain 
 thereby God's grace, and remission, AS WELL OF OUR ORIGINAL SIN, IN 
 Baptism, as of all actual sin committed by us after our Bajrfism if we 
 truly repent and turn unfeignedly to Him again. * 
 
 " Our office is, not to pass the time of this present life unfruitfully and 
 idly, after that we are BAPTIZED OR JUSTIFIED — not caring how few good 
 works we do, to the glory of God and the profit of our neighbours : much 
 less is it our office, AFTER THAT WE BE ONCE MADE CHRIST'S MEMBERS, 
 to live contrary to the same, making ourselves members of the devil, 
 walking after his enticements, and after the suggestions of the world and 
 the flesh, whereby we know that we do serve the world and the devil 
 and not God." 
 
 And lest these quotations from the homilies should fail in 
 inducing Mr. Goode to acquit us of Romanising, let us 
 endeavour to take the edge off his charge, by referring him 
 to an authority which he is bound to respect. The com- 
 placent and thoroughly Protestant historian of his " own 
 times," Bishop Burnet, in the introduction to his Expo- 
 sition of the Thirty-nine Articles, plainly confesses, that 
 positive doctrine we of the Church of England have none, 
 but they of Rome have it also. Here are the Bishop's 
 words : 
 
 "Now, since the Church of Rome owns all that is positive in 
 our Doctrine, there could be no discrimination made, but by condemn- 
 ing the most important of those additions that they have brought into 
 the Christian religion in express words." 
 
 Where, let me ask Mr. Goode, are the " express words," in 
 the Thirty-nine Articles, which condemn the doctrine, that a 
 
 D 
 
34 
 
 renewed will, and a power of co-operating with Divine Grace, 
 is the " privilege of Baptism ?" And yet, if we accept the 
 authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury, for thirty-five 
 years of his life between 1815 and 1850, this is the posi- 
 tive doctrine of the Church of England ; owned therefore, 
 Bishop Bui-net being witness, by the Church of Borne. 
 Yes, Mr. Goode, actually the doctrine of the Church of 
 Borne, and 3 T et not false but true ! 
 
 The other authority to whom I shall refer Mr. Goode, is 
 the learned Bishop Sanderson, who, in reference to this 
 charge of Bomanising, pithily asks, — 
 
 " The having of godfathers at Baptism, churching of women, prayers 
 at the burial of the dead, children asking then- parents' blessing, &c, 
 which whilonie were held innocent, are now by very many thrown aside, 
 as raggs of Popery. Nay, are not some gone so farre already, as to cast 
 into the same heap, not only the ancient hymne, ' Gloria Patri' — (for 
 the repeating whereof alone, some have been deprived of all their liveli- 
 hoods), and the Apostles' Creed, but even the use of the Lord's Prayer 
 it selfe f And what will ye do in the end thereof? And what would 
 you have us do in the mean time, when you call hard upon us to leave 
 Popery, and yet would never do us the favour to let us know what it is ? 
 It were good, therefore, both for your own sakes, that you may not rove 
 in infinitum, and in compassion to us, that you would give us a perfect 
 boundary of what is Popery now, with some prognostication or epheme- 
 rides annexed (if you please), whereby to calculate what will be Popery 
 seven years hence. 
 
 " § XV. But, to be serious, and not to indidge myselfe in too much 
 merriment in so sad a business : — I believe all those men will be found 
 much mistaken, who either measure the Protestant religion by an oppo- 
 sition to Popery, or account all Popery that is taught or practised in the 
 Church of Rome. Our godly forefathers, to whom (under God) we owe 
 the purity of our religion, and some of which laid down then- lives for 
 the defense of the same, were sure of another minde ; if we may, from 
 what they did, judge what they thought. They had no purpose (nor had 
 they any warrant) to set up a new religion, but to reform the old, 
 by purging it from those innovations which, in tract of time (some 
 sooner, some later), had mingled with it, and corrupted it, both in the 
 doctrine and worship. According to this purpose, they produced, without 
 constraint or precipitancy, freely and advisedly, as in peaceable times, 
 and brought their intentions to a happy end ; as by the results thereof, 
 
35 
 
 contained in the Articles and Liturgy of our Church, and the Prefaces 
 thereunto, doth fully appear." — Sanderson 's Preface to Twenty Sermons, 
 1657. 
 
 The good Bishop's challenge is as necessary, and his 
 warning as seasonable, in 1850 as in 1657. 
 
 It will be convenient here to notice an objection to Mr. 
 Goode's mode of arguing this present controversy, which is 
 the cause of much confusion. The questions in debate are, 
 1, The Efficacy of Baptism in the case of worthy recipients, 
 and then, 2, Whether all infants are worthy recipients. In 
 this way it comes about that we assert that Remission of 
 Sins, and Justification, as well as Regeneration, are given in 
 and by Baptism to all infants. Mr. Gorham, and his 
 apologist, Mr. Goode, deny this and insist on mixing up the 
 two entirely distinct cases of infants and adults. 
 
 Mr. Goode says (p. 24) — 
 
 " The ohvious repulsiveness, however, of such a notion in the case of 
 adults, has induced the majority of those who incline in the direction 
 of this view, to stop short at the case of infants, and to deny this doc- 
 trine in the case of adults. Among these is your Lordship, though many 
 of your statements are consistent only with the former view. And 
 thereby you nullify at once a large number of your proofs and argu- 
 ments, and make your reference to the Creed palpably absurd ; for if the 
 words themselves taken alone prove that remission of sins is necessarily 
 given in the case of infants, they must prove the same in the case of 
 adults. This your advocate, Mr. Badely, clearly saw, and therefore, to 
 preserve consistency in his argument, boldly stood to the whole doctrine 
 in all its integrity." 
 
 Now, so far as Mr. Badely is concerned, Mr. Goode's 
 statement is quite untrue. So far from saying that impeni- 
 tent adults receive remission of sin, Mr. Badely expressly 
 says, as Mr. Goode ought to have known — 
 
 " The adult would not receive the full benefit of the Sacrament — 
 lie would NOT receive remission of sins ; but Regeneration, as I understand 
 the doctrine of the Church, he would receive." — Badely s Speech, fyc, 
 p. 99. See also Ibid pp. 132, 153, quoted infra. 
 
 D 2 
 
36 
 
 It really is very uncomfortable to be obliged thus to 
 distrust all Mr. Goode's assertions, even upon matters so 
 immediately within reach— but so it is. 
 
 And although the Bishop's language, (at p. 22. of his 
 Letter J to which Mr. Goode so often in anger and in scorn 
 sends us, has the appearance of stating the case somewhat 
 differently from the manner in which it is put by his Lord- 
 ship's advocate; yet, so far as it affects the present question, 
 the admission hi respect of adults, that " the grace of spirit- 
 ual Regeneration is separable, and, in fact, often separated, 
 from the Sacrament of Baptism," is nihil ad rem. Neither 
 do I see anything in the passage to contradict his Lord- 
 ship's well-known opinions on the presence of the gift of 
 Regeneration in the Sacrament of Baptism — which is there- 
 fore received by the unworthy to condemnation — a savour 
 of death unto death — as in the worthy recipient it is a 
 savour of life unto life. Just as we find that St. Augustine 
 held, that a person who had received Baptism in a sinful 
 spirit was regenerated, but that this availed him nothing 
 until he repented (and — if he had been baptized in some 
 heretical communion, but with the true form of Baptism — 
 was received into the Catholic Church), upon which the 
 Sacrament which he before had received to condemnation, 
 began to avail to salvation ;* so it is notorious, that such 
 is the Bishop of Exeter's doctrine, and that he so speaks of 
 the grace of Baptism in the case of adults, as that which 
 is separable, and often separated from, the impenitent and 
 hypocritical adult, by reason of his infidelity : who is, there - 
 
 * Cf. S. August, de Bapt. c. vi. 19. — " Simon ille magus natus erat 
 ex aqua et Spiritu, et tamen non intravit in regnum Coelorum. Sic fieri 
 potest ut hcereticis etiam contingat. * * * Necesse est enim, ut unum de 
 duobus concedatur, (1) aut illi qui fallaeiter sseculo renuntiant nascuntur 
 de Spiritu, quamvis ad perniciem non ad salutem, (this he intends as the 
 true proposition) atque ita possunt et hseretici ; (2) aut si illud quod 
 scriptum, &c, potest quis baptizari aqua et non nasci de Spiritu," 
 (which this Father holds to be impossible). 
 
37 
 
 fore, guilty of rejecting a grace which, notwithstanding, is 
 present and offered. To this same point is the following 
 statement of this doctrine, from the careful and learned 
 treatise of a living Bishop, which has heen for many years 
 a text-book in the English Church : 
 
 " With respect to those who receive Baptism in a state of hypocrisy 
 or impeuitency, though this sacrament can only increase their con- 
 demnation, still pardon and grace are conditionally made over to them, 
 and the saving virtue of Regeneration, which had been hitherto sus- 
 pended, takes effect, when they truly repent and unfeignedly believe 
 the Gospel. In Augustin's controversy with the Donatists, he assumes 
 this ease as a medium of proof, and, of course, as an acknowledged 
 doctrine. 
 
 " The Donatists held, agreeably to Cyprian's opinion, that the Bap- 
 tism of schismatics is invalid ; and since they contended that, with the 
 exception of their own Churches, all the Christians of their days were 
 in a state of schism, they affirmed that none but themselves were validly 
 baptized, and that none could enter into the kingdom of God without 
 receiving Baptism from then- ministers. But Augustin replied that, 
 even allowing the truth of their accusations, they who are baptized in 
 schism are in the same situation with those who are baptized in impeni- 
 tence or hypocrisy. For, as the latter participate in the saving effects 
 of Regeneration, when they repent of their sins, and believe the Gospel 
 with sincerity, so the former enjoy the benefits of their Baptism, when- 
 ever they renoimce their schism, and are received into the communion 
 of the Church." — Bp. Bethell, " Regeneration in Baptism," Fifth Edition, 
 pp. 18, 21. 
 
 But whatever may be the true doctrine in respect of the 
 lrypocritical adult receiving Baptism, that cannot by possi- 
 bility affect the appropriate effect of Holy Baptism — as 
 Christ's ordinance — instituted for making the nations His 
 disciples, and set forth by Himself as that without which 
 none can enter into the kingdom of heaven. There must 
 be a true doctrine of the efficacy of Holy Baptism, apart 
 from all considerations of the condition necessary to the 
 reception of the benefit thereof by those who are baptized. 
 What is now in dispute, is — 
 
 I. What does Baptism give ? and then. 
 
38 
 
 II. To whom does Baptism give this ; i. c. Is it necessarily 
 conferred upon all infants ? 
 
 We, in agreement with the Holy Church throughout the 
 world, accept Holy Scripture in its plain and literal sense, 
 and believe that in and by Baptism, Remission of Sins and 
 Spiritual Regeneration are given to all infants. It is as a 
 defence of that statement — as the " Plain Sense " of the 
 doctrine of the Prayer Book, that this " Apology " is written. 
 
 Let us, then, proceed on this supposition. 
 
 The Bishop of Exeter had complained that the Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury attached undue importance to a sneer 
 of the infidel Gibbon, as to the abuse of Baptism in the 
 fourth and fifth centuries, and having referred to the warn- 
 ings and enactments by which the Early Church sought to 
 discourage clinical Baptism, his Lordship proceeds — 
 
 " What reasonable ground is there, then, for apprehension that telling 
 men the truth — namely, that they were regenerate in Baptism, however 
 they may since, by wilful sins, have lost that state of salvation, and 
 thereby incurred ' greater damnation ' — ' should lull them,' as your 
 Grace assumes that it will, ' into a fallacious security?' " — Letter, p. 21. 
 
 And then his Lordship further challenges his Grace to 
 bear witness, from his own experience of cases in which 
 parties who had lived a sinful life pleaded the fact of their 
 regeneracy in Baptism as the cause of their false security. 
 Mr. Goode replies to this challenge thus : — 
 
 " My Lord, I believe that you and others may have rarely found any 
 one resting on such a ground of hope. And for this reason — that there 
 are few, comparatively very few, ungodly persons who really believe 
 what I must be permitted to call the false doctrine of those who would 
 fain teach them that they are spiritually regenerate persons. Their con- 
 science — their common sense tells them they are not." — Letter, p. 17. 
 
 Now, in the manner in which Mr. Goode has here stated 
 the question, there is suggested the great obstacle to the 
 reception of the truth on the part of many earnest-minded 
 persons. There is an awkwardness about Mr. Goode's ac- 
 
39 
 
 count of the teaching of those who hold the doctrine of 
 Baptismal Regeneration, which is not to be found in the 
 Bishop's statement, to which he is replying. The Bishop 
 says, " that they were (sic) regenerate in Baptism." Mr. 
 Goode says, " that they are spiritually regenerate persons." 
 Now I have no intention to deny the Scriptural truth, that 
 what God does, it shall he for ever, * nor to gainsay the 
 catholic verity agreeable thereto — That once regenerate, a 
 man cannot be as though he had never been new born. But 
 I complain of the awkwardness of Mr. Goode's statement 
 of the question, as calculated to encourage the notion, that 
 we teach wicked men that, their wickedness notwithstanding, 
 they are still spiritual persons in the sense which is opposed 
 to being carnally-minded — as though we should affirm of 
 those who are doing the works of the flesh, that they are 
 bringing forth the fruits of the Spirit. 
 
 The doctrine, as Mr. Goode words it, would seem to 
 imply an use of the phrase " born of God," similar to that 
 employed by the beloved disciple in his General Epistle — 
 where the phrase signifies the same thing as to " abide in 
 the light," to " know God," to " abide in God," to " dwell in 
 God, and God in us." Now, in this " enlarged " f sense, Mr. 
 Goode's statement would be untrue ; and of that confined one 
 in which it is true, Ins mode of expression is delusive. 
 
 Birth is not a continuous state, but an act referable to a 
 particular period. X While, therefore, it is true that all 
 baptized persons, whatsoever their state, are spiritually re- 
 generate persons — just as one who late in life becomes a 
 
 * Eccles. iii. 14. 
 
 t See Bishop Bethell, " Doctrine of Regeneration in Holy Baptism." 
 Cap. v. 
 
 \ " Justification, like Regeneration, is distinct in theory from Con- 
 version, or the renewal of the inward frame, and docs not, strictly 
 speaking, consist in a change of mind (for in adults that change, i. e, 
 repentance, must precede it), hut in a change of relative condition to 
 God. and a free grant of privileges and mercies j including in its deh- 
 
40 
 
 lunatic is a sane born man — yet the one expression is as 
 awkward and as inadequate as the other, since the facts to 
 which they strictly refer belong to past moments. Conse- 
 quently, Mr. Goode confuses the real point at issue between 
 himself and those who hold that all infants are in and by 
 Baptism new born, when he seeks to bring discredit upon 
 the doctrine, by urging the absurdity of the paradox, that 
 a wicked man is a spiritually new-born person. If men 
 would keep more in view the analogy of the natural and 
 the spiritual birth, they would not be led away by the 
 exaggerations and misstatements which make a deeply mys- 
 terious truth of Christ's Religion appear to be not only 
 above and beyond reason, but contrary to sound sense, and 
 contradictory to the just resolutions of a well-informed 
 judgment. 
 
 Different modes of treatment are resorted to in the case 
 
 nition, the forgiveness of sin, the acceptance of the person, and a con- 
 ditional title to eternal life. 
 
 " Thus far, therefore, it agrees with Regeneration ; and every "worthy 
 recipient, according to the constant doctrine of the Church, is not only 
 regenerated, hut justified in Baptism. But, in many respects, Justifica- 
 tion differs from Regeneration. 
 
 " In Regeneration, God is considered as a father, adopting us for his 
 children, and bringing us into a state of new life. In Justification, He 
 is spoken of as a judge or moral governor, passing sentence upon us, 
 and pronouncing us just and righteous. 
 
 " Regeneration is a single act of God's grace, conveyed over to us at 
 a determinate time, and in a form specially appointed by Christ. Its 
 privileges and good effects may be suspended, and in the end utterly 
 forfeited ; but cannot, humanly speaking, be totally lost in this world, 
 because every person who has been born again of water and of the 
 Spirit, is, till he dies, within the covenant of repentance. But, if we 
 except the case of infants, the being accounted just and righteous in 
 God's sight is a blessing which depends on the actual condition of the 
 heart and habits ; and no man is justified who has not forsaken his sins, 
 and is not living in a state of habitual belief and holiness, and com- 
 pliance with the will of God." — Bp. Bethell, " Regeneration in Baptism" 
 p. 152. 
 
41 
 
 of those congenitally blind or deaf, and those who have lost 
 their hearing or their sight in afterlife. And the practitioner 
 who should encourage a hope that, where deafness had been 
 caused by some sudden alarm, the hearing might be re- 
 covered—because the fact that the patient had been born 
 with hearing justified the conclusion that there was no un- 
 conquerable defect in the organic structure of the passage of 
 sound — would have reason on his side ; and he would do 
 well to encourage the patient to the use of his remedies with 
 this hope. But if, instead of saying to him, " Do not 
 despair ; remember you were born with hearing," he were to 
 say, " Do not despair ; you are born with hearing" the 
 latter would be a very inapplicable, while the former would 
 be a very intelligible, expression. And so it is calculated to 
 mislead by the very unusualness of the phraseology, to say, 
 as Mr. Goode does, that sinful Christians " are spiritually 
 regenerate persons ;" instead of, as the Bishop does, " that 
 they tcere regenerate in Baptism." 
 
 The Bishop of Exeter denies that persons are likely to be 
 lulled into a false security on their death-beds, by being told 
 during their lives that they were in their Baptism spiritually 
 regenerate. And his Lordship may well deny, and safely 
 deny it. 
 
 For what is the practical teaching which springs out of 
 this enforcement of Baptismal grace, this " confining Rege- 
 neration to Baptismal privileges?" It is "Apostolical 
 Preaching." It is the teaching of St. Paul, who urges to 
 purity by representing the fornicator as one who takes the 
 members of Christ, and makes them the members of an 
 harlot. It is the teaching of St. Peter, who would deter 
 men from sin by the fearful case of those who having been 
 once enlightened, and having tasted of the powers of the 
 world to come, yet draw back from their stedfastness. It is 
 the teaching of St. Jude, who warns Christians in every age, 
 by their sad lot whose fruit withereth, and who, being twice 
 
42 
 
 dead, are plucked up by the roots ; and who commends the 
 faithful to Him who is able to keep them from "faMng." It 
 is the teaching of St. John, who encourages to perseverance 
 by the comforting declaration — " If any man sin, ice have 
 an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous ; 
 and He is the Propitiation for our sins, and not for ours 
 only, but for the sins of the whole world." " Yea, it is the 
 teaching of our Blessed Lord Himself, when He declared, 
 " I am the Vine, and my Father is the Husbandman ; every 
 Branch in Me that beareth not fruit, He taketh away, and 
 every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may 
 bring forth more fruit." Yea, this is the gracious Lord's 
 teaching, when " He began to upbraid the cities wherein 
 most of his mighty works were done." It is a high privi- 
 lege and blessing to have His Presence, if we value it and 
 profit by it ; but that same Presence is a curse and a con- 
 demnation, if we despise it and make none account of it. 
 In both the one case and the other, it is Himself who is 
 really accepted or rejected, as the case maj r be. Construct a 
 religion without the doctrine of the New Birth in Holy Bap- 
 tism, and you introduce another Gospel than that which Jesus 
 preached to Nicodemus, and another Gospel than that with 
 which He chartered His eleven, and which He entrusted in 
 miraculous vision to him who, from being Saul the perse- 
 cutor, was destined to be Paul the great Apostle of the 
 Gentiles. 
 
 In very truth, this fundamental doctrine is the very key to 
 all the teaching of St. PauL Arrested in his way to Damas- 
 cus by the voice, " I am Jesus Whom thou persecutest :" 
 busy haling men and women to prison who called on the 
 Name of Christ, he was turned from darkness to light, 
 and taught the mysterious lesson, that they who have been 
 made Christians, are so one with — so in Christ, that when 
 they are wounded it is Christ who suffers ; when they are 
 hunted, it is Christ who is persecuted. And this truth was 
 
43 
 
 so fixed in his mind, that he seems to know no such incentive 
 to holiness as the mercy of God vouchsafed in the change 
 which takes place in Holy Baptism. And this is and ever 
 has heen the doctrine of those who have most fully mastered 
 a deep and reverential Faith in our Blessed Lord's Incar- 
 nation ; who, regarding the Church as His Body, have believed 
 the Sacraments to be instinct with His Presence ; and 
 having held, that in and by Holy Baptism we are made 
 members of Christ, the children of God, and inheritors of 
 the kingdom of Heaven, have ever urged to watchfulness 
 and stedfastness, by dwelling on the greatness of the privi- 
 leges bestowed ; and the awful responsibility which attaches 
 to the fact that these great privileges may be forfeited, for a 
 time withdrawn, } r ea, and finally lost ! That as the Bishop 
 teaches in this very passage, men may, " by wilful sins, have 
 lost that state of salvation " to which Baptism admitted 
 them, " and thereby incurred ' greater damnation.' " 
 
 Is it possible, then, that there can be a greater perversion 
 than they are guilty of who represent that those who hold 
 that all infants are spiritually regenerate in and by Baptism, 
 do thereby teach that all baptized persons are — necessarily 
 and by virtue of their Baptism alone, apart from all fresh 
 ministries of the Divine Spirit — at every period of then- 
 life and in every course of living — in the certain way to lay 
 hold on everlasting salvation ? Mr. Goode cannot believe so 
 of those whom he accuses. And yet, by the mode in which 
 he has stated the character of the teacliing of those who 
 hold " what I must be permitted to call " the truth, he 
 does encourage the notion that such is our practice. 
 
 It is one thing to say to a notorious sinner — " How fear- 
 ful is your guilt ! — how much is it aggravated by the mercy 
 you are despising, the grace you are slighting ! At your 
 Baptism you were regenerate ; then was all necessary grace 
 pledged to you alike for the avoidance of sin, and for its 
 pardon, upon true repentance. ' Remember, therefore, 
 
44 
 
 whence thou art fallen ; and repent, and do the first works.'* 
 Do this, and do it at once, or else you will finally ' quench ' 
 that gracious Spirit Whom these many years you have so 
 sadly ' grieved,' but Who still — if conscience has a voice 
 within you — thereby witnesseth that He waiteth once again 
 to be gracious." It is one thing to teach and preach thus, 
 and it is another and a very different thing to assure all 
 baptized persons that they are those in whom now the law of 
 life is working in the purity and energy of its first bestowal. 
 It is an awful fact, that men may in their infancy receive 
 Regeneration savingly, and may yet subsequently hold it in 
 unrighteousness. Yea, the after life of those regenerate in 
 infancy too often shows that that which was a savour of life 
 unto life, may become a savour of death unto death. 
 
 It is one thing to affirm that a person is adopted into a 
 family from which by birth he was an alien, and another to 
 allege that he has therefore now a full and sufficient use 
 of the privileges which attach to his sonship of that 
 family. But it is manifestly untrue to say, that he is not a 
 son, because he is unmindful of filial duties and heedless of 
 paternal blessings and domestic comforts. They that are 
 Christ's — i. e. that truly continue His — have crucified the 
 flesh with the affections and lusts ; they in whom the law of 
 life works towards everlasting salvation, not only were new- 
 born, but are living the new life ; they are not only spiritually 
 regenerate, but they are day by day sanctified by the Spirit 
 of Truth. 
 
 Manifold are the mysteries of the Divine kingdom. God 
 be praised ! it is concealed from us how far the sinner may 
 wander before it is impossible for him to return. Wilful and 
 flagrant was the guilt of the Prodigal, and yet, when he did cast 
 his looks and turn his steps once again towards home, "while 
 he was yet a long way off, his Father ran out to meet him, and 
 fell on his neck, and kissed him." The Spirit will bear with 
 * Revelation ii. 5. 
 
45 
 
 much, is long and often grieved, and done despite unto, ere 
 it is finally quenched. When that dark doom passes over 
 any soul in which Christ once has dwelt, it is not given 
 to Christ's minister to know ; and therefore however great 
 may be the torpor he seeks to rouse — however deep the sleep 
 from which he seeks to awaken the sinner — however death- 
 like the stillness he endeavours to quicken unto life— how- 
 ever abandoned the sinfulness he is called upon to denounce 
 - — he cannot, he dare not, otherwise address those who have 
 been once baptized, than as those who are fallen from grace, 
 and whose hope of recovery is dependent upon the certainty, 
 that in Baptism they were new born, and placed in relations 
 of forgiveness to Almighty God by being made members of 
 His dear Son. He will call to mind the hope and the 
 charity which the Apostle in such a case enjoins, and will, 
 even against hope, trust that there may be yet remaining 
 one single spark of the heavenly grace in the heart which 
 has been so long dark and cold, and that it may be of God's 
 mercy to allow that spark to be fanned into a bright and 
 burning flame instinct with the warmth of His own Divine 
 love. 
 
 Can this be called a preaching which would lull men into 
 forgetfulness and sin, such as Mr. Goode would have us 
 believe it is ? Surely no. If there be any force in motives 
 — if there be any weight in arguments — what motives or 
 arguments can be conceived more persuasive than those 
 which would urge an erring Prodigal to return to the loving 
 Father he has left — winch would call back a wandering sheep 
 to the fold from winch it has strayed ? While, on the other 
 hand, what can be more likely to produce the result Mr. 
 Goode deprecates than a system of doctrine which finds hi 
 emotions and assurances a nostrum which shall cure on the 
 nonce every form of spiritual malady ? 
 
 But Mr. Goode says, that " there are few, comparatively 
 very few ?mgodly persons who really believe" this doctrine. 
 
46 
 
 With all respect, I would deny Mr. Goode's assertion ; and, 
 as mere assertions carry in general little weight, I would 
 corroborate my own view by adducing the way in which 
 parents, even in an age when false and erroneous teaching 
 has so long kept out of view the true doctrine of Christ's 
 Holy Sacraments, not only think, but act, at times when 
 feelings are deepest and surest, even in that awful moment 
 when death threatens an inroad upon the unities of home. 
 Yes ! notwithstanding the manner in which the administration 
 of Holy Baptism has been thrust out of its proper place in 
 the public service, and our people thus kept in ignorance of 
 what the Church herself says on this vital doctrine, there 
 does yet linger among our people the conviction that in and 
 by Baptism blessings are conferred upon the sinning race of 
 man, and that in and by that Holy Sacrament our little ones 
 are necessarily placed in a state of salvation. In the solemn 
 hour when death threatens to snatch little ones from the 
 parent's embrace — in that solemn hour, prejudice and in- 
 difference are the one roused, the other dispelled. Is there 
 one father or one mother in a thousand among the members 
 of the Church of England who would not at any cost or effort 
 or sacrifice, bring its dying child to be baptized ere it die '? 
 And what is this but a proof that, in fact, not a "few," but 
 the many, really believe that their children will in such cir- 
 cumstances be saved in and by Baptism ? If the act of 
 prgevenient grace can save without Baptism, or if Baptism 
 without this prsevenient grace is of none effect, then these 
 afflicted ones might spare their anxiety and distress. But 
 the masses of England are even still more Catholic than 
 Genevan. And the deep utterances of the afflicted soul 
 which God has stricken bear witness to the truth which 
 God's Church is commissioned to preach, and to the depth of 
 the consolation she is dowered to impart. That these same 
 persons are indifferent and negligent in the Baptism of their 
 healthy children, is but an unhappy consistency with the 
 
47 
 
 indifference they manifest in respect of their own salvation 
 They hope for a convenient season in each case ; and their 
 indifference about their children is no niore a proof that 
 they disbelieve in the effect of Baptism, than their own care- 
 lessness of living proves them to be deliberate rejecters 
 of all Spiritual truth — theoretically as well as practically. 
 Ask the most abandoned profligate if he denies a God — a 
 Saviour — a heaven and a hell ? He will tell you no. Ask 
 him why he despises the goodness of God and squanders 
 the riches of his grace ? He will tell you that he does not 
 mean to be always as he is now ; but that one day he will 
 turn to God, and forsake his present evil courses. And what 
 is the reply of the Teacher of Baptismal Regeneration ? It 
 is this, that every step he takes is a step away from God, and 
 that each step must be re-trodden in sorrowful penitence — 
 his comfort on his return towards happiness and heaven ! 
 being the thought that he has a Father's love on which to 
 rest, and the happiness of a home for which to strive. 
 
 I pass over for the present, but only for the moment, Mr. 
 Goode's peculiar theory of Baptism, and his version of the 
 Church's doctrine thereupon, thinking it better previously 
 to consider one or two other points in his letter. 
 
 And first, a few words on Mr. Goode's angry attempt to 
 vindicate the judgment which has awakened so much alarm 
 throughout the Church. It may have weight with those 
 for whom Mr. Goode writes, that he should heap insult 
 after insult upon one whom he yet remembers is a " sep- 
 tuagenarian and a Bishop," and that he should compare his 
 Lordship's honest and virtuous indignation at this most 
 unrighteous judgment with "the ravings of disappointed and 
 infuriated Chartists." But such vituperation can eventually 
 reach only to himself. The cause must be weak which 
 needs such props as Mr. Goode's declamatory abuse. What 
 shall be thought of the pitiful spirit in which Mr. Goode 
 charges ignorance and want of understanding and the 
 
48 
 
 being an " empty vessel ! " upon him whom even Mr. 
 Gorham describes as of a mind " so acute" that it could 
 not fail to reject "palpable error?" Whatever may be 
 Mr. Goode's opinion of the Bishop of Exeter's letter, 
 those whom posterity will certificate as the true judges 
 in the matter, will confess that it is a masterpiece of elo- 
 quence and argument : and that, viewed merely as a com- 
 position, our literature has perhaps nothing superior. 
 Apart from all other claims, it gives utterance in measured 
 argumentativeness and eloquent rhythm to the deeply 
 stirred feelings of a mighty spirit roused into jealousy, 
 lest the aspersions cast on truth should be favourably 
 received by a careless and unheeding multitude. 
 
 And while, amid all the truthful vehemence of that letter, 
 there is not one passage for which its writer need less concern 
 himself as to its righteous energy, than that in which he 
 formally repudiates the Judgment ; so, throughout its whole 
 ninety pages, I very much question if there is one line which 
 will justify the mildest of those attacks which are the staple 
 matter of almost every page of his assailant's Letter. I have 
 been more than once tempted to arrange in a tabular form 
 Mr. Goode's misstatements and aspersions ; but, really, the 
 tissue of abuse which he has heaped upon one honoured 
 individual, the most prominent in this controversy, is so 
 scandalous, that I cannot bring myself to so place it 
 on record in these sheets. His Lordship's friends may 
 regard it as one proof more, that at least he need not fear 
 the woe the Saviour has pronounced upon the time-server 
 and the popularity hunter : " Beware when all men speak 
 well of you." And seeing that they called the Master of the 
 house Beelzebub, the servant must not complain if he is 
 subject to similar contumely and reproach. 
 
 It is not because of the degree of sanction which this judg- 
 ment lends to Mr. Gorham's particular views that it is so harm- 
 ful ; its real bane consists in this, that it saps the very first prin- 
 
49 
 
 ciples of truth and probity; and not content with endeavouring 
 to extend the latitude in which dogmatic assertions may be 
 received through the laxity of interpretation which each 
 individual clergyman may adopt in his own case, this judg- 
 ment has deliberately affirmed that it is possible for two 
 different and opposing views to be taught by those who are 
 authorized dispensers of God's Word, in one and the same 
 Church. 
 
 Whatever may be Mr. Goode's view, or Mr. Gorham's 
 view, and whatever may be the Church's view — and all these 
 matters will come before us in due course — this one thing is 
 certain, that while Mr. Goode allows of Mr. Gorham's 
 theory as capable of expression by his formula (see pp. 24, 
 25), that formula altogether excludes that for which the 
 Bishop of Exeter justly contends as the Church's view. 
 And yet, while Mr. Gorham says of the Bishop of Exeter's 
 view that it is " unscriptural" — that " no nicety can obviate 
 the fatal effects of the virus which lurks in such a system" — 
 that it " has a lamentable tendency to enslave, if not to 
 destroy the soul" (Preface xxiv — xxvii) — and while Mr. 
 Goode says of it that it is " a daring assumption of the 
 Divine prerogative," and " of the essence of the apostacy' of 
 "Antichrist" — yet we are assured on all hands that the judg- 
 ment has done nothing to disturb the Bishop of Exeter and 
 those who think with him from teaching as they have ever 
 done — that they may still teach their doctrine, only that 
 license is now also secured to those who think otherwise 
 and oppositely to teach their negations with the authority 
 that belongs to them as the accredited ministers of the 
 Church of England. 
 
 A very independent testimony in this matter, and one 
 whose apprehension of Romanising tendencies, if not quite 
 equal to that of Mr. Goode, is yet so considerable as to 
 cause him to grudge that certain persons now in the fore- 
 front of the battle against the effects of this judgment, should 
 
50 
 
 be accredited as leaders of himself and of his friends, thus 
 describes the object of Mr. Goode's admiration : — 
 
 " The true meaning of the judgment, therefore, is not to establish 
 Puritanism, but to weaken the force of doctrinal tests, — of subscription 
 to creeds, confessions, articles, and formularies of all lands. It is a step 
 in the same direction with many other steps which have lately been 
 taken or attempted. The theological party which really triumphs, is not 
 the puritanical, but the ' philosophical,' or latitudinarian. And hence 
 arises the exultation of those who, while they acknowledge (as all but 
 his partisans must do) that Mr. Gorham's doctrine is not the doctrine of 
 the English Church, admire the late judgment, as tending to establish 
 the principle, that the time is past when the human mind was to be 
 trammelled by creeds and traditions."* — The Bearings of the Gorham 
 Case, by Rev. J. C. Robe?-tson. 
 
 Some there are who say Mr. Gorham's doctrine does not 
 make him excommunicate. It will be time enough to con- 
 sider his doctrine and his mode of maintaining that doctrine 
 in that light and behalf, when occasion shall so arise. But 
 the question hitherto under review has been whether a 
 Bishop has power to prevent a parish in his diocese being" 
 placed under the pastoral care and doctrinal guidance of one 
 whose " doctrine" he deems contradictory of the creeds. 
 Has not every Bishop sworn to " banish and drive away all 
 erroneous and strange doctrine?" and is that judgment ac- 
 cording to equity which, without considering the terms or 
 answering the statements of the judgment of the court below, 
 snatches from the hand of one of our Fathers in God, at 
 once both the staves of " beauty and bands"! — alike doctrine 
 
 * Here is a Baptist Dissenter's common-sense view of the matter : — 
 " In the course of his address, Mr. Wallis said of the late judgment in 
 favour of Gorham, that, of course, they felt very glad of it. Yet it 
 seemed rather curious, after all. When they put down black, the judg- 
 ment said it meant white; and when they made a plain categorical 
 statement, it said it meant ' if.' This remark was received with loud 
 laughter." 
 
 t Zech. xi. 10, 14. 
 
51 
 
 and discipline — and without pronouncing that the tenets are 
 Scriptural, or ecclesiastical, directs that yet he who holds 
 them shall he allowed cure of souls ? Is that an equitable 
 judgment winch, complaining of the form in which the case 
 came before the Court, and censuring the Judge of the 
 Church Court for not " requiring the parties, even at the last 
 moment, to bring forward the case in a regular manner by 
 plea and proof;" yet forbears to exercise its own power to 
 have the case put in a form which should obviate " the diffi- 
 culty of coming to a right conclusion ?" The Judicial Com- 
 mittee, as I am informed, have full powers under their act, 
 (3 and 4 Will. IV., c. 42, sec. 8), to direct the examination 
 of witnesses not examined in the court below, or to direct a 
 re-hearing in the court below in such form as they may think 
 fit, and this either generally or on particular points. And if 
 Sir H. J. Fust ought to have done this, or whatever similar 
 thereto was in his own power, then it was far more imperative 
 on the Judicial Committee than on the Judge of the Court of 
 Arches, inasmuch as they were alive to the inconvenience of a 
 contrary course, and were moreover a court of last resort. The 
 judgment may be a well-intentioned judgment — it may be a 
 kindly-meant judgment — it may be a conciliatory judgment — 
 it may be (if, according to modern fashion, truth be elimi- 
 nated from charity) a charitable judgment ; but that it is a 
 righteous or an equitahle judgment, I cannot concede. I see 
 in it only an elaborate document full of subtile niceties, woven 
 together apparently to support a foregone conclusion, alleged 
 to be the only one consistent with the peace of the Church. 
 Nor can I form any other opinion of that judgment than that 
 which the learned Recorder of New Sarum arrives at as the 
 conclusion of his most searching argument : — 
 
 " I will venture to propose to your Lordship four conclusions from the 
 arguments of which I have made use : and they are these : — 
 
 " 1. That the decision in the suit of Gorham v. The Bishop of Exeter, 
 violates the rules of law, grammar, reason, and equity : is therefore 
 
 E 2 
 
52 
 
 binding only in the particular instance, and can never form a precedent 
 in any future case. 
 
 " 2. That if it were legally unexceptionable, still it does not settle 
 what is the true, just, and honest construction of the Formularies of the 
 faith of the Church of England ; hut only declares that the fantastic 
 theology of Mr. Gorham is not absolute!!/ contrariant or repugnant 
 thereto : in other words, that he has secured a loop-hole through which 
 he may evade then- stringency. 
 
 " 3. That it ought not, and cannot, therefore, affect the individual 
 conscience of any single member of the Church of England, however 
 it may in foro exteriori deform and wound the temporal status of that 
 Church. 
 
 " 4. That it is, nevertheless, a serious affront and indignity offered to 
 the catholicity of the faith of the Church of England, and, pro tanto, a 
 denial of that faith ; and this denial having been made by the authority 
 of the Chief Magistrate of the nation, the Laity in their sphere, the 
 inferior Clergy in theirs, and the Bishops in theirs, are bound to repu- 
 diate and disaffirm the same ; and that the Bishops especially, as the 
 head of the spirituality, ought, in their corporate capacity, to reinstate 
 in its pristine position, that great truth which the temporal power has 
 endeavoured to overturn."* 
 
 This would seern to be the proper time to notice that 
 marvellous assumption of the judgment which Mr. Goode 
 adopts as his own, when at p. 78 he says that : — 
 
 " The principle of charitable hypothesis was justly maintained by the 
 Judicial Committee to be the principle on which the Church's offices are 
 constructed ;" 
 
 unless, indeed, the Judges themselves got their view from 
 Mr. Goode's larger work, pp. 414, 415, &c. 
 
 Be this as it may, it is a view which the Bishop of Exeter 
 most indignantly repudiates, and with justice ; for one more 
 destructive of all truthfulness and honesty it is difficult to 
 conceive ; what can be more monstrous than the idea that 
 our prayers do not contain dogmatic teaching — that the 
 
 * A Review of the Gorham Case in its aspects Moral and Legal, with 
 a critical Examination of the Judgment. A Letter to the Lord Bishop 
 of Salisbury, by John David Chambers, Recorder of New Sarum. Ben- 
 ning, and Masters, London. 
 
53 
 
 faith of our hearts and the faith of our heads are twain, and 
 not one ; and that words used in our most solemn offices 
 need not be understood in their plain and natural sense. 
 The following passage, in which Bishop Burnet explains the 
 reasons for beginning with a revision of the Prayer Book 
 instead of a settlement of the articles, has been in the most 
 suicidal manner quoted b} r a clergyman in a neighbouring 
 diocese, to prove the view for which Mr. Goode con- 
 tends : — 
 
 " Many thought they should have begun, first of all, with these ; but 
 Cranmer, upon good reasons, -was of another mind, though much pressed 
 by Bucer about it. Till the order of Bishops was brought to such a 
 model, that the far greater part would agree to it, it was much fitter to 
 let that design go on slowly, to which so great a part of the chief pastors 
 might be so obstinately averse. The corruptions that were most import- 
 ant were those in the worship by which men, in their immediate 
 addresses to God, were necessarily involved in milawful compliances, and 
 these seemed to^ require a more speedy reformation. * But for specu- 
 lative points, there was not so pressing a necessity to have them all 
 explained, since in these, men might, with less prejudice, be left to a 
 freedom in their opinions. It seemed also advisable to open and ventilate 
 matters in public disputations, and books written about them, for some 
 years, before they should go hastily to determine them ; lest, if they 
 went too fast in that affair, it woidd not be so decent to make alterations 
 afterwards : nor could the clergy be of a sudden brought to change then' 
 old opinions. Therefore, upon all these considerations, that work was 
 delayed till this year (1-551)." — Burnet's History of the Reformation, 
 a.d. 1551, Vol. II. pp. 264, 265. 
 
 It is difficult to imagine a more pertinent proof of the 
 importance attached by the Reformers to the dogmatic 
 authority of our Prayers. By false doctrine being set forth 
 in the worship, the Reformers saw that the worshippers were 
 of necessity involved in unlawful compliances ; and there- 
 fore, while they postponed the speculative points of Predes- 
 tination, and the precise limits of Romish error on matters 
 
 * The first book of Common Prayer in Edw. VI.'s time was published 
 A.D. 1549. 
 
54 
 
 not hitherto accurately defined, they at once put the Creeds 
 into English, and striking out all innovations which favoured 
 the false doctrines of the Papac} r , they adhered to the ancient 
 rituals of the early Church, and translated into the mother 
 tongue, prayers in the use of which Martyrs and Confessors 
 and Saints had been armed in fighting the good fight of 
 faith. Availing themselves of all helps in the subsequent 
 revisions of the book which might carry out the design they 
 had entertained from the first, they at once set about the 
 reformation of our " Common Prayers in the Church, com- 
 monly called Divine Service," in the wish to observe the 
 " godly and decent order of the ancient Fathers," — as in the 
 matter of the Lessons from Holy Scripture, so in all other 
 particulars. 
 
 And my brethren of the laity will do well to give their 
 earliest and best attention to this attempt to get rid of the 
 dogmatic authority of the Prayer Book. To the laity it is 
 manifestly of the greatest moment, that it should be required 
 that the teaching of every clergyman be of necessity in 
 agreement with the doctrine which is involved in the Com- 
 mon Prayer ; for Common Prayer and the administration of 
 the Sacraments are the acts of communion. No sincere 
 Christian can hold communion with any Church in whose 
 prayers and sacraments he cannot join, without professing 
 thereby doctrine which he deems unsound ; therefore any 
 clergyman who is authorised to teach in our Church while 
 he holds doctrine which is contrariant to the doctrine of the 
 Book of Common Prayer, is so far forth authorised to with- 
 draw men from the communion of our Church. 
 
 Should this nullifying of the doctrine of our Prayer Book 
 by means of the hypothetical construction of our services 
 become the established rule of our Church, apart from the 
 palpable dishonesty which would thus obtrude itself into the 
 very recesses of the sanctuary, it is easy to see that the safe- 
 guard for the orthodoxy of the masses is at once withdrawn. 
 
55 
 
 " Publick forms of Liturgy," says Bishop Jeremy Taylor, 
 " are also the great securities and basis to the religion and 
 piety of the people." 
 
 " It is all the ol noXXoi, many men know of their religion, and 
 they cannot any way know it better than by those Forms of 
 Prayer wbich publish their faith and then- devotion to God and all the 
 world, and wliich, by an admirable expedient, reduces their faith into 
 practice, and places their religion in then- understanding and then* 
 affections. And therefore St. Paid, when he was to give an account of 
 his religion, he did it not by a mere recitation of the articles, but by 
 giving an account of his Liturgy, and the manner of his worship : ' After 
 that way which they call heresie, so worship I the God of my Fathers,' 
 and the best worship is the best religion." — Bishop Jeremy Taylor, 
 " Apologie for Authorized and Set Form of the Liturgie" Sect. hi. p. 29, 
 Polemical Discourses. Ed. 1574. 
 
 And the same author, in the Preface to the Apologie puts 
 the matter still more to our present purpose. 
 
 "If it were worth the pains, it were very easy to enumerate the 
 authors, and especially the occasions and time when the most nrinute 
 passages, such I mean as are known by distinct appellations, came into 
 the Church ; that so it may appear, our Liturgy is as ancient and primi- 
 tive in every part, as it is pious and unblameable, and long before the 
 Church got such a beam in one of her eyes, which was endeavoured to be 
 cast out at the Reformation. But it will not be amiss to observe, that 
 very many of them were inserted as antidotes and deletories to the worst 
 of heresies, as I have discoursed already : and such was that clause, 
 ' Through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with THEE, in 
 the unity of the Holy Spirit, ever one God ;' and some other phrases 
 parallel were put in, in defiance of the Macedonians, and all the species 
 of the Anti-trinitarians, and used by St. Ambrose in Milan, St. Austin 
 in Africa, and Idacius Clarus in Spain; and in imitation of so pious 
 precedents, the Church of England hath inserted divers clauses into her 
 offices." — Preface, sec. 34. 
 
 And yet again once more, Sect. 36 of the saint' Preface : — 
 
 "The offices are so ordered that the most indifferent and careless 
 cannot but be reminded of the mystery in every anniversary, which, if 
 they be summed up, will make an excellent Creed, (and then let any man 
 
56 
 
 consider what a rare advantage it will be to be the belief of such pro- 
 positions when the very design of the Holy-day teaches the hard-handed 
 artizan the name and meaning of an article), and yet the most forward 
 and religious cannot be abused with any semblances of superstition." 
 
 And confirmatory of this is the following passage from the 
 judicious Hooker : — 
 
 " As therefore, in controversies between us and the Chm - ch of Rome, 
 that which they practise is many times even according to the very gross- 
 ness of that which the vulgar sort conceiveth ; when that which they 
 teach to maintain, it is so nice and subtile, that hold can very hardly be 
 taken thereupon ; in which cases we should do the Church of God small 
 benefit by disputing with them, according unto the finest points of their 
 dark conveyances, and suffering that sense of their doctrine to go uncon- 
 trolled, wherein by the common sort it is ordinarily received and prac- 
 tised." — Hooker, lib. hi. ch. 7 — 5. 
 
 And thus writes the present Bishop of Bangor, quoting 
 Archhishop Laurence and Hooker : — 
 
 " We are told that these services .make use of a general phraseology, 
 or of hypothetical language, and expressions of hope and charity. But 
 plain sense, sober criticism, and historical research, refute these artificial 
 attempts to affix to them a meaning very different from that which they 
 bear at first sight, and foreign from the views and principles on which 
 they were originally constructed. Our Liturgy speaks a plain, simple, 
 and ingenuous language, ' adapted to popidar comprehension and instruc- 
 tion :' and the attempts to which system has had recourse, to wrest it from 
 its genuine and native meaning, may act as beacons and warnings to the 
 inexperienced, and teach them that it is a dangerous experiment to 
 tamper Avith its literal construction. ' There is nothing,' says Hooker, 
 ' more dangerous than this licentious and deluding art, which changeth 
 the meaning of words as alchymy doth or would do the substance of 
 metals, maketh of anything what it listeth, and bringeth in the end all 
 truth to nothing." — Betliell on Baptismal Regeneration, oth Ed. p. 114. 
 
 But there is a passage in Bishop Burnet's Pastoral Care 
 (cap. vi. p. 72, of Ed. 1840, with Prefatory Address by Bev. 
 Thomas Dale) which so completely contradicts this statement, 
 and in language so clear, that with it we will close these 
 extracts and dismiss this matter :— ~ 
 
57 
 
 " The truest indication of a sense of a Church is to be taken from her 
 language in her public offices ; this is that which she speaks most fre- 
 quently and most publicly ; even the articles of doctrine are not so much 
 read, and so often heard, as her Liturgies are. And as this way of rea- 
 soning has been of late made use of with great advantage against the 
 Church of Rome, to make her accountable for all her public offices in 
 then- plain and literal meaning, so will I make use of it on this occasion : 
 IT is the stronger IN our case, whose offices being in a tongue under- 
 stood by the people, the argument from them does more evidently 
 conclude here." — See chap. vi. p. 72, 1840. 
 
 Mr. Goode then proceeds to give us two different views 
 on the subject of Baptism, " characterising the schools" to 
 which the Bishop and Mr. Gorham respectively belong. 
 
 First he gives the following version of the Bishop's views 
 of this Holy Sacrament: — 
 
 " The former is that the Sacrament of Baptism is by God's appoint- 
 ment, and affixed grace, the primary source of all life-giving influence to 
 man ; so that in and by Baptism, that is, the opus operation, of the 
 Baptismal Act, and by that alone, remission of sins, and spiritual regene- 
 ration are absolutely, and without reference to conditions or qualifications, 
 conferred upon man. And that this is the meaning of the Article of the 
 Nicene Creed, ' One Baptism for the remission of sins.' Every one 
 baptized is ipso facto spiritually regenerated." — Letter, pp. 23, 24. 
 
 If this be the view against which Mr. Goode and others 
 contend when they deny Regeneration in Holy Baptism, 
 they have themselves to thank for the alarm and horror with 
 which they profess to regard that doctrine. This is not our 
 doctrine, and it is remarkable how Mr. Goode can assemble 
 so many erroneous charges in so small a compass ; and so, 
 before proceeding to canvass his own view, it may be well to 
 expose these misstatements in respect of those with whom 
 he contends. 
 
 It will be convenient to correct Mr. Goode's statement, so 
 as to enunciate the catholic verity — with as little divergence 
 as possible from his own words — and then to call attention 
 to the wrong done us by the views alleged to be ours. I 
 
58 
 
 would state the doctrine thus, adopting Mr. Goode's words 
 as far as possible : 
 
 " The Sacrament of Baptism is by God's appointment and 
 affixed grace the primary" [means whereby we are made 
 members of Christ, Who in the deep Mystery of His Incar- 
 nation is the One only] " Source of all life-giving influence 
 to man ; so that in and by Baptism ; that is," [not by] " the 
 opus operatwm," [but, ex opera Operantis, by the working of 
 God in and by] " the Baptismal Act, and" [so far as we 
 have God's covenant and promise on which to rely] "by 
 that alone, Remission of Sins and Spiritual Regeneration 
 are," [not indeed in all cases] "absolutely and without 
 reference to conditions or qualifications," [but, still, surely 
 and truly in the case of all infants ; and as truly and surely 
 in the case of adults coming with repentance and faith] 
 " conferred upon man, and that this is the meaning of the 
 Article of the Creed — One Baptism for the Remission of 
 Sins." " Every" infant " baptized is ipso facto si>iritually 
 regenerated." 
 
 Taking this as a corrected account of the true doctrine, 
 the first misstatement of which we have to complain, is, that 
 a rite which we ever describe as a means of grace, and a 
 pledge to assure us thereof — as the channel of Remission of 
 Sins, should be thrust into the place of Christ, whose ordi- 
 nance it is ; or, rather, we complain that we should be charged 
 with so monstrous a view. It is not in this place only that 
 the charge is made — it is repeated several times ; and in fact 
 this holy Sacrament is all along spoken of as though it had 
 nothing of connexion with Him by whose command it is 
 celebrated ; out of Whose most sacred side it flowed in sig- 
 nificant emblem ; and to Whom it is its end and object to 
 bring us and unite us. 
 
 The charge is most irreverently made at p. 36 : — 
 
 " The great, vital, fatal objection to your Lordship's doctrine is briefly 
 this — that you make the mere ojnts operatum of Baptism the source of 
 
59 
 
 spiritual life to the soul. You thereby place yourself almost in the posi- 
 tion of God Himself. You boldly aver that in the case of all infants, &c. 
 
 ; that these gifts are so tied to Baptism, that until you 
 
 choose to give Baptism, God Himself cannot (without some extraordinary 
 interference) give those gifts ; that you have only to sprinkle the child 
 with water, and utter a few words, and the thing is done." 
 
 Has Mr. Goode no friend to protect him from thus ex- 
 posing himself? or do his party think that they can thus 
 describe Christ's Holy Sacraments, and he blameless ? 
 " Sjirinkle a little water and utter a few icords /" " A little 
 water," that element which Christ hath sanctified to the 
 mystical washing away of sins ;* the " few words," those of 
 Christ Himself, the sacred deposit given to His Church 
 containing the last revealed Name of God, and in summary 
 the whole faith of Christendom! "And the thing is done J" 
 "The thing/" Thus does Mr. Goode describe a fulfilment of 
 the Lord's command — " Go ye into all the world, and make 
 disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the 
 Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." It is 
 well that Churchmen should see in what terms they write 
 who rob Christ's Sacraments of then* rich dowry of 
 heavenly grace. Surely the words of such shall not avail 
 against the hearty faith of the millions of saints gathered to 
 their eternal rest ! 
 
 But to return to Mr. Goode's charge. We find it again 
 repeated (p. 39) : — 
 
 " The great (sic) point at issue between yourself and those whom you 
 
 * Thus taught the disciple of St. John himself, the apostolical father 
 and martyr, Ignatius, in his epistle to the Ephesians — " For our God 
 Jesus Christ was born in the womb of Mary, according to the dispen- 
 sation of God, of the seed of David, yet by the Holy Ghost. He was 
 born, and was baptized, that through His passion he might purify water 
 (to the washing away of sin)." Epistle to Ephesians, p. 84. A Transla- 
 tion of the Epistles of Clement of Rome, Polycarp, and Ignatius. By 
 Rev. Temple Chevallier, B.D., Cambridge, 1833. 
 
60 
 
 are assailing, is, whether the Sacrament of Baptism is placed by God in 
 the hands of man as the source (sic) of remission of sins and spiritual 
 life to the soul, to be used by him ad libitum in the case of infants (the 
 more consistent of your party adding the case of adults also)." 
 
 It is difficult to understand what class of readers Mr. 
 Goode can mislead by statements such as these : but it is 
 reasonable to suppose that he thinks them such as English- 
 men will tolerate. He must judge of his countrymen by 
 data to which I am a stranger : and I will hope that his 
 judgment is erroneous. I have already shown that in 
 charging Mr. Badely with avowing that remission of sins is 
 given by Baptism to impenitent adults, he charged him 
 wrongly; and I now ask Mr. Goode to instance any one 
 authority — any one writer of the school he is opposing — who 
 has anywhere said that they have no enquiries to make as 
 to the faith and repentance of adults before admitting them 
 to Baptism. I further challenge him to produce any one 
 writer who, on a fail- construction of his statements, can be 
 held to affirm, that even in the case of infants there is any- 
 thing so really dependent on the will of man, as to justify 
 his expression ad libitum, in connexion with the bestowal of 
 sacramental grace on the part of the minister who celebrates 
 God's ordinance. 
 
 But the most strange perversion of the doctrine held by 
 those from whom Mr. Goode differs, is to be found in his 
 speaking of Baptism as the source of those gifts of which 
 we teach it is the channel. Does this arise from Mr. Goode 
 having been so long accustomed to substitute the qualifi- 
 cations of the recipient for the graciousness of the Author 
 of the Sacraments, as the condition of their efficacy, that he 
 is but giving to Baptism a title which he would think to be 
 properly applied to Faith ? 
 
 The Venerable Archdeacon Wilberforce, to whom Mr. 
 Goode refers as insisting on this doctrine, " without any 
 timid reservations or scruples," thus states it : — 
 
CI 
 
 " What is Regeneration ? It is the effect of grace which the Fattier 
 of all mercies was pleased to embody in the manhood of the Incarnate 
 Son, that thereby humanity at large might be reconstructed, and which, 
 in Him and by Him, is received by those happy members of the family of 
 man to whom the Gospel comes, and by ichom it is not rejected through 
 unbelief or impenitence" — The Doctrine of Holy Baptism, p. 27. 
 
 Baptism, then, avails not because of any inherent efficacy 
 of its own apart from Him from whose most sacred side it 
 flowed in union with the purpling streams of His shed 
 blood.* He is the Source of the life which is imparted in 
 Baptism ; and it is because there is an application of that 
 blood in and by this Sacrament, that the ancients were ac- 
 customed to speak of Baptism by a term which implies not 
 moistening only, but the giving a hue or colour also. And 
 thus did they teach that in Baptism is the striking of the 
 blood upon the lintels of the door-posts of our human nature; 
 seeing which, the destroying angel shall know that we are of 
 the Lord's new Israel, saved out of the darkness of the 
 mystical Egypt of a sinful world. Baptism is not the source 
 of life, but the means of our union with Him who is the Life 
 itself. To say that this means is apparently trivial, is but 
 to say that it comes from God, a law of whose Being it is to 
 produce great effects with the intervention of means which 
 become adequate only by His appointment. 
 
 * " This place of the epistle refers to that place of the Gospel, where at 
 once, with one blow, His side being opened, there came forth ' blood and 
 water' both. Blood, sanguis testamenti, saith Zachary the ninth, 'the blood 
 of liis testament,' whereby He set His guilty prisoners free. Water, saith 
 the same Zachary the thirteenth, fons domui Israel — ' a fountain which 
 He opened to the house of Israel for sin and uncleanness.' The one 
 blood, the Xvrpov, ' the ransom,' or price of the taking away the guilt; 
 the other, water, the \ovrpbv, ' laver,' of our new birth, from our original 
 corruption. Hcec sunt Ecclesice gemina Sacramento, saith Augustine, 
 'These are (not two of the Sacraments; so there might be more, but) the 
 twin-Sacraments of the Church.' So but two of that kind, two famous 
 memorials left us ; in baptism, of the water ; hi the cup of the New 
 Testament, of the blood He then came in." — Bishop Andrewes's Sermon 
 xxii. Works, vol. iii. p. .148. Oxford. 1841. 
 
62 
 
 Mr. Goode's next mis-statement is repeated usque ad 
 nauseam throughout the letter, and is, that we attribute the 
 efficacy of Baptism to the opus operatum of the Baptismal 
 act. 
 
 His object in the repeated iteration of his charge is trans- 
 parent enough. This phrase, opus operatum, has been plen- 
 tifully used in the controversy with Borne, and its use now 
 keeps up the prejudice against the doctrine Mr. Goode 
 rejects as being a popish doctrine. In the eighth of the 
 canons, " De Sacra/mentis in genere," of the seventh session of 
 the Council of Trent, an anathema is pronounced upon any 
 who shall deny that the Sacraments of the new law do of 
 themselves, ex opere operato, by the work wrought, by the 
 very fact of their administration, confer grace ; but the 
 statement seems to be made less to claim a material efficacy 
 for the Sacraments themselves and in themselves, than to 
 assert their necessity against those who substitute for the 
 Sacraments the faith of the suppliant for Divine grace, as 
 sufficient by itself without the intervention of outward means 
 to that end.* But be this as it may, this at least is certain, 
 in the minds of the generality of people, the idea prevails 
 that the Roman doctrine gives more efficacy to the externals 
 of the Sacrament than is consistent with the freedom of the 
 Divine operations : and their allowing even midwives to 
 baptize rather than that any particular child should fail of 
 the ordinance of Baptism, is calculated to establish this 
 opinion. This being so, a point is gained if that which we 
 maintain as the Anglican and the Catholic view, can be 
 identified with what is not Catholic, but popish. Hence this 
 constant repetition of the " opus operatum' charge. 
 
 But any statement which speaks of the efficacy of the 
 
 * Siquis dixerit, per ipsa novse legis Sacramenta ex opere operato non 
 conferri gratiam, sed solam fidem Divina? promissionis ad gratiam con- 
 sequendam sufficere ; anathema sit. — Sacros. et (Ecum. Cone. Trid. 
 Mechlinice cum approbatione. 1826. — p. 66. 
 
63 
 
 Sacraments as proceeding from the thing done or the work 
 wrought, does not set forth that which we of the Church of 
 England hold. The Bishop of Exeter satisfactorily pointed 
 this out in the 59th and 60th of his questions in Mr. Gorham's 
 examination, when he spoke of the work which was effica- 
 cious as " the Gift of God in Baptism," and attributed the 
 blessing's of that Sacrament " to God in Baptism." We 
 ascribe the efficacy of the Sacraments not to the rites them- 
 selves, but to God who works in and by them.* And though 
 Mi\Goode takes none account of this distinction, Mr. Gorham 
 does, but endeavours to abate its force by alleging that 
 doubtless intelligent Romanists make a like distinction. 
 At p. xxv. of the Preface to his work, Mr. Gorham affects to 
 see no difference between — 
 
 "the Popish, doctrine of the unconditional regenerating efficacy of 
 that initiatory Sacrament ex opere operato," and the " dogma of Baptism 
 absolutely efficacious on right administration." He thinks " the in- 
 telligent Romanist would doubtless allow that it was" to God, " giving 
 His blessing to this opus operatum, that its never-failing efficacy must be 
 ascribed, just as the Bishop of Exeter, (at once rejecting, as so acute a 
 mind could not fail to do, the more palpable error,) endeavours to guard 
 his faintly discriminated, or rather scarcely dissimilar, dogma, by a 
 recognition of the Divine Author of that Sacramental rite, invariably 
 present to bless its outward and legitimate application." 
 
 The divine who cannot see a distinction between ascribing 
 a work to a material element, and ascribing it to God, 
 employing that element to accomplish His own gracious 
 purposes, is not likely to be convinced by any arguments I 
 can offer ; but I may urge to others in respect of him that it 
 need not cause them much concern to find themselves at 
 
 * Sacraments are instriunents of God, whereby He bestows grace, 
 grace not proceeding from the visible sign, but from His invisible power. 
 We derive their virtue not ex opere operato, sed ex opera Operantis ; 
 that is, not from the work wrought, but from Him who worketh in and 
 by them, Almighty God. — Occasional Sermons, by Rev. Ch. Wordswortli , 
 D.D. Sermon iii. — On the Doctrine on Baptism, p. 59, London, 1850. 
 
64 
 
 variance with one who speaks of Christ's Sacrament in the 
 temper of him who asked, " Are not Abana and Pharpar rivers 
 of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel ? may I not 
 wash in them and be clean ?" Surely the Gracious Lord, 
 who Himself submitted to Baptism that He might perfect 
 the human nature He had taken into His everlasting God- 
 Head ; and who taught us His Gracious will in respect of 
 naturally inadequate means by His using clay wherewith to 
 make the blind to see, may reasonably expect in His followers 
 a more childlike and trustful acceptance of His unqualified 
 announcement — " Except a man be born again of Water 
 and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God" 
 (John iii. 5.) ; for what is it to which those are driven who will 
 not recognize God's right to tie us to the observance of 
 specified rites as the ordinary means of His moving towards 
 us with blessing ? They are compelled to pour contempt 
 upon Christ's Sacraments, and to speak as Mr. Gorham, 
 following John Calvin,* does of " the wnphilosophical ascription 
 of a spiritual effect to a material element." — Preface, p. xxvi. 
 
 Let us not, then, be deterred from giving to Baptism 
 its Scriptural importance by this idle charge of the opus 
 
 * Moreover, they bring forth the wordes of Christ, which are rehearsed 
 in the thirde chapter of John, whereby they think that a present regener- 
 ation is required in Baptisme. Unlesse a man be born againe of water 
 and the Spirite, he cannot enter into the kingdome of God. Soe (say 
 they), howe Baptisme is by the Lorde's own mouth called Regeneration. 
 Them, therefore, whome it is more than enough knowen to be unable to 
 receive Regeneration, by what color do we admit to Baptisme which 
 cannotlbe without Regeneration ; first they are deceived in thys, that they 
 think that in thys place mention is made of Baptisme, because they hear 
 the name of water. For after that Christ had declared to Nicodemus 
 the corruption of nature, and taught him that men must he born of newe, 
 because Nicodemus dreamed of a bodily newe birth, he there showed the 
 manner how God doth regenerate us, namely, by water and the Spirite, 
 as though he should say, by the Spirite, which in cleansing and watering 
 faithfull soules, doth the office of water. Therefore I take water and the 
 Spirite, simply for the Spirite, which is water. — Calvin's Institution of 
 Christian Religion, Fol. Ed. p. 115, London, 1561. 
 
65 
 
 operatum made by Mr. Goode, and confessed to be unjust by 
 Mr. Gorham, who, however, thinks the statement, " ex opera 
 Operantis," sets forth the doctrine of grace in a manner 
 equally objectionable. We may be well content to fall 
 under the censure of one in whose doctrine upon this 
 subject I am unable to distinguish any difference from that 
 ascribed by Bishop Pearson to Socinus, and refuted by him 
 in his " Determinatio VI." — " Baptismus non est ritus indif- 
 ferens," from which I have already quoted earlier in this 
 controversy ; * ay, of one who, with strange consistency, 
 huddles together, in one catena of rejected authorities, 
 " the Council of Nice, a.d. 325," " Bishop Paulinus," " Bel- 
 larmine," and "the Bishop of Exeter." The Bishop may 
 forgive Mr. Gorham the charge of popery which is estab- 
 lished by proving that his Lordship holds doctrine on Holy 
 Baptism which has the authority of the first Gilcumenical 
 Council, wherein was vindicated the Divinity of the Word 
 from Everlasting, God's only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ — 
 a Council of which the Martyr Ridley, as a dutiful son of the 
 Church of England, says, " That Council was collected out of 
 ancient fathers, and is to me a great authority."f 
 
 The next of Mr. Goode's mis-statements which I have to 
 notice is that wherein he says that we hold that by Baptism 
 "alone" remission of sins, &c. Now, that we hold that God 
 has tied Christians to the use of this Sacrament as that to 
 which alone He has affixed the promise of Regeneration 
 whereby we enter into His kingdom, is most true. That we 
 deny that He Himself can give Regeneration independently 
 of the ordinance to which He has tied us, but not Himself, is 
 not true. What we do hold as to the indispensableness of 
 
 * The Judgment in re Gorham v. Bishop of Exeter. The passages 
 from Jewell, Pearson, Taylor, and Hooker, collated with the Originals, 
 in a Letter to a Friend. On a Sheet, price Id., or 7s. per 100. Masters, 
 London. 
 
 t Works.— Parker Society's Ed. 1841, p. 248. 
 
 T 
 
66 
 
 Baptism has been well put by the learned Archbishop Brain- 
 hall, in the following passage, in which he shows that while 
 Baptismal grace is absolutely, external Baptism is only 
 generally, necessary to Salvation : — 
 
 2. " Secondly, we distinguish between the visible sign and the invisible 
 grace ; between the exterior sacramental ablution and the grace of the 
 Sacrament ; that is, the interior regeneration. "We believe that who- 
 soever HATH THE FORMER, HATH THE LATTER ALSO ; SO that he (loth not 
 put a bar against the efficacy of the Sacrament by his infidelity or hypo- 
 crisy of which a child is not capable. And therefore our very Liturgy 
 doth teach, that ' a child baptized, dying before the commission of 
 actual sin, is midoubtedly saved.' Secondly, we believe, that without 
 Baptismal grace — that is, Regeneration — no man can enter the kingdom of 
 God. But, whether God hath so tied and bound Himself to His 
 Ordinances and Sacraments, that He doth not, or cannot, confer the 
 grace of the Sacraments extraordinarily, where it seemeth good in His 
 eyes, without the outward element, this is the question between us." — A 
 Short Discourse to Sir Henri/ De Vic, about, 8,-c. fyc, of Persons dying 
 without Baptism. — Works, Vol. J', p. 172, Oxford, 1845. 
 
 My remaining objection to Mr. Goode's statement, is that 
 he alleges that we say that by the Sacrament of Baptism 
 " Remission of sins and spiritual regeneration are absolutely, 
 and without reference to conditions or qualifications, con- 
 ferred upon man." 
 
 We do, with Archbishop Bramhall, in the conclusion of the 
 next discourse to that from which I have already quoted, 
 maintain " that God is not wanting to His own ordinances, 
 when we do not set a bar against ourselves." And we do 
 further hold, that, original sin notwithstanding (and of this 
 more anon), our infants do not place any hindrance in 
 the way of Baptism, and that therefore upon them, by the 
 " condition" of the Saviour's own promise, God does in and 
 by Baptism confer the above-mentioned graces. But while 
 we hold that infants without active " qualifications," of which 
 they are not capable, do receive the benefits of Baptism 
 really and truly, we also affirm that adults must " come unto" 
 Christ, " truly repenting," and " by faith," or they will not 
 
67 
 
 lay saving hold on the blessings which belong to Christ's 
 Sacraments : they will receive them to their condemnation ; 
 their "effect or operation" will not be "wholesome" (salutarem), 
 but it will be "damnation " that they purchase to themselves.* 
 And here I might dismiss the paragraph of Mr. Goode's 
 Letter in which these mis-statements occur, but that in the 
 close of it Mr. Goode charges Archdeacon Wilberforce with 
 maintaining that it is 
 
 " entirely reconcilable with reason and Revelation that every- 
 
 * This matter cannot well be better put than it is by Mr. Badeley, not- 
 withstanding Mr. Goode's assertion respecting that learned gentleman's 
 views in respect of Adult Baptism. 
 
 The Bishop of Londox. — You do not mean to distinguish, and to say 
 that there can be effective Baptism without " the grace of God ?" 
 
 Dr. Llsiiingtox. — That in Baptism it is presumed. 
 
 Me. Badeley. — Xo doubt all is to be attributed to the " grace of 
 God." But Baptism is the means of grace, our Lord having made that 
 the instrument by which certain privileges and benefits are conferred 
 upon every child who is admitted to the rite. 
 
 Lord Campbell. — And in the case of adults, that grace only being 
 given on " faith and repentance." 
 
 Mr. Badeley. — Upon faith and repentance. 
 
 Mr. Pemberton Leigh. — Yesterday you suggested that Regeneration 
 might take place without faith or repentance, but not remission of sins. 
 
 Mr. Badeley. — Supposing an adult came without faith and repentance, 
 so far the Baptism might be effectual as operating for his regeneration ; 
 according to the doctrine of the Church, it cannot be an " inane signum," 
 and those who come unwortliily, are said to purchase to themselves dam- 
 nation. Regeneration, therefore — the change of nature, the alteration in 
 the condition of the person — may take place by the Sacrament : at all 
 events, a character is impressed; and it is for this reason that the Sacra- 
 ment is never allowed to be repeated, this having always been regarded 
 by the Church as a kind of sacrilege. But the remission of sin is sus- 
 pended if the party comes in hypocrisy ; the change of condition, the 
 operation of the Sacrament itself, whatever it be under such circum- 
 stances, would seem to enhance the guilt of the unworthy recipient ; and 
 this appears to be the view which our Church takes, because, according 
 to her Articles, you cannot treat the Sacrament as a nullity, — you cannot 
 say that it has no effect, — and if it does not convey a benefit, it must 
 operate for condemnation. 
 
 F 2 
 
68 
 
 body baptized should be in and by Baptism spiritually regenerated, and 
 have all the powers of their nature renovated, and have ' Christ dwell- 
 ing in them,' even though their will remains corrupt, and they may be 
 none the better for it." — Letter, p. 24. 
 
 Mr. Goode gives no references. But if unhappily I am 
 right in thinking that he has got his statements from that 
 part of the Archdeacon's hook from which I have just 
 quoted ; then, the widest stretch of Christian charity can 
 scarcely allow us to acquit him of detraction."* 
 
 In Chapter I. Archdeacon Wilberforce treats as to " what 
 Regeneration is." And he there defines it to be in its" 
 fulness the re-construction of our nature, summing all up, in 
 its concluding paragraph, by the italicised sentence — " It is 
 Christ taking up His dwelling in man." Now let us look to 
 the whole passage, and see whether those who are " none the 
 better for it" are said to have " Christ dwelling in them : " — 
 
 " For, first, though a new nature has been bestowed on man in 
 Christ, yet the old one has not been extinguished. The corruption of 
 nature doth remain, yea in them that are regenerate. 
 
 " We read, indeed, that ' they that are Christ's have crucified the 
 flesh, with the affections and lusts.' Yet is crucifixion but a lingering 
 death, by which our members which are upon the earth are only gra- 
 dually mortified. And, secondly, it is to be considered that in man there 
 is something besides this common nature which has been re-constructed 
 
 in Christ." 
 
 ***** 
 
 " This principle of personality is something distinct from that com- 
 mon nature which is re- constructed in Christ our Lord." 
 
 ***** 
 
 " Now, unless this responsibility of their own yields to the suasion of 
 the renewed nature, the blessings of the Gospel-gift do but increase 
 their condemnation. ' If we say that we have fellowship with Him, 
 and walk in darkness, we he, and do not the truth.' 
 
 * " He is wont to misconstrue ambiguous words, or to misinterpret 
 doubtful appearances of things : let a man speak never so well, or act 
 never so fairly, yet a detractor will say his words may bear this ill sense, 
 his actions may tend to that bad purpose." — Dr. Isaac Barrow. Sermon 
 xix. — Against Detraction. Works, vol. i. p. 52, Oxford, 1830. 
 
09 
 
 " And therefore is it, that belief and love are needed on our part for 
 the acceptance of that gift of a renewed being, which is bestowed upon 
 us through the mediation of Christ. 
 
 " These graces, indeed, being good, are God's gift ; but they are a 
 gift which does not exclude human responsibility, and to which, there- 
 fore, the accountable principle must assent. 
 
 " For where the will of the individual opposes itself by unbelief and 
 impenitence against God's blessing, His streams of mercy lose their 
 saving effect. ' The earth, which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft 
 upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, 
 receiveth blessing from God. But that which beareth thorns and briers 
 is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing, whose end is to be burned.' On 
 this account it is that Repentance and Faith are spoken of as NECESSARY 
 on OUR part, if we would profit by those blessings which the Gospel 
 
 bestows.*' 
 
 ***** 
 
 " But the necessity of these qualities is, that then- absence from the 
 adult mind is equivalent to that state of repugnancy against the Gospel 
 which renders its blessings unavailing. And therefore is it, that in this 
 state of probation, the blessings of a re-created nature are not only 
 possessed imperfectly by the best, through the opposition of a conflicting 
 concupiscence, but by many are altogether rejected, through the hard- 
 ness of an impenitent and unbelieving will." [Here follows passage 
 quoted, supra, p. 61]. " It is not, therefore, the general influence of 
 the Divine Power, but the gift bestowed through the Mediator. Neither 
 is it the mere promulgation by Christ of a better law, but His re-creating 
 Presence. 
 
 " Nor yet is it attained by all men, nor even by all to whom it is 
 offered ; but by those to whom it is given of God, and who do not reject 
 it. It is Christ taking up Iris dwelling in man. ' For in Christ Jesus 
 neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but the new 
 creation ; and as many as walk according to this rule, grace be on them, 
 and mercy, and upon the Israel of God.' " — The Doctrine of Holy Bap- 
 tism, chap. i. p. 25. London, 1850. 
 
 What correspondence there is between the Archdeacon's 
 doctrine and Mr. Goode's statement of it, the reader can 
 now judge. I proceed to consider that which he states to 
 be " the other view " in this behalf. Immediately following 
 the passage Ave have just considered, Mr. Goode sets 
 forth a general formula, which he considers applicable to 
 the several opinions which men have advanced irto the 
 
70 
 
 place of the one doctrine on this cardinal point of Christian 
 Belief. 
 
 Mr. Goode's abstract statement of the hypothetical view is 
 thus framed, as a general theorem of which he afterwards 
 gives two particular cases : — 
 
 " The other view is, that the Sacrament of Baptism has heen appointed 
 by God as the rite by which the privilege of sonship, with its accom- 
 panying blessings, is formally made over to man, at once, and absolutely 
 to those who by God's precious favour have been placed in a position 
 which causes the rite to be efficacious, and who possess God's grant of 
 the privilege, and conditionally, that is, upon the conditions of subsequent 
 faith and repentance, to all. But no opus operation efficacy is conceded 
 to the rite itself. The privilege of sonship is given by it, but only upon 
 the strength of and in accordance with the grant of that privilege by God. 
 That privilege is absolutely made over by it only where it has been pre- 
 viously, or at the time, granted by God — a grant independent of Bap- 
 tism. And where it is conditionally made over, the rite has efficacy 
 only when, — the condition being, by God's grace, fulfilled, — the actual 
 grant is made by God." — Letter, pp. 24, 25. 
 
 It is to be observed, even of this statement, that it has 
 points of contact with true doctrine, as, ex. gr., when the 
 blessing of Baptism is said to be contingent on God's 
 grant of the privilege, and when its future efficacy is made 
 to depend upon subsequent faith and repentance ; and, 
 moreover, it is couched in terms which so far parody the 
 true doctrine, that minds unaccustomed to discriminate, 
 as to the points at issue, might be disposed to accept the 
 formula, giving their own value to the abstract quantities 
 in the several terms. And therefore it will be well, before 
 considering this general statement in detail, to supply what 
 is wanting, and to omit what is extraneous in its terms, in 
 order to make it conformable to Holy Scripture and ancient 
 precedent. 
 
 " The Sacrament of Baptism has been appointed by God 
 as the rite by which the privilege of sonship, with its 
 
71 
 
 accompanying blessing, is " given * " to man, at once, 
 and absolutely to those who by God's previous favour 
 have been placed in a position which causes the rite to be 
 efficacious, and who possess God's grant of the privilege," 
 [/'. e., to all infants] "and conditionally, that is, upon the con- 
 ditions of " [present or] " subsequent faith or repentance 
 to all " [adults.] " But no opus operation efficacy is con- 
 ceded to the rite itself. The privilege of sonship is given 
 by it, but only upon the strength of, and in accordance 
 with, the grant of that privilege by God. That privilege 
 is absolutely made over by it only where it " [is so ad- 
 ministered as to satisfy the conditions with which Christ 
 lias limited its use.] [Nothing is " at the time granted 
 by God " [which is] " a grant independent of Baptism." 
 [All His ordinances are complete and perfect : He does 
 nothing in vain : and in his kingdom counterfeits have no 
 place. If, then, He call Baptism the Sacrament of Rege- 
 neration, or speak of Baptism in connexion with the Ark, 
 as " the like figure whereunto Baptism doth even now 
 save us," then Baptism is Regeneration or New Birth ; yea, 
 it is a present and true mode of salvation. t But] " where 
 
 * I am unwilling to adopt Mr. Goode's term, " formally made over,'" 
 from the ambiguity of the sense in which he uses the word " formally.' 
 The impression conveyed to my mind by the manner in which he uses 
 the term, is that of unreality ; and yet he does apply it to the case of a 
 transfer of property by title-deeds, where the " formal " act is that by 
 which the party becomes seized of the estate. Hooker, as quoted by 
 Johnson, can give Mr. Goode a meaning of form in which, I fear, he does 
 not use it. " In definitions, whether they be framed larger, to augment, 
 or stricter, to abridge the number of sacraments, we find grace expressly 
 mentioned as their true essential form, and elements whereunto that ,. for m 
 did adjoin itself." — Hooker. — Johnson's Dictionary, " Form." 
 
 f Here St. Austin's rule will serve for this, and for many a case be- 
 sides. He gives it in the Sacraments, In Divinis Scripturis Sacramento 
 earum rerum nomina sortiuntur, quarum sunt stmilitudines. The Sacra- 
 ments in the Holy Scriptures have the names of those things given them 
 
72 
 
 it is conditionally made over, the rite has " [saving'] " effi- 
 cacy only when — the condition being by God's grace fulfilled 
 — the actual grant" — [which] " is made by God," [is laid hold 
 of, and the seed sown, falling into good ground, bringeth forth 
 fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, and some thirty- 
 fold.] 
 
 Now, if the alterations by which I have endeavoured to 
 bring Mr. Goode's statement into harmony with Holy Scrip- 
 ture, as received in and by the Church, which is its witness 
 and keeper, be necessary in order to that end, it follows that 
 Mr. Goode departs from Holy Scripture in these particulars 
 following : — 
 
 I. He robs the Sacrament of Baptism of its truthfulness : 
 according to his theory it is a sham, which feigns to give 
 that which all the while is given in some other manner, and 
 possibly at some different time. 
 
 II. He ignores the certainty of that goodwill of our 
 Saviour Christ towards infants which Holy Church hath 
 ever seen in the command — " Suffer little children to come 
 unto Me, and forbid them not," inasmuch as he avers that 
 if in after life the child baptized to-day be reprobate, that 
 then it is not that he has squandered grace, but that he 
 has never had it ! 
 
 III. He does not allow that the Sacraments have any 
 effect, as of necessity belonging to them in virtue of Christ's 
 institution and promise. 
 
 IV. He denies that Baptism has any spiritual efficacy 
 so its own, that God confines to that specific ordinance, 
 
 of which things they are similitudes ; — he adds, and so do we, — BUT 
 such similitudes as carry their truth always with them."* — Cosin's 
 Works, Vol. I. p. 273. 
 
 * Si enim Sacramenta quamdam similitudinem earum rerum, quarum 
 sacramenta sunt, non haberent, omnino sacramenta non essent. Ex hac 
 autem similitudine plerumque etiam ipsarum resum nomina occipiunt. — 
 Opp. Tome II. col. 202. 
 
73 
 
 where it can be had, that particular gift which we hold is 
 conferred by it, and ordinarily by it alone. 
 
 The general argument I have adopted renders a more 
 specific refutation of these errors than that which these 
 pages afford, unnecessary. But, before I proceed to show 
 how idle it is to allege that the Prayer Book, or its framers, 
 or our standard Divines, hold this view ; and before I seek 
 to expose sundry other mis-statements into which Mr. 
 Goode has suffered himself to fall, it may be well to con- 
 sider whether Mr. Goode have fairly stated Mr. Gorham's 
 views. 
 
 We may remark in passing, that Mr. Goode's application 
 of his general formula to his own theory involves an in- 
 terpretation of 1 Cor. vii. 14, which is scarcely distinguish- 
 able from Pelagianism. If original sin be so unreal a 
 thing that, it notwithstanding, children born of a Christian 
 parent are so within the bond of the covenant, that "its 
 guilt will not be imputed to them,", then the first birth, 
 without being born again, is sufficient to admit within the 
 kingdom of God. In addition to the gloss Mr. Goode 
 puts on this passage of St. Paul, he seeks to justify his 
 theory by alleging (p. Gl), that what the Bishop of Exeter 
 has said (p. 53) of " God's grace and favour," implies that 
 infants " do not come under the full weight of unpardoned 
 original sin, though that pardon may not be formally 
 made over but by the rite of Baptism." It is unnecessary 
 to repeat here all the passages in which Mr. Goode empties 
 this sacrament of grace by his favourite expressions, 
 "formally made over," "publicly and formally made over." 
 " The public do not recognise any one as belonging to it until 
 he has been in this way introduced into it," &c. They may 
 one and all be disposed of by the simple fact already alluded 
 to, that God does nothing in vain, and that with Him to 
 name and to call are all one with saying that such things are 
 what He names and calls them. And therefore in Baptism 
 
74 
 
 we are born again, not merely registered in a visible society ; 
 we are then and "thereby" "made," not merely declared to be 
 "members of Christ." Original sin is not half forgiven 
 that we may come freely to Baptism; but, "the goodwill of our 
 heavenly Father, declared by His Son Jesus Christ," allows 
 us to bring infants to Baptism, that their original sin may 
 be washed away. That the language of the Apostle justifies 
 Mr. Goode's inference, I wholly deny. That the children of 
 believing parents are so far within the covenant that they 
 are entitled thereby to the benefits of that covenant, i. e. to 
 Holy Baptism and its fruits and consequences, in a sense 
 which the children of heathens are not, is wholesome doc- 
 trine ; but to dogmatically assert, that by difference in the 
 circumstances of natural propagation, spiritual forgiveness 
 is conferred, so that original sin doth not as much need for- 
 giveness by Baptism in a Christian's child as in a heathen 
 child, is to impugn the Church's teaching on the doctrine of 
 our natural depravity ;* to break down the fences which 
 surround the doctrine of "Christ alone without sin;" and to 
 prepare the way for "the -pious cju^ou" of the Immaculate 
 conception of the Virgin, about, it is said, to be made an 
 " Article of Faith" by the Church of Rome ! 
 
 Bishop Burnet can teach Mr. Goode a sounder interpret- 
 ation : — 
 
 " In the New Testament, Christian and saint are the same thing ; so the 
 saying that children are holy when one of the parents is a Christian must 
 import this, that the child has also a right to be made holy or to he made 
 a Christian ; and, by consequence, that by the parent's dedication that child 
 may he made holy or a Christian." — Burnet on Article xxvii. Oxford 
 Ed. 1831. p. 406. 
 
 * Even those who have not lived to sin after the similitude of Adam, 
 yet are they so tainted with Adam, that, unless the second Adam cleanse 
 them by His Baptism, they are hopeless." — Bishop Hall's Contemplations. 
 Works] Vol. II. p. .305, Ed. Oxford, 1837. 
 
75 
 
 And Archbishop Bramhall teaches those who may be in- 
 clined to distrust Bishop Burnet : — 
 
 " Yet do we not believe that the children of Christian parents do derive 
 any inward or inherent sanctity by propagation (as is by some imputed 
 to us, amiss). We know well that a Christian begets not a Christian. 
 But that holiness which St. Paul ascribes to the children of believing 
 parents — 'If the root be holy, so are the branches'* — we expound of an 
 exterior or ecclesiastical sanctity, or a right to the Sacrament of Baptism 
 by the privilege of then birth, being not born foreigners, but natives and 
 freemen of the Church." — Works, vol. v. p. 173. 
 
 And in very truth, this theory of Mr. Goode's in respect 
 of a previous nomination which has the force of regenera- 
 tion, while Baptism is only a mere formal declaration to the 
 public of this change already wrought by God ; this theory 
 that " nothing is ever (sic) given to man, woman, or child 
 by Baptism, "f is nothing more or less than a compound of 
 the highest Calvinism and the coldest Socinianism. The 
 nomination seems to involve the doctrine of reprobation ; 
 and the merely declaratory force of the rite is thus set forth 
 by Bishop Pearson : — 
 
 "I resolve that Baptism is not a thing in its own nature indifferent, 
 but that it has by its institution great efficacy for spiritual good. 
 
 " Now this proposition has been established against SociNUS, who 
 maintained that Baptism, if it be still hi force to this day, is yet a thing 
 in itself indifferent : FOR THAT NOTHING is given by it, but only 
 there is signified a certain outward declaration of those things which 
 either are already given, or which it is very certain will be given."J 
 
 * " Bramhall apparently intended to quote 1 Cor. vii. 14, " Else were 
 your children unclean, but now are they holy." The passage in the text 
 refers to the spiritual descent of the Christian Gentile from the Jewish 
 Church ; not to any supposed or probable coincidence of spiritual with 
 natural propagation." 
 
 f Mr. Goode explains this by, " that is, nothing is given through the 
 mere performance of the Baptismal act" I confess I know not how the 
 word mere can be thus applied to a Holy Sacrament " rightly" received ; 
 i.e. as Burnet seems to imply when " regularly gone about." — (p. 27.) 
 
 \ Pearson Min. Theol. Works. Detenu, vi., vol. 1, p. 313. — Concludo, 
 baptismus non est reipsa indifferens, sed ex institutionc ad bonum spiri- 
 
76 
 
 Surely we may tell Mr. Goode and Mr. Gorham, as 
 Leslie told the Quakers of his day, that " their views are the 
 same which the Socinians have set up against this holy 
 Sacrament, so that they may see out of whose quiver those 
 arrows came which they have so desperately shot against 
 the sacred institutions of Christ our Lord." 
 
 We now come to ascertain Mr. Gorham's actual doctrine, 
 of which the Bishop of Exeter thus writes : — 
 
 " The heresies, then, iny Lord, which came out hi my examination of 
 Mr. Gorham, and for which I refused him institution, are these : 1st. 
 That by declaring original sin to he a hindrance to the benefit of Baptism, 
 he denied the Article of the Creed, ' One Baptism for the remission of 
 sins ;' 2nd. That he separated entirely ' the inward and spiritual grace 
 from the Sacrament, inasmuch as he stated ' regeneration' to precede 
 Baptism, when Baptism was rightly received." 
 
 Mr. Goode calls this " a partial and defective exhibition 
 of Mr. Gorham's views," and gives the following instead • — 
 
 " This doctrine, then, leads in the case of infants to more than one 
 view as to the effects of Baptism upon them. By some it is held, that 
 all children of a Christian parent are so within the bond of the covenant, 
 that the guilt of original sin, under which they are born, will not be im- 
 puted to them, the Apostle distinctly representing such as ' holy' 
 (1 Cor. vii. 14) ; and consequently that in Baptism the remission of 
 original sin (-with which alone they can be chargeable) is in all cases 
 formally made over to them. They do not, however, consider this to be 
 equivalent to spiritual regeneration. Others, however, not prepared to 
 maintain that all these infants are in such a position by their birth of a 
 Christian parent, believe, that as in the case of an adult there must be 
 some previous grant of grace by God, in order that there may be a pre- 
 sent and absolute beneficial effect from Baptism, so we must suppose the 
 same to be necessary in the case of infants, who, being by nature under 
 the guilt of original sin, cannot be considered as necessarily entitled to 
 the remission of sin and the gift of spiritual life in and by Baptism. This 
 latter is Mr. Gorham's view." — Letter, p. 25. 
 
 tuale magnani vim habet. — Haec etiam conclusio adversus Socinum 
 instituta est, qui statuit baptismum, si hodie retinendus sit, rem tamen 
 esse per se indifferentem : per eum enim nihil dari, sed tantummodo [ut] 
 eorum qua? vel jam data esse, vel datum hi certissimum est, externa quon- 
 dam agnitio significetur. 
 
77 
 Mr. Chambers, in the Letter already cited, says : — 
 
 " The Gorhamistic theory resolves itself into a series of negations (the 
 Articles and Liturgy in this point being, it will be remembered, wholly 
 affirmative) ; which are these : — 
 
 1. Regeneration does not invariably take place in Baptism. 
 
 2. Grace does not always accompany Baptism. 
 
 3. Baptism has no good effects except in one of these classes of re- 
 cipients. 
 
 4. Proprio vif/ore, Baptism has no effect in any infants. 
 
 5. Regeneration in Baptism is never unconditional. 
 
 6. In no case is grace or regeneration ever conveyed to infants by 
 Baptism. 
 
 7. He maintains one affirmative, that baptized infants, if ever regene- 
 rate, are made so by prtevenient grace."— Ze^er to Bishop of Salisbury, 
 p. 13. 
 
 The learned Dr. Wordsworth, in the course of a valuable 
 series of sermons on this subject, thus states Mr. Gorham's 
 theory : — 
 
 " Let us then proceed to examine the doctrine which has recently been 
 put forth on Infant Baptism ; and which may be called the theory of 
 Prcevenient Grace. This theory is as follows : and I shall take care to 
 exhibit it faithfully in the words of the authentic document in which it is 
 propounded. * 
 
 " The worthy reception of Sacraments, (it is there said,) is essential to 
 their becoming effectual signs of grace.f ' And where there is no worthy 
 reception, there is no bestowment of grace.'! ' No spiritual grace is con- 
 veyed in Baptism, except to worthy recipients,' and ' Infants,' it is said, 
 are by nature unworthy recipients, being born in sin, and the children of 
 wrath.' ' And therefore,' it is added as a conclusion, ' Infants cannot 
 receive any benefit from Baptism, except there shall have been a prseve- 
 nient ' (or antecedent) ' act of grace to make them worthy.'§ 
 
 " This is carried still further in p. 113 : ' That filial state,' (the being 
 
 * Examination before admission to a Benefice, &c, respecting the 
 Efficacy of Baptism. Edited by the Clerk examined, George Cornelius 
 Gorham, B.D. London : Hatchard. 1848. 8vo. pp. 230. 
 
 f Ibid. p. 68. 
 
 % Ibid. p. 69. 
 
 § Ibid. pp. 83, 85. Also, pp. 90, 123, 125. 
 
78 
 
 made children of God by adoption,) ' though clearly to be ascribed to 
 God, was given to the worthy recipient before Baptism, and not in 
 Baptism.' " — Sermon hi. on the Doctrine of Baptism, p. o3, 5-4. 
 
 Of these statements, that which most practically and with 
 rigid truthfulness describes Mr. Gorham's tenets, is the one 
 put forth by the Bishop of Exeter. This was to be expected. 
 
 Mr. Goode says, that Mr. Gorham holds that, in order to 
 there being " a present and absolute effect from Baptism," 
 there must be " some previous grant of grace from God." 
 Mr. Goode, on the preceding page, tells us that the blessings 
 which are formally made over in Baptism are " the privilege 
 of sonship with its accompanying blessings." Does Mr. 
 Gorham allow that any " previous grant of grace" whatever 
 can enable man to get " the privilege of sonship with its ac- 
 companying blessings," as " the present and absolute effect 
 of Baptism?" Decidedly not. The Bishop asks him : — 
 
 Question 97.- — " Would not ' the right or privilege' of becoming sons 
 of God, stated in John i. 12, be satisfied by Christ's giving them 'right or 
 privilege' to have recomse to an Ordinance, instituted by Him, as a 
 means or instrument, hi or by which the state of sons of God shall be 
 given ' to them that believe ?' " 
 
 Mr. Gorham answers : — 
 
 " That privilege woidd NOT be so satisfied; for the following reasons : — 
 
 "1. If adoption were not co-existent with, or instantly consequent on, 
 
 Faith, but were relegated to the period of Baptism,— then the believer 
 
 would be ' born of the will of the flesh,' and ' of the will of man ;' since 
 
 man can will to select the time. 
 
 " 2. The other text, also, Gal. iii. 26, expressly tics adoption to Faith, 
 and makes no mention of the supposed postponement of this (e£oucria) 
 ' privilege,' till an opportunity for Baptism may be found. Thus the 
 believer is ' born, not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but 
 of God ;' for ' Faith is the gift of GW.'— Eph. ii. 8." 
 
 The Bishop had previously asked Mr. Gorham (Q. 59) whe- 
 ther the blessings mentioned in the first answer of the cate- 
 chism were given by God in Baptism. Mr. Gorham answers : 
 
 " Anstver 60. — * * The blessing is, ' adoption to be the Sons of 
 
79 
 
 God ;' that blessing is undoubtedly to be ' ascribed to God.' For ' Faith 
 is not of ourselves, it is the gift of God :' and to such as possess Faith, 
 1 to them giveth He,' (Jesus Christ,) ' power to become the sons of God.' 
 But that ' faith,' and that filial state, though clearly to be ' ascribed 
 to God,' was given to the worthy recipient (for we are here all along 
 assuming this worthiness,) before Bajrtism, and not ' in Baptism.'' 
 
 " My former reply, therefore, I hold to be quite to the points brought 
 before me ; and if there seems to be any ambiguity in it, I wish this 
 to be considered as my explanation." 
 
 Mr. Goocle further implies that Mr. Gorham only denies 
 that infants are " necessarily entitled" to the remission of sin 
 and the gift of spiritual life in and by Baptism. Mr. Gorham 
 denies that these gifts are ever by Baptism. In the answer 
 in which Mr. Gorham concedes the most, and on which the 
 judicial committee seem to have formed their opinion of his 
 doctrine in this behalf, Mr. Gorham says (Answer 125), "Jus- 
 tification may take place, before, or in, or after that Sacrament 
 of Baptism;" but then he had expressly disconnected justifi- 
 cation from Baptism, and connected it with Faith, and con- 
 sequently there is no circumstance under which it can be by 
 Baptism. The most that he admits is, that by a marvellous 
 coincidence, the Divine Spirit may at the moment of 
 Baptism make a grant which is independent of Baptism. 
 
 Had Mr. Goode taken the edge off the passages quoted 
 by the Bishop of Exeter, it might be necessary to examine 
 what he might have alleged in extenuation of their manifest 
 heterodoxy, but as he has not done so, I shall content 
 myself with recapitulating some of Mr. Gorham's leading" 
 errors, with references to his book. He holds that there is 
 no grace in Holy Baptism, unless we be freed from original 
 sin previously, (Answer 15); that we must have been 
 regenerated before Baptism to receive Baptism worthily, 
 (Answer 19); that the new nature must have been received 
 before Baptism if Baptism be received worthily, (Answers 
 26 and 27); that the filial condition must necessarily precede 
 Baptism, (Answers 47 and 78) ; and that adoption is also 
 
80 
 
 a gift previously conferred, {Answer 59). And he tells us 
 (p. Ill) that, 
 
 " FACT (sic) overthrows the supposition, ' that Regeneration,' or 
 being made the child of God,' absolutely, unconditionally, peremptorily 
 takes place in ' Every infant (sic) baptized by a lawful minister with 
 water, in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,' " 
 
 Neither is the case at all affected hy Mr. Gorham's ad- 
 missions at p. 70. Mr. Gorham, it is true, continually refers 
 us to these answers, 5, 6, 7, in which he replies to the 
 following plain questions of the Bishop, in a long and 
 involved answer, which completely meets the description of 
 the judgment as being 
 
 " Not given plainly and directly, but in a guarded and cautious 
 manner, with the apparent view of escaping from some apprehended 
 consequence of plain and direct answers." — Seeieifs Edition, p. 5. 
 
 While the questions to which this answer was given 
 certainly do not correspond with the account given in the 
 same document, as being 
 
 " Questions upon a subject of a very abstruse nature, intricate, 
 perplexing, entangling, and many of them not admitting of distinct and 
 explicit answers." — Ibid. p. 5. 
 
 If in the whole compass of theology there are any three 
 questions which a clergyman of the Church of England 
 ought to be able to answer in a plain and straightforward 
 manner, the three following, one would think, are such. 
 
 Question V. 
 " Does our Church hold, and do you hold, that every infant baptized 
 by a lawful minister, with water, in the name of the Father, and of the 
 Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is made by God, in such Baptism, a 
 member of Christ, the child of God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of 
 heaven ? *' 
 
 Question VI. 
 " Does our Church hold, and do you hold, that such children, by 
 the Laver of Regeneiation in Baptism, are received into the number of 
 the children of God, and heirs of everlasting life ? " 
 
81 
 
 Question VII. 
 " Does our Church hold, and do you hold, that all infants, so bap- 
 tized, are born again of water and of the Holy Ghost?" 
 
 Yet, to answer these questions, Mr. Gorham takes 
 upwards of eleven pages of his book ; and whenever 
 pressed upon this plain matter with some plain question, 
 the reference is always ready to his answers, 5, G, 7. 
 His references, however, serve him but little real purpose, 
 for in the course of this very answer he lays down the fol- 
 lowing propositions : — 
 
 I. That the question of Infant Baptism as to the Efficacy 
 of the Sacrament, is not in any way distinguishable from 
 that of adults, or from the efficacy of the Sacrament of the 
 Lord's Supper. We are, therefore, told in large capitals, 
 
 that " WHERE THERE IS NO WORTHY RECEPTION THERE IS NO 
 
 bestowment op grace :" and he requires that in order to 
 " worthy reception" on the part of infants, there shall be 
 " lively faith :" and that therefore all the expressions in the 
 Baptismal office are " in a strain of charitable hypothesis" — 
 p. 71. 
 
 II. He asserts that where this lively faith is, there must 
 already be a new nature imparted by the Holy Ghost — and 
 that this new nature He may give before Baptism, in 
 Baptism, or after Baptism — p. 71. 
 
 From this long answer, more especially taken in con- 
 nexion with the whole Examination, I infer that Mr. 
 Gorham denies that it is true of any, but those to whom is 
 vouchsafed the grace of election and perseverance in the 
 Calvinistic sense, that they are regenerate when they are 
 baptized. However this may be, he certainly affirms even of 
 those of whom it is true that when they are baptized they 
 are regenerate — that their regeneration is a gift granted by 
 the Holy Ghost, quite independently of Holy Baptism ; that, 
 in fact, in order to "worthy reception" of Baptism, re 
 generation must already have taken place — 
 
 G 
 
82 
 
 " It being nnposstELE that such dispositions and fruits," (that is, the 
 dispositions and fruits necessary to worthy reception of Baptism,) 
 " should exist, except when the Holy Ghost has imparted a new 
 nature ; which He may do before Baptism, in Baptism, or after 
 Baptism, ' as He listeth.' " 
 
 Can words make it more plain, that Mr. Gorham denies 
 the new birth and the filial state to he ever by Baptism, or that 
 it is ever connected with or dependent upon Baptism ? 
 
 Whoever may misrepresent Mr. Gorham's doctrine, the 
 Bishop of Exeter clearly does not. Mr. Gorham does deny 
 the Remission of Sins in and by Baptism ; he does deny 
 that Regeneration takes place through Baptism. And as 
 Mr. Goode alleges, that the former of these charges was not 
 brought under the notice of the Judges by the Bishop, 
 I make no apology for the following lengthened extract 
 from Mr. Badeley's memorable speech, when, as the Bishop's 
 Advocate, he stated his case before the Judicial Committee. 
 
 " But, my Lords, independently of all this, beyond Mr. Gorharn's con- 
 tradiction of the Articles, and Services, and Catechism of our Church, 
 there is one most serious consideration to which it is now our duty to 
 advert ; it is this : that if Mr. Gorham holds, as I contend he does, doc- 
 trine which derogates from the effect of Baptism, if he does not allow 
 that Baptism of itself, and as Baptism, confers all those benefits which 
 the Church has uniformly and iiniversally attributed to it, he is contra- 
 dicting, not merely the Articles of our Church, not merely our Services 
 and our Catechism, but something more sacred even than they ; he is 
 contradicting the Nicene Creed, and annulling one of its Articles. 
 We profess in that creed to ' acknowledge one Baptism for the remis- 
 sion of sins,' and I should be glad to know what is the meaning of those 
 words, if they do not apply to such a case as this ? if they are not to be 
 imderstood of that remission of sins original and actual — original in 
 infants and actual in adults, — in and by Baptism, winch we have seen to 
 be not only the doctrine of our own Church, but of the whole Christian 
 world in all ages ? If this remission of sins is not the effect of Baptism, 
 and of Baptism alone, what, I repeat, is the meaning of those words ? 
 and if Baptism is, as Mr. Gorham declares, nothing more in many in- 
 stances than a mere sign — if its virtues or efficacy are transferred from 
 it to a prevenient act of grace, which may or may not be vouchsafed — 
 if they are not, and therefore if the remission of original sin is not, 
 ' annexed and tied to the visible sign,' as the Homily declares them to 
 
83 
 
 be, what becomes of that ' one Baptism for the remission of sins, 
 which we thus so solemnly and so positively ' acknowledge ? ' How can 
 Baptism be for the remission of original sin at all, in the case of infants, 
 when this operation is forestalled in many cases by some separate, inde- 
 pendent agent, in some rendered merely hypothetical, in others abso- 
 lutely denied ? How can we any longer acknowledge as an absolute 
 verity, as a fundamental article of Faith, that the one, and one only, 
 Baptism, which the Church allows, is ' for the remission of sin,' operates 
 for that, is effectual for that, if the doctrine which Mr. Gorham teaches is 
 catholic or sound ? Let me refer, for a moment, on this subject, to the 
 language of one of the greatest and most learned prelates who have ever 
 adorned our Church, Bishop Bull. In his ' Judicium Ecclesise Catholicse,' 
 (a treatise which you will find in the 6th volume of the works of Bishop 
 Bull, published at Oxford in 1827,) at page 147, he says : 
 
 " i p er g ad articulum sequentem, els ev fianTi<Tp.a p.eravoias els a<pe<riv 
 afxapriav, in unum Baptismum pcenitentiae in remissionem peccatorum. 
 Hsec quidem in excusis Cyrilli Catechesibus lemmata duo distincta faci- 
 unt ; sed ha unum articulum omnino conjungenda sunt, prout in symbolo 
 fit Constantinopolitano, hunc in modum ; 'O^oXoyw ev ^anricrpa els acpe- 
 (tiv dpaprtwv, confiteor unum Baptismum in remissionem peccatorum ; ut 
 Haptismus hie statuatur medium remissionis obtinenclce, remissio ijisajinis 
 Baptismi.'* 
 
 " And then he refers to the heretics of the first ages, who had denied 
 the doctrine of regeneration and remission of sin in Baptism, and whom 
 the Church intended to denounce. 
 
 " ' Casterum hunc etiam articulum in Gnosticorum hseresin directum 
 fuisse, Ego persuasissimum habeo. Refert enim de Valentinianis Ire- 
 nseus (I. 18a circa initium) eos Satanse prsestigiis adductos fuisse, els 
 i^apv-qcriv row fianTia-paros ttjv els Qeov dvayevvqerecos, /cat TraarjS rrjs 
 7rl(TTecos ctTTuOeaiv, ad Baptismi illius, per quern ad deum regeneramur, 
 inficiationem, totiusque adeo iidei abjectionem. Hanc autem inrpietateni 
 non omnes eodem modo propugnarunt. Quidam enim eorum unicum 
 Christi Baptismum per duplicis Baptismi distinctionem evacuabant ; alii 
 vero omnem prorsus, qni exetino ritu j>erficitm", Baptismum sustulerunt.' f 
 
 * " I proceed to the following article, els ev /3a7rrtcr/xa fieravoias, els 
 lityecnv anaprimv, in one Baptism of repentance, for the remission of sins. 
 These, indeed, in the Catechisms of Cyril, make two distinct propositions, 
 but they are by all means to be joined in one article, as is done in the 
 Constantinopolitan Creed, after this manner : 'O/^oXoyw ev Panno-pa els 
 acpeiriv apapriwv, I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins ; 
 so that Baptism is there defined to be the means of obtaining remission, 
 remission itself the end of Baptism." 
 
 t " But I am most thoroughly persuaded, that this article also was 
 
 g3 
 
84 
 
 " Then, after mentioning in what manner Irenseus had dealt with 
 these two classes of heretics, and citing a passage in which Irenams 
 had stated some of the heretical tenets of the Valentinians, Bishop Bull 
 proceeds thus :— 
 
 " ' Quis jam non videt, articulum symholi Hierosolymitani, " Credo in 
 unum Baptismum poenitentise, in remissionem peccatorum," antidotum 
 fuisse adversus impia ista Gnosticorum placita appositisshnam ? Etenim 
 iis verbis profitebantur Cathohci, se credidisse primo, Baptismum neces- 
 sarium esse, necessitate scilicet turn prajcepti, turn medii saltern ordinarii ; 
 dein Christ! Baptisma unicum esse, nempe, illud quod Ecclesia Catholica 
 observat ; denique unum illud Baptisma esse Baptismum pcenitentire et 
 remissionis peccatormn ; neque quemquam in hac vita ad earn reXeicoaiv 
 assurgere, ut remissione peccatorum non indigeat. Caeteruni hunc arti- 
 culum veteris symboli orientahs respexisse Irenreum omnino censeo, cum 
 in lib. I. cap. ii. regulam fidei referens, in ea notat credendum tradi, 
 salutem ceternam datum iri non modo iis qui ab initio Domini nostri prse- 
 cepta servarunt, sed et iis qui id fecerunt re fieravolas, per vel post pceni- 
 tentiam, nempe universalem, qua a statu peccati et mortis in statum jus- 
 titise ac salutis fit migratio.' * 
 
 directed against the heresy of the Gnostics. For Irenseus says of the 
 Yakntmians (1. 18a. at the beginning) that they were led by the wiles 
 of Satan, els ei-apvrjcriv rod (3a.TrTlo-na.Tos rrjs els Qeou dvayevvrjaecos, Kai 
 Tvao-rjs rrjs Trio-Teas anodeo-iv : to the denial of that Baptism by which we 
 are regenerated to God, and so to the casting away of the entire faith. 
 But not all have defended this impiety in the same manner. For some 
 of them evacuated the one Baptism of Christ by making a distinction of 
 a two-fold Baptism ; but others have entirely taken away all Baptism, 
 which is done by the external rite." 
 
 * " Who does not now see that the article of the Creed of Jerusalem, 
 ' I believe in one Baptism of repentance, for the remission of sins,' was 
 a most fitting antidote against those impious dogmas of the Gnostics? 
 For in those words Catholics ever professed, that they first of all be- 
 lieved that Baptism is necessary, that is, by necessity, as well in respect 
 of command as of means, at least the ordinary means ; secondly, that 
 there is one only Baptism of Christ, namely, that which the Catholic 
 Church observes ; and, finally, that that one Baptism is (the Baptism) of 
 repentance and remission of sins ; and that no one in this life rises to such 
 reXelmo-iv perfection, as not to need remission of sins. But I am entirely 
 of opinion that Irenreus had regard to tliis article of the ancient Eastern 
 Creed, when in book 1. chap. 2, in stating the rule of faith, he observes, 
 that in it it is handed down as an article to be believed, that eternal 
 salvation will be given, not only to those who from the beginmng have 
 kept the commandments of our Lord, but to those also who have done it re 
 
85 
 
 " Such is Bishop Bull's commentary upon this Article of the Nicene 
 Creed ; and I may observe that Bishop Pearson, in his work upon the 
 Apostles' Creed, declares the Article of ' the Forgiveness of Sins,' which 
 occurs there, to have the same meaning as the corresponding Article in 
 the Nicene Creed, and to refer to Baptism : 
 
 " ' For, being (says he) the Creed at first was made to be used as a con. 
 fession of such as were to be baptized, declaring their faith in the Father, 
 the Son, and the Holy Ghost, in whose name Baptism was administered, 
 they propounded unto them the Holy Church, into which by Baptism 
 they were to be admitted, and the forgiveness of sins, ichich by the same 
 Baptism was to be obtained ; and therefore in some Creeds it was par- 
 ticularly expressed, " I believe one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins." ' 
 
 " And in his note to this passage he refers to the various Creeds which 
 contain this Article. The testimony of the Fathers is entirely and 
 directly to the same effect : — 
 
 " ' Manifestum est (says St. Cyprian) ubi et per quos remissio peccatorum 
 dari possit, qicce in Bajitismo scilicet datur.'* 
 
 " But it is unnecessary to accumulate evidence on this point. No person 
 can possibly doubt that this was invariably the faith of the Church, and 
 that the remission of sins, in and by Baptism, as the appointed means, 
 was what the Church, by its Creeds, uniformly professed, and intended 
 to be universally received. 
 
 " What shall we say, then, of Mr. Gorham's doctrine, which separates 
 from the sign the thing signified ; which makes this, which the Church 
 declares as one of her fundamental verities, which she asserts positively 
 and absolutely, to be no longer truth, or at best but hypothetical and 
 uncertain ? How can that doctrine be otherwise then heretical, which 
 thus contradicts an article of the creed, and robs us of one of 
 the essential principles of our religion ? "Whatever, directly or indirectly, 
 tends to this fearful consequence, must at once be reprobated and con- 
 demned, for if there is anything that we are bound to preserve, to watch 
 with religious jealousy, it must be the faith embodied in the creeds, 
 handed down as they have been from the earliest ages of the Church, and 
 sanctified to us by all the most solemn obligations. 
 
 " If, then, my Lords, the doctrine of Mr. Gorham is so unsound as I 
 have now shown it to be ; if it is thus inconsistent with the Articles of 
 our Church ; if it thus contradicts our Services and our Catechism ; if it 
 thus ignores all primitive and catholic truth ; and if it thus annuls 
 
 fieravoias, through or after repentance, — I mean that universal repent- 
 ance, by which men pass from a state of sin and death to a state of jus- 
 tification and salvation." 
 
 * " It is manifest (says St. Cyprian) where and by whom the remission 
 of sins can be given — I mean that which is given in Baptism." 
 
AN ARTICLE of THE CREED; there surely can be no doubt that Mr. 
 Gorham has been rightly rejected from institution to the Vicarage of 
 Bampford Speke." — Badeley's Speech, pp. 205 — 209. 
 
 Mr. Gorham and Mr. Goocle both support their view of 
 Baptism, being a mere form, by which certain things 
 are declared, but by which nothing is given by a reference 
 to the Baptism of our Blessed Lord. Mr. Gorham can see 
 in that mysterious action of our Lord's life, by the virtue 
 going out of which we pray Him in the Litany to deliver 
 us, nothing but a mere attesting of His eternal sonship. 
 Mr. Goode following herein Mr. Faber, finds, in St. Clement 
 of Alexandria, a passage relating to this subject, in which 
 our Lord is said to be regenerated at the time He was 
 baptized ; so constantly was it the practice of the ancients 
 to use the terms Baptized and Regenerated as convertible ; 
 and Mr. Goode tells us that this passage makes for His 
 view. Instead of seeing in our Lord's Baptism a proof of 
 the high dignity of Baptism, instead of seeing in it, as our 
 Church does, a hallowing of the element of water, to the 
 mystical washing away of sin : Mr. Goode only sees in it 
 that a rightful claim to sonship may be possessed before 
 Baptism ! 
 
 It was differently regarded by a Bishop of Norwich in the 
 earlier part of the seventeenth century : — 
 
 " He that was formerly circumcised, would now be baptized. What 
 is Baptism, but an evangelical circumcision ? What was circumcision, 
 but a legal Baptism ? One both supplied and succeeded the other ; yet 
 the Author of both will undergo both. He would be circumcised, to 
 sanctify His Church that was ; and baptized, to sanctify His Church 
 that should be : that so, in both Testaments, he might open a way into 
 heaven. There was in Him neither filthincss nor foreskin of corruption, 
 that should need either knife or water. He came not to be a Saviour 
 for Himself, but for us ; we are all uncleanncss and uncircumcision : He 
 would therefore have that done to His most pure body, which should be 
 of force to clear our impure souls ; thus making Himself sin for us, that 
 we might be the righteousness of God in Him. 
 
 " His Baptism gives virtue to ours. His last action (or rather Passion) 
 
87 
 
 was His Baptizing with blood; His first, was his baptization with water; 
 both of them wash the world from their sins. Yea, this latter did not 
 only wash the souls of men, but washeth that very water by which 
 we are washed ; from hence is that made both clean and holy, and 
 can both cleanse and hallow us. And if the very handkerchief 
 which touched His Apostles had power of cure, how much more that 
 water which the sacred Body of Christ touched." — Bishoj) Hall's Works, 
 vol. ii. Oxford, 1837, p. 304, 305. 
 
 How far Clement of Alexandria makes for Mr. Goode, 
 Bishop Bethell shall tell us, — 
 
 " That the knowledge of which he is speaking is not acquired through 
 the ordinary means of instruction, but springs up in the mind in Baptism, 
 is what Clemens Alexandrinus is insisting on from the commencement of 
 this chapter, in which he is answering those persons (Gnostics), who sup- 
 posed that Christians being called children or babes, implied then- being 
 as yet acquiring only the first elements of knowledge. 
 
 "Immediately after our Regeneration (». e. our Baptism), we re- 
 ceived that perfection which we were eager to obtain ; for we were en- 
 lightened ; but this is (in other words) to know (or to acquire a clear 
 knowledge of) God (imyvS>vai). 
 
 " He, therefore, cannot be imperfect who knows that which is perfect." 
 
 " He then adduces in proof of this, the example of our Saviour, of 
 Whom he says, that in order to form an economical precedent {oIkovoixlk^v 
 irpobiarvncoo-iv), a precedent that is connected with his Incarnation and 
 human nature, it was necessary he should be perfectly regenerated. 
 
 " Did he then become perfect immediately after being Baptized by 
 John ? Certainly. Did he then acquire any additional knowledge from 
 John ? By no means. Was he perfected by the laver (Baptism) alone, 
 and sanctified by the descent of the Holy Spirit ? So IT is. 
 
 " The very same thing happens to us likewise, whose pattern our Lord 
 was. Being Baptized («'. e. Regenerated), we are enlightened; being en- 
 lightened we are adopted ; being adopted we are perfected ; being per- 
 fected we are made immortal. He that is born again, and illuminated, 
 (as the very term implies), is immediately set free from darkness." 
 
 " He afterwards dwells upon this topic at some length, and expresses 
 his opinion upon it in the Avords quoted by Mr. Faber, and cited by me 
 as above, viz., — 
 
 " But since this knowledge (that knowledge, i. e. of which he had 
 been speaking) springs up together with illumination, ((pana-fia being 
 one of the terms by which Baptism is commonly designated), at once 
 flashing upon the mind, we, who were unlearned, are at once called 
 learners or disciples. Are we then so called because this learning has 
 
88 
 
 been added to that which we had before acquired?" (*. e. because we have 
 acquired this additional knowledge through the same means as our 
 former stock). (No). " For you cannot mention the time when it was 
 so acquired ;" (t. c. had it been taught you in the usual way, you might 
 have mentioned the time). " For catechetical instruction leads to faith, 
 and faith at Baptism," (apa ™ /3a7rrio-/iari, at the very time, t. e. of 
 Baptism,) " is instructed by the Holy Spirit." — Bisho}) Bethell on Re- 
 generation, Edition v. note, p. 309 — 11. 
 
 Mr. Goode also sends us to St. Cyril of Jerusalem, and 
 refers to a passage in which that father appears to consider 
 that Cornelius and his friends were regenerated as the 
 Apostles were, apart from Baptism. But the very passage 
 he cites, so far from depreciating the efficacy of Baptism, 
 implies the common belief of the ancient Church, that Bap- 
 tism convej^s to our bodies the principle of immortality, by 
 giving us part and lot in the Resurrection of Christ. 
 Christ came not only to heal our souls, but our bodies too. 
 He therefore took our entire human nature into His 
 eternal Godhead, that He might sanctify us wholly, soul and 
 body, and therefore, as St. Cyril urges, that Sacrament 
 wherein our bodies are washed with pure water, is neces- 
 sary for the perfect Regeneration of those who yet had 
 received the sanctifying influences of the Holy Ghost into 
 their souls. Thus onty has the Lord ordained, that each 
 several man shall be incorporated into His mystical Body. 
 Thus has He provided, that in Him, the second Adam, we 
 who were dead in the first Adam, should be made alive, and 
 become partakers of the Divine nature. If we would have our 
 bodies cleansed and quickened, it is through Baptism; if 
 we would have our souls knit into Christ's Oneness, it is 
 through Baptism ; albeit, for abiding in Christ, after having 
 been baptized in infancy, Faith is necessarj'; and for 
 coming to Christ to receive Baptism aright, in riper years, 
 Faith is also necessaiy. 
 
 But in this, as in the other cases in which Mr. Goode 
 has sent us to authorities, it is well the reader should 
 
89 
 
 see how he quotes them. What becomes of Clement of 
 Alexandria as a witness in behalf of a rightful claim to 
 sonship in Mr. Goode's sense, we have already seen ; with 
 how much success he quotes St. Cyril of Jerusalem, we 
 shall now have the means of judging. I will give the entire 
 passage in which Mr. Goode's two references occur, includ- 
 ing those references, in brackets ; that which stands last in 
 the passage, is the one to which Mr. Goode refers first : — 
 
 " 4. For whereas man's nature is twofold, soul and body, twofold 
 also is his cleansing ; the spiritual for the spiritual, the material for his 
 body. The water cleanses his body, the Spirit seals his soul : that being 
 by the Spirit sprinkled in heart, and washed in body with pure water, 
 we may draw near to God. Now, then, that thou art to descend into the 
 waters, consider not the bare element ; LOOK FOR ITS SAVING POWER by 
 the operation of the Holy Ghost ; for without the two thou canst 
 
 NOT BE MADE PERFECT. 
 
 " This is not my word, but the Lord Jesus Christ's, who has the 
 power to do it. He saith, ' Except a man be born again ' — and he en- 
 larges — ' of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom 
 of God.' 
 
 " [Neither he who is baptized with water, without the privilege of the 
 Spirit, hath the gift entire] ; nor, be he ever so virtuous in his deeds, 
 shall he enter into the kingdom of heaven, except with the seal vouch- 
 safed through water. A bold word, but it is not mine. Jesus hath 
 uttered it ; and here is the proof of it from Holy Scripture. Cornelius 
 was a just man ; he was honoured with visions of angels ; he had raised 
 his prayers and alms in the sight of God, as a goodly monument in the 
 heavens. Peter came, and the Spirit was poured on them that believed, 
 and they spake with other tongues, and prophesied. 
 
 " Yet, after the gift of the Sph'it, the Scripture saith, that Peter com- 
 manded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ ; that [the soul 
 having been regenerated through then- faith, the body also, by means of 
 the water, might share the gift] ." — The Catechetical Lectures of St. Cyril, 
 Archbishop of Jerusalem. Oxford Translation, 1838. Lect. iii. s. 4, 
 p. 27. 
 
 And this is quoted to show, that that Regeneration which 
 we understand to be meant when our Lord says, " Except a 
 man be born again of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter 
 into the kingdom of heaven," is "independent of Baptism!" 
 
90 
 
 St. Cyril expressly affirms it to be the privilege of Baptism 
 to admit into the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 Were it necessary, page after page might he quoted from 
 this father, which Mr. Gorham and Mr. Goode would be 
 constrained to reject, as, upon their principles, popish and 
 unscriptural. What sympathy could one who asserts " un- 
 less a man receive Baptism, he hath not salvation " (Lect. iii.) 
 have with the following statement ? — 
 
 " Technically (sic), no doubt he is not a member until be bas gone 
 through the required form of admission ; but by right (sic), and intrin- 
 sically, he is." — Goode 's Letter, p. 34. 
 
 Hear St. Cyril, speaking not of original sin only, which 
 is what infants take into the bath of cleansing and remission, 
 but of actual sins also in the adult : — 
 
 " 12. Thou descendest into the water bearing sins, but the invocation 
 of grace having sealed thy soul, allows not that thou shouldest hence- 
 forth be swallowed up by the fearful Dragon. Dead in sins thou 
 
 WENTEST DOWN, QUICKENED IN RIGHTEOUSNESS THOU COMEST UP : for 
 
 if thou wert planted together in the likeness of the Saviour's death, 
 thou shalt be counted worthy of His resiu'rection also. For as Jesus 
 took on Him the world's sins, and died that, having been the death of 
 sin, He might raise thee up in righteousness, so thou also, by descending 
 into the water, and in some sense being in the waters buried, as He was 
 in the rock, are raised again, to walk in newness of life." — Lect. hi., 12. 
 
 Again : 
 
 " 15. What is greater than crucifying Christ? Yet even of this is 
 
 Baptism a purification Behold the power of Baptism ! If 
 
 any of you hath by blasphemous words crucified Christ ; if any of you 
 hath, through ignorance, denied Him before men ; if any of you, through 
 wicked works, hath led to the doctrine's being evil spoken of, let him 
 be of good hope in repenting, for the same grace is also present now." 
 — Lecture iii. 
 
 Say not that St. Cyril was ignorant of the power of faith, 
 and of its necessity as an active principle in those capable of 
 it. Hear how he speaks to those preparing for the mysterious 
 gift:- 
 
91 
 
 " 3. This is in truth a serious matter, brethren, and you must approach 
 
 it solemnly Make ready, therefore; prepare, not by wearing 
 
 robes of shining whiteness, but arraying the soul with the devoutness of 
 a clear conscience. Regard the sacred laver not as simple water ; regard 
 rather the spiritual grace given with the water." 
 
 And will Mr. Goode say that this is exactly what he him- 
 self means, there is to be a devout, clear conscience first, 
 and then the grace is " technically" given with the water, 
 the forgiveness ''formally made over ?" 
 
 Let St. Cyril himself answer : — 
 
 " 2. so that all your souls may be found, not having 
 
 spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing. I say not, before you have received 
 the gift ;" [i.e. in Baptism] (" if so, why should you be note called to the 
 remission of sins V ) [he is addressing catechumens in preparation for 
 Baptism,] but so that, on its being given [t. e. by Baptism], your con- 
 science, being found blameless, may keep pace with it." 
 
 And here let us endeavour to ascertain whether the real 
 teaching of the cases of St. Paul and Cornelius is not wholly 
 different from that which Mr. Goode would have us believe. 
 Surely, St. Paul, when deliberately recalling the circumstances 
 of his conversion and admission into the Christian Church, 
 would not have supplied an hiatus in the original narrative, 
 by telling us the object of his being baptized, unless in very 
 deed Holy Baptism is the laver of remission and spiritual 
 regeneration. He had been miraculously converted. Con- 
 version is God's work. His preventing grace must lead us 
 to the ordinances in which is vouchsafed the " renewed will," 
 and the " power of co-operating" with further supplies of 
 saving grace. But conversion in the adult no more excludes 
 regeneration in Baptism, than the regeneration of the infant in 
 Baptism ignores in after life a conscious faith, or excludes 
 conversion in after years in the case of one who has been 
 unfaithful to the grace of Baptism. It matters not, then, to 
 the present question whether this conversion take place by 
 the preaching of an apostle — as when the thousands were 
 
92 
 
 pricked to the heart— or by the miraculous intervention of 
 the Lord Himself — as in the change of Saul the persecutor 
 into Saul the chosen vessel appointed to the Master's use. 
 But the chosen Saul cannot become the Christian Paul; 
 nor the awakened three thousand become the accepted wor- 
 shippers — abiding in the doctrine and fellowship of the 
 Apostles — without the supervening of God's Holy Baptism. 
 The Pentecostal converts repented as preparatory to the 
 Baptism which was to place them in a state of salvation — 
 in the way of being saved. And Saul elect to the office of 
 Preacher and Apostle of the Gentiles must wash away his 
 sins and be made St. Paul by submitting to what, with 
 strange irreverence, men sneeringly call Water Baptism. 
 
 Out, then, upon the thought which makes Baptism neces- 
 sary only that man may have official knowledge of an act 
 already done in the court of heaven, independently of an 
 ordinance Divinely instituted for this specific end and object! 
 Is it to be supposed that the ascended Saviour parted from 
 His eleven with the institution of a mere beggarly outward 
 rite ? Verily, such reasoners altogether evacuate the sacra- 
 ments of spiritual grace, for what "inward and spiritual 
 grace" is there in that which is only declaratory, visible, 
 and official ! ! 
 
 Again: The case of Cornelius, as we have seen, so far from 
 proving that Baptism is a mere external rite for the satisfac- 
 tion of the outer world, is like the case of St. Paul — one of 
 those marvellous proofs of the Divine adherence to His own 
 ordinances which tells man trumpet-tongued the peril he 
 incurs if he set lightly by that which God has made matter 
 of express institution. And thus the text of St. Peter, so 
 far from showing that the answer of a good conscience 
 " brings" the blessing of Baptism, expressly states that it is 
 that which is the blessing of Baptism, and is the warrant of 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury's assertion that a " renewed 
 will" is " the privilege of Baptism." 
 
93 
 
 I come now, once again, to vindicate the memory of 
 Jewell, Hooker, Pearson, and Taylor, from the wrong 
 done them in the present controversy. And I gladly 
 accept Mr. Goode's intimation that in dealing with himself 
 I deal with the original offender in this matter, and that we 
 are not to regard the citation of these authorities as the 
 separate and independent act either of the Judicial Commit- 
 tee, or of the Archbishop ; but that the citations we are 
 about to consider " are only a few which his Grace happened 
 to select out of a multitude that had been brought before the 
 public of a similar kind." — (Letter, p. 58.) We have had 
 previous intimation who it is that thus brought them before 
 the public — even Mr. Goode himself. With Mr. Goode, 
 then, we have to deal ; and what we may expect, St. Cyril, 
 St. Clement of Alexandria, the Cologne Liturgy, the Arch- 
 bishop's various editions, will tell us. Neither Hooker, 
 Pearson, nor Taylor, nor Jewell, can be alleged in behalf 
 even of Mr. Goode's theory, and therefore, it is most idle 
 to allege them in behalf of Mr. Gorham's, which un- 
 equivocally states that at which Mr. Goode would approxi- 
 mate with as little of avowal as might be permitted. 
 
 The two passages of Hooker have been treated separately, 
 but I shall consider them in immediate sequence ; and 
 having disposed of Mr. Goode's glosses in respect of them, 
 proceed to cite this "judicious" authority upon each point 
 in which I allege Mr. Gorham to be unsoimd. And Mr. 
 Goode cannot blame me for the importance which I here 
 attach to what Pdchard Hooker has left on record, for 
 he will certify — " The name of Hooker is a sufficient 
 
 INTRODUCTION TO ANYTHING THAT COMES FROM HIS PEN."* 
 
 The course that I am taking saves me from meddling 
 again with Mr. Goode's assertion, that the Bishop of Exeter's 
 sense of Holy Baptism is one private and distinct from 
 
 * Goode's " Effects of Infant Baptism," second edition, p. 368. 
 
94 
 
 that which is the plain and obvious teaching of our Book of 
 Common Prayer ; and I address nrvself, therefore, at once, 
 to the manner in which he claims Richard Hooker as an 
 authority for the doctrine that Baptism conveys no gift, 
 though it is the formal announcement and certificate of a 
 grant already conferred. 
 
 And here in limine let me cite, in its full connexion, a 
 passage already partially quoted in an extract I have given 
 from Bishop Bethell. It is well we should have from his 
 own lips how he desires to be understood, and by what rule 
 this great authority would have all grave and weighty 
 questions determined. It will be seen that Richard Hooker 
 had no liking for hypothetical interpretations : — 
 
 " I hold it for a most infallible rule in expositions of Sacred Scripture, 
 that where a literal construction will stand, the farthest from the letter 
 is commonly the worst. There is nothing more dangerous than this 
 licentious and deluding art, which changeth the meaning of words, as 
 alchymy doth or would do the substance of metals, maketh of anything 
 what it listeth, and bringeth in the end all truth to nothing. Or, how- 
 soever such voluntary exercises might be borne with otherwise, yet in 
 places which usually serve, as this doth concerning regeneration by 
 water and the Holy Ghost, to be alleged for grounds and principles, less 
 to be permitted. 
 
 " To hide the general consent of antiquity agreeing in the literal inter- 
 pretation, they cunningly affirm that 'certain' have taken those words 
 as meant of material water, when they know that of all the ancients 
 there is not one to be named that ever did otherwise either expound or 
 allege the place than as implying external Baptism. Shall that which 
 hath always received this and no other construction be now disguised 
 with the toy of novelty?"* 
 
 The first of the two passages cited from Hooker is in 
 the third section of a chapter, in which he is maintaining 
 against T. C. (the Puritan Cartwright) the necessity of 
 Baptism as a means of everlasting salvation, and he refutes 
 the misrepresentations of the doctrine which were in fashion 
 among the Puritans of his da}^. 
 
 * Book v. ch. 1. 4. 5. 
 
95 
 
 The extract was evidently caught at in the first instance for 
 the sake of the words, " a seal perhaps to" (Mr. Goode 
 substitutes "of" for "to") "the grace of election before 
 received." How these words come into the statement, is 
 evident enough. In the margin, Hooker quotes the follow- 
 ing passage from Cartwright : — 
 
 " He which is not a son before he come to receive Baptism cannot be 
 made a Christian by Baptism, which is only the seal of the grace of God 
 before received." 
 
 This passage being evidently founded on the following- 
 one from Calvin's " Institution of Christian Religion" : — 
 
 " Whereupon followeth, that the children of the faithful are not there- 
 fore baptized, that they may then first be made the children of God, which 
 before were strangers from the Church, but rather that they be therefore 
 received by a solemne signe into the Church, because by the benefite of 
 the promise they did already belong to the body of Christ." — Institut. 
 b. iv. c. 15. s. 22. 
 
 Here we have it plainly and nakedly asserted that Baptism 
 only declared that adoption which already has been granted 
 by God. Hooker, in reply, affirms, that while Baptism has 
 an office towards the Church of declaration, it hath also a 
 function from God of making ; that while new birth makes us 
 " Christian men in the eye of the Church of God," that " ac- 
 cording to the manifest ordinary course of Divine dispen- 
 sation," " men are not new-born but by that Baptism which 
 both declareth and maketh us Christians." He then 
 declares Baptism to be, not as Mr. Goode italicises it, " the 
 door of our actual entrance into Christ's house," but " the 
 door of our actual entrance," in opposition to Calvin's doc- 
 trine, that infants are not "first made children of God'' in 
 Baptism ; neither, as Mr. Goode's capitals are calculated to 
 mislead us, is there anything unreal meant by " the first 
 apparent beginning of life ;" for the force of Hooker's 
 statement lies in its being the Beginning (still answering 
 
96 
 
 Cartwright and Calvin) of life : as Mr. Goode ought to have 
 known by the citation on the margin of the following 
 sentence from St. Basil :* — 'Apx 7 ! l xoi C 00 */? to fia.7;Tio~iia — 
 (" Baptism the beginning of my life"). Then, allowing as 
 much of the words of Cartwright's statement as he can, (just 
 as has been done above with Mr. Goode's statement) he quali- 
 fies the statement by defining the grace which has been before 
 received to be the " grace of Election" — a grace which 
 Hooker himself claims, in the other passage cited by Mr. 
 Goode, to belong, by Christ's words, to all infants brought to 
 Baptism. But Mr. Goode further misleads as to Hooker's 
 meaning, by italicising the word " here' in the next sentence, 
 " but to our sanctification here a step that hath not any 
 before it." Hooker is contrasting the grace of Election and 
 Sanctification. The grant of Baptism he considers may be 
 taken as a seal to the fact that the child is intended by God 
 to partake of His mercy; and to this intention, he concedes 
 Cartwright's term of grace, calling it the grace of Election ; 
 but lest he should be supposed to accept his opponent's 
 doctrine in respect of the child baptized being otherwise and 
 previously adopted into that favour of God which leadeth 
 unto life by the way of holiness, he adds, " but to our sanc- 
 tification here a step that hath not any before it." Cart- 
 wright's and Calvin's doctrine (and that Mr. Gorham is their 
 pupil, is but too plain) is that Baptism does not confer grace, 
 but is only the seal of grace before received, and that it 
 does not make men Christians. Hooker's answer is, that in 
 the ordinary way of God's dealings (and that is all we are 
 concerned with), Baptism is the only thing which does make 
 us Christians ; that viewed in connexion with the secret 
 counsels of God, it may perhaps be a seal of the grace of 
 election ; but that viewed in reference to ourselves, it is the 
 first moving of God's grace towards us. Thus, the only 
 
 * Basil de Spir. Sanct. cap. 10. 
 
97 
 
 words in the passage which even appear to favour the pur- 
 pose for which they are cited, are those quoted from Cart- 
 wright : quoted with a half assent to the words themselves, 
 if used as a partial exposition of the connexion of Baptism 
 with Election, but with entire condemnation of them so far 
 as they profess to state the whole doctrine of Baptism. 
 
 Let us now turn to the other passage. Here, again, the 
 words are more Cartwright's than Hooker's ; and here too 
 Mr. Goode has perverted Hooker's meaning, by his italics 
 and capitals. Cartwright had said : — 
 
 " If children could have faith, yet they that present the child cannot 
 precisely tell whether that particular child hath faith or no. We are to 
 think charitably, and to hope it is one of the Church; but it can be no more 
 precisely said that it hath faith, than it may be said precisely elected." 
 
 To this Hooker answers, that whether we can precisely 
 and absolutely predicate faith of children, is all nothing to 
 the purpose ; still less is our doctrine hereupon a mere 
 charitable presumption. " We speak," says he, " of infants 
 as the rule of piety alloweth to speak and think." The " rule 
 of piety" is God's Word soundly interpreted. Hooker knew 
 well when to use the one rule, and when to apply the other.* 
 He will not allow that the interest in Christ which infants 
 have by Baptism is a matter of charitable hope ; — he deter- 
 mines it by the rule of piety, and quotes God's word to show 
 that infants admitted to Baptism are by that fact witnessed 
 to be elect. And he presses Cartwright home with his own 
 judgment (the reign of hypocrisy notwithstanding) of men 
 of his own sort, as a reason why he should not cavil at the 
 Church, because it " presumes as it doth," i. e. because it 
 accepts what it doth without proof or experience concerning 
 a Christian innocent. Mr. Goode labours hard to make 
 Hooker affirm that the Church presumes this in his sense of 
 charitable supposition. 
 
 Now I opine the National School boys, to whom Mr. 
 
 • See Book v. c. 60. s. (>. 
 
 II 
 
98 
 
 Goode refers the Bishop of Exeter for instruction, will tell 
 him that the force of "as" in this sentence is " that which" 
 or " what," as I have rendered it above ; and that, there- 
 fore, Hooker is not making any strong assertion about whether 
 the Church does or does not presume, but admitting that 
 it does presume a certain thing, he goes on to show that what it 
 so presumes, it so affirms unhesitatingly, because of Christ's 
 words. Having, in reference to the former passage, charged 
 the Bishop with not understanding it, he now sneeringly 
 begs his Lordship to supply Johnson's next editor, with 
 " to be certain of," as a meaning of " presume." His Lord- 
 ship's good offices are not needed either with Johnson or 
 other lexicographers. Let us instance two or three. 
 Johnson tells us that Milton uses the word as believing 
 previously without examination ; that Brown uses it as 
 affirming without immediate proof; Sheridan defines it to 
 have the meaning of affirming without Immediate 'proof ; 
 so does Dr. Ash'; and Crabbe, in his Sjmonymes, tells us that 
 presume and premise are convertible terms. Blackstone 
 says, " The law ptresnmes that a man has covenanted or 
 contracted to do what reason and justice dictate." 
 
 When, then, Cartwright accuses the Church of taking 
 the election of infants for granted, Hooker answers that she 
 has a right to so premise what she does, and that on the 
 grounds which follow : — 
 
 " For when we know," he proceeds, " how Christ in general hath said 
 that of such is the kingdom of heaven, which kingdom is the inheritance 
 of God's elect, and do withal behold how His Providence hath called them 
 unto the first beginnings of eternal life, and presented them at the well- 
 spring of new birth, wherein original sin is pinged, besides which sin 
 there is no hindrance of their salvation known to us, as themselves will 
 grant ; hard it were, that, having so many fair inducements whereupon 
 to ground, we should not be thought to utter at the least a truth as pro- 
 bable and allowable in terming any such particular infant an elect babe : 
 as in presuming the like of others, whose safety nevertheless we are not 
 abso utely able to warrant," — Hooker, Bo'ok v. ch. lxiv. 3. 
 
 Will Mr. Goode give up this passage now, and admit thai 
 
99 
 
 Hooker is telling Cartwright that he has no locus standi 
 in the charge he makes, seeing what large assertions he 
 makes concerning elect adults. If this is not an ad hominem, 
 then my citation of John Calvin in re Titus iii. 2, is not. 
 
 But Mr. Goode next says of the passage quoted by the 
 Bishop: — 
 
 " What then, my Lord ? The very question at issue is, Who are 
 capable thereof, i. e. of ' the saving grace of Christ,' which Hooker 
 affirms the sacrament ' imparts ' to all such ?" 
 
 Be it so, the question raised out of Hooker's words shall 
 
 he answered by Hooker himself: — 
 
 " The fruit of Baptism dependeth only upon the covenant which God 
 hath made ; that God by covenant requireth in the elder sort Faith and 
 Baptism, in children the Sacrament of Baptism alone, whereunto He 
 hath also given them right by special privilege of birth within the bosom 
 of the Holy Church ; that infants, therefore, which have received Bap- 
 tism complete, as touching the mystical perfection thereof, are by virtue 
 of His own covenant and promise cleansed from all sin ; forasmuch as all 
 other laws concerning that which in Baptism is either moral or eccle- 
 siastical, do bind the Church which giveth Baptism, and not the infant 
 which receiveth it of the Church." — Book v. chap, lxii. 15. 
 
 But that Mr. Goode may know what Hooker's views really 
 are, we will cite him upon each of the points in which I 
 have alleged Mr. Gorham to be unsound. 
 
 Mr. Gorham alleges that original sin must have been for- 
 given before Baptism, or that the grace of Baptism cannot 
 be received ; original sin being a bar to worthy reception. 
 Hooker, in the passage just quoted (b. v. c. lxiv. s. 3.) 
 calls Baptism the " wellspring of New Birth, wherein ori- 
 ginal sin is purged." 
 
 Mr. Gorham alleges that Regeneration, Adoption, the Filial 
 condition, must all be received independently of Baptism. 
 Hooker expressly connects all these blessings with Baptism, 
 giving thereto this further grace, that therein is given to us 
 the shield of faith. 
 
 " . . . . Baptism is a Sacrament which God hath instituted in His Church, 
 to the end that they which receive the same might thereby be incor- 
 
 h2 
 
100 
 
 porated into Christ, and so through His most precious merit obtain as 
 well that saving grace of imputation which taketh away all former 
 guiltiness, as also that infused Divine virtue of the Holy Ghost, which 
 giveth to the powers of the soul their first disposition towards future 
 newness of life." — Book V. eh. lx. 2. 
 
 He tells us — 
 
 " As Christ hath therefore died and risen from the dead hut once, so 
 the Sacrament which both extinguished in Him our former sin and 
 beginneth in us a new condition of life, is by one only actual adminis- 
 tration for ever available, according to that in the Nicene Creed, ' I 
 believe One Baptism for the remission of sins.' " — Book V. ch. lxii. 4. 
 
 He tells us that grace is — 
 
 " Infused into Christian men by degrees, planted in them at the first 
 by Baptism, after cherished, watered, and strengthened as by other 
 virtuous offices . . . even so by tins ... of Confirmation." — 
 Book V. ch. lxvi. 9. 
 
 " In our infancy we are incorporated into Christ, and by Baptism 
 receive the grace of His Spirit without any sense or feeling of the gift 
 which God bestoweth." — Book V. ch. lxvii. 1. 
 
 Touching which difficulty, whether it may be truly said for infants, at 
 the time of their Bain" ism, that they do believe, the effect of St. August- 
 ine's answer is, Yea, but with this distinction (23), a present actual 
 habit of faith there is not in them ; there is delivered unto them that 
 sacrament, a part of the due celebration whereof consisteth in answer- 
 ing to the articles of faith, because the habit of faith which afterwards 
 doth come with years, is but a farther building up of the same edifice, 
 i\\o first foundation whereof was laid by the Sacrament of Baptism. For 
 that which there we professed, without any imderstanding, when we 
 afterwards come to acknowledge, do we anything else but only bring 
 ■unto ripeness the very seed that was sown before: 1 — Book V. ch. lxiv. 2. 
 (23.) Aug. Ep. 23. al. 98. § 10. and ii. 2G8. D. 
 
 We are then believers, because then ice begin to be that which process of 
 time doth make perfect. And till we come to actual belief, the very 
 Sacrament of Faith is a shield as strong as after this the faith of the 
 Sacrament against all contrary infernal powers. Which whosoever 
 doth think impossible, is undoubtedly farther off from Christian belief 
 though he be baptized than are these innocents, which at their Baptism 
 albeit they have no conceit or cogitation of faith, are notwithstanding 
 pure and free from all opposite cogitations, whereas the other is not 
 free. — Book V. chap. lxiv. 2. 
 
 The grace which we have by the holy Eucharist doth not begin but 
 continue life. No man therefore rcceiveth this Sacrament before Bap- 
 
101 
 
 tism, because no dead thing is capable of nourishment. — Book V. chap, 
 lxvii. 1. 
 
 Mr. Gorham tells us, that Baptism is but a seal of pre- 
 viously conferred grace. Hooker expressly affirms the 
 contrary : — 
 
 " Christ and His Holy Spirit with all their blessed effects, though 
 entering into the soul of man we are not able to apprehend or express 
 how, do notwithstanding give notice of the times when they use to 
 make their access, because it pleaseth Almighty God to communicate by 
 sensible means those blessings which are incomprehensible . . . Grace 
 is a consequent of sacraments, a thing which accompanieth them as their 
 cud. a benefit which he that hath receiveth from God himself, the author 
 of sacraments, and not from any other natural or supernatural quality in 
 them .... Neither is it ordinarily His will to bestow the grace 
 of sacraments on any, but by the sacraments : . . . For we take not 
 Baptism, nor the Eucharist, for bare resemblances or memorials of things 
 absent, neither for naked signs and testimonies assuring us of grace 
 received before, but (as they are in deed and in verity) for means effec- 
 tual, whereby God, when we take the sacraments, delivereth into our 
 hands that grace available unto eternal life, which grace the sacraments 
 
 represent or signify We receive Christ Jesus in Baptism 
 
 once, as the first Beginner, in the Eucharist often, as being by continual 
 degrees the Finisher of our life. By Baptism, therefore, we receive Christ 
 Jesus, and from Him that saving grace which is proper unto Baptism. 
 By the other Sacrament we receive Him also, imparting therein Himself, 
 and that grace which the Eucharist properly bestoweth." — Book V. 
 ch. lvii. 3, 4, 5, G. 
 
 So much for Richard Hooker's sanction to the theory 
 of Pmevenient Grace. 
 
 It is unnecessary to dwell at any length upon Mr. Goode's 
 defence of the citation of Ussher in a passage which Usshcr 
 owns not. But we may remark, at passant, on the extreme 
 absurdity of Mr. Goode's claim, that if Calvin have used a 
 given form of speech, that forthwith nobody else must use 
 it, but they must be held to use it in Calvin's sense. Does it 
 follow that, because Calvin explains away our Lord's men- 
 tion of water as having nothing to do with water, that there- 
 fore any one using words which he applies to his imaginary 
 
102 
 
 Baptism, and connects with his imaginary elect, does not 
 mean thereby Holy Baptism, or that therefore plain men 
 may not use plain words in their plain meaning ? Neither 
 does it follow that, because many Calvinists use words in 
 a double sense, that therefore the plain and obvious sense 
 may never be given to their language. When Ussher 
 asserts, as he does in the following words — I give him 
 credit for condemning Mr. Gorham's assertion that ' Sacra- 
 ments are very often nothing more than bare signs that faith 
 has been professed.' {Answers 22, 23, & 24.) 
 
 " In this sort we acknowledge Sacraments to be signs; but bare signs 
 we deny them to be : seals they are as well as signs of the covenant of 
 grace. As it was therefore said of John the Baptist, that he was a 
 prophet, and more than a prophet, so must we say of Sacraments, that 
 they be signs, AND more than signs ; even pledges and assurances of 
 the interest which we have in the heavenly things that are represented 
 by them." — Answer to a Jesuit, with oilier Tracts on Popery. — Cam- 
 bridge University Press, 1835. 
 
 We next come to Bishop Jeremy Taylor. Now, if Mr. 
 Goode had succeeded in quoting from this voluminous 
 writer some passages making for a view other than that 
 which the Bishop in the main holds, it would neither have 
 been strange nor perplexing. Few writers throw themselves 
 with more unsuspecting vehemence into then- immediate 
 argument than Taylor. He always goes right at the sub- 
 ject he is immediately upon, and writes thereon without 
 reservation. And thus it might have been easy for Mr. 
 Goode to show how, in stating the true doctrine of Con- 
 firmation, or how in insisting upon Repentance and Con- 
 version for sinful Christians, the Bishop appears to lessen 
 the efficacy of Baptism ; but he may depend upon it, that 
 he cannot claim Jeremy Ta}dor as separating Regeneration 
 and the Remission of Original Sin from Baptism. 
 
 Mr. Goode attempts to make out his case by a patchwork 
 quotation. He gives in close connexion two passages, 
 
103 
 
 separated by several pages. It is true he appears to direct 
 attention to the fact that they are not one consecutive pas- 
 sage by a — , but he not only does not supply the least clue 
 to the further fact, that while in the former part of the 
 quotation the Bishop is speaking generally of the effect of 
 Baptism, in the latter part he is speaking exclusively of 
 that part of the effects of Baptism which is Sanctification ; 
 but he even asserts the very contrary. 
 
 Here is Mr. Goode's statement of the effect of his quo- 
 tation : — 
 
 " Now, what does Bishop Taylor say ? He expressly maintains in this 
 passage that the grace of the Sacrament, which is Regeneration, may he 
 given before, or in, or after Baptism. He says expressly of the case of 
 infants, in direct opposition to what your Lordship is contending for, 
 that in infants it is not certain hut that some [grace] is collated or in- 
 fused. However, he it so or not, yet," &c. 
 
 Now, will it be believed, that while in the paragraph quoted 
 in the Judgment, Taylor is speaking of " Regeneration 9 ' 
 generally — in that which Mr. Goode has appended to it, 
 giving, as he calls it, " the whole context," " in extenso,'" 
 he is speaking of " Sanctification " exclusively ; so much 
 so, that Bishop Taylor is the rein answering the objection 
 that Baptism does not sanctify infants, because there 
 is no sign or expression of it; and his reply to that objection 
 appears in the beginning of the paragraph, which Mr. Goode 
 fails to quote : — 
 
 " No man," Taylor writes, " can conclude that this kingdom of 
 Power — that is, the Spirit of Saxctification — is not come upon infants, 
 because there is no sign or expression of it. It is within us; therefore 
 it hath no signification. It is the seed of God; and it is no good argu- 
 ment to say, Here is no seed in the bowels of the earth, because there 
 is nothing green upon the face of it." And then follows, " for the Church 
 gives the Sacrament," with the remainder of the passage, as quoted by 
 Mr. Goode. — Letter, p. 43. 
 
 I am constrained to ask, What is to come of honest con- 
 troversy if those engaged in it will thus tear away passages 
 
104 
 
 from their context, and so make them sanction tenets 
 utterly alien to their own? 
 
 Why, when Bishop Taylor speaks of Regeneration, as in 
 the former part of the passage, it is to affirm that it is 
 begun in Baptism, but that all the issues of Baptism are 
 perfected in some sooner, in some later ; just as we should 
 say, that which groweth unto vigour of mind or body is 
 begun when a healthy child is born, but it is perfected in 
 some sooner, in some later. But when he is speaking of 
 the grace winch is given after Baptism — (he is nowhere, 
 throughout the passage, speaking of any given before) — he 
 is speaking not of the grace of Regeneration, but of that of 
 Sanctification, which it is the daily work of the Holy 
 Spirit to confer on those who are to grow in grace : which 
 indeed is consigned in Baptism, even though it is not given 
 in its completeness until the fight be over, and the courts of 
 grace here be exchanged for the mansions of peace here- 
 after. And not only does Mr. Goode thus wrest the para- 
 graph from its immediate context, but immediately before 
 that paragraph stands the following passage : — 
 
 " Fifthly, Baptism is not to be estimated as one act, transient and 
 effective to single purposes ; but it is an entrance to a conjugation, and a 
 state of Blessings. All our life is to be transacted by the measures of 
 the Gospel Covenant, and that Covenant is consigned by Baptism." [Mr. 
 Gorham says the filial condition must precede Baptism.] " There we have 
 our title and adoption to it ; and the grace that is then given to us is 
 like a piece of leaven put into a lump of dough, and faith and repent- 
 ance do in all the periods of our life put it into fermentation and 
 activity. Then the seed of God is put into the ground of our hearts, and 
 Repentance waters it, and Faith makes it subactum solum — the ground 
 and furrows apt to produce fruits : and therefore Faith and Repentance 
 are necessary to the effect of Baptism — not to its susception ; that is 
 necessary to all those parts of life in which Baptism does operate ; not to 
 the first sanction or entering into the Covenant. The seed may lie long 
 hi the ground, and produce fruits hi its due season, if it be refreshed with 
 the former and the latter rain ; that is, the Repentance that first changes 
 the state, and converts the man, and afterwards returns him to his title, 
 
105 
 
 and recalls him from his wanderings, and keeps him in the state of 
 grace, and within the limits of the Covenant : and all the way Faith 
 gives efficacy and acceptation to this Repentance ; that is, continues our 
 title to the promise of not having righteousness exacted by the measures 
 of the law, but by the covenant and promise of Grace, into which we 
 entered in Baptism, and walk in the same all the days of our life." — Tay- 
 lor, p. 1GS. Ed. fol. London, 1667. 
 
 And again, a little before, and still coming in between the 
 two passages Mr. Goode lias joined together as one : — 
 
 "Actual faith is necessary, not to the susception, but to the consequent 
 effects of Baptism, appears, because the Church, and particularly the 
 Apostles, did baptize some persons who had not faith. * * * * 
 For the effect depends upon God, who knows the heart ; but the out- 
 ward susception depends upon those who do not know it, which is a 
 certain argument that the same faith which is necessary to the effect 
 of the Sacrament is not necessary to its susception ; and if it can be 
 administered to hypocrites, much more to infants, — if to those who 
 really hinder the effects, much rather to them that hinder not. And 
 if it be objected, that the Church does not know but the pretenders 
 have faith, but she knows infants have not, I reply, that the Church 
 does not know but the pretenders hinder the effect, and are contrary 
 to the grace of the Sacrament ; but she knows that infants do not : the 
 first possibly may receive the grace; the other cannot hinder it." — 
 p. 166, part i. 
 
 And again, in the same chapter, a page or two further on, 
 the Bishop writes : — 
 
 " In Baptism we are born again ; and this infants need in the pre- 
 sent circumstances, and for the same great reason that men of age and 
 reason do. For our natural birth is either of itself insufficient, or is 
 made so by the fall of Adam, and the consequent evils, that nature 
 alone, or our first birth, cannot bring us to heaven, which is a super- 
 natural end ; that is, an end above all the power of our nature as 
 now it is. So that if nature cannot bring us to heaven, grace must, 
 or we can never get thither ; — if the first birth cannot, a second must ; 
 but the second birth spoken of in Scripture is Baptism — ' A man 
 must be born of water and the Spirit." And therefore Baptism is the 
 laver of a new birth. Either, then, infants cannot go to heaven any 
 way that we know of, or they must be baptized. To say that they are to 
 be left to God, is an excuse, and no answer : for when God hath opened 
 the door, and calls that the entrance into heaven, we do not leave them 
 
106 
 
 to God when we will not carry them to Him in the way which He hath 
 described, and at the door which Himself hath opened : we leave them 
 indeed, hut it is but helpless and destitute; and though God is better 
 than man, yet that is no warrant to us : what it will be to the children, 
 that we cannot warrant or conjecture. And if it be objected, that to the 
 new birth are required dispositions of our own, which are to be wrought 
 by and in them that have the use of reason, — besides that this is wholly 
 against the analogy of a new birth in which the person to be born is 
 wholly a passive, and hath put into him the principle that in time will 
 produce its proper actions, — it is certain that they who can receive the 
 new birth are capable of it. The effect of it is a possibility of being 
 saved, and arriving to a supernatural felicity. If infants can receive this 
 effect, then also the new birth, without which they cannot receive the 
 effect. And if they can receive salvation, the effect of the new birth, 
 what hinders them but the way to receive that that is in order to that 
 effect, and ordained onely for it, and which is nothing of itself, but in its 
 institution and relation, and which may be received by the same capacity 
 in which one may be created; that is, a passivity, or a capacity 
 obediential?" — p. 174, part i. 
 
 And yet again : — 
 
 " Since, therefore, infants have the punishment of sin, it is certain 
 that the sin is imputed to them; and therefore they need being re- 
 conciled to God by Christ: and if so, when they are baptized into 
 Christ's death and into His resurrection, then- sins are pardoned, be- 
 cause the punishment is taken off, the sting of natural death is taken 
 away ; because God's anger is removed, and they shall partake of 
 Christ's resurrection, which, because Baptism does signifie and consign, 
 they also are to be baptized. To which also adde this appendant con- 
 sideration, — that whatsoever the sacraments do consign, that also they 
 do convey and minister ; they doe it — that is, God, by them, does it — 
 lest we should think the sacraments to be mere illusions, and abusing us 
 by deceitful, ineffective signs ; and therefore, to infants, the grace of a 
 title to a resurrection and a reconciliation to God by the death of Christ 
 is conveied, because it signifies and consigns this to them more to the 
 life and analogy of resemblance than circumcision to the infant sons of 
 Israel. I end this consideration with the words of Nazianzen : — ' Our 
 birth by baptism does cut off every unclean appendage of our natural 
 birth, and leads us to a celestial life.' And this in children is therefore 
 more necessary, because the evil came upon them without their own act 
 of reason and choice, and therefore the grace and remedy ought not to 
 stay the leisure of didl nature and* the formalities of the civil law." — 
 p. 175, part i. 
 
107 
 
 And is it after making references such as these that Mr. 
 Goode writes to a Bishop venerable in age, and renowned 
 for learning ? — 
 
 " My Lord, what object, think you, can be accomplished by your thus 
 exposing yourself in the face of the Church ?" &c. — Letter, p. 44. 
 
 The following passage is an instance of what I have 
 already stated, in respect of the vehemence with which 
 Bishop Taylor addressed himself to the matter imme- 
 diately in hand. Having it in view to maintain the import- 
 ance of Confirmation, he may appear to want precision 
 in his statements in respect of Baptism ; but if Mr. Goode 
 had printed Jeremy Taylor's words, instead of . . . ., those 
 of his readers who have not access to his larger book, or 
 to Jeremy Taylor's own works, woidd have known that 
 he was no more depreciating Baptism than was St. James 
 depreciating faith when he affirmed that " By works a man 
 is justified." 
 
 Jeremy Taylor, quoted by Mr. 
 Goode, (Letter, p. 44) : — 
 
 " Although, by the 
 present custom of the Church, we 
 are baptized in our infancy, and do 
 not actually reap that fruit of pre- 
 sent pardon which persons of a 
 mature age in the Primitive Church 
 did, 
 
 yet we must remember, 
 that there is a Baptism of the Spi- 
 rit, as well as of water : and when- 
 
 Jeremy Taylor's own words : — 
 
 " This consideration I intend 
 should relate to all Christians 
 OF THE WORLD ; and, although by the 
 present custom of the Church, we 
 are baptized in our infancy, and do 
 not actually reap that fruit of pre- 
 sent Pardon which persons of a 
 mature age in the Primitive Church 
 did (for we yet need it not, as we 
 shall when we have past the calen- 
 tures of youth, which was the time 
 in which the wisest of our Fathers 
 in Christ chose for their Bap- 
 tism, as appears in the instance of 
 S. Ambrose, S. Austin, and in several 
 others), yet we must remember, 
 that there is a Baptism of the Spi- 
 rit as well as of water: and when- 
 
108 
 
 ever this happens, whether it he 
 together with that Baptism of -wa- 
 ter, as usually it was when only 
 men and women of years of dis- 
 cretion were baptized ; or whether 
 it he ministered in the rite of Con- 
 firmation, 
 
 or that, 
 lastly, it be performed by an inter- 
 nal and merely spiritual ministry, 
 when we, by acts of our own elec- 
 tion, verify the promise made in 
 Baptism, and so bring back the rite 
 by receiving the effect of Baptism ; 
 that is, whenever the ' filth of our 
 flesh is washed away,' and that we 
 have ' the answer of a pure con- 
 science towards God,' which S. Peter 
 affirms to be the true Baptism .... 
 
 then let us look to our 
 standing," &c. — Life of Christ, 
 Part 2, § 12, Disc. 9. 
 
 N.B. The opposite passage is not 
 given in Mr. Goode's larger book, 
 neither is the first sentence, which is 
 the hey to the ivhole argument. 
 
 ever this happens, whether it be 
 together with that Baptism of wa- 
 ter, as usually it was when only 
 men and women of years of dis- 
 cretion were baptized ; or whether 
 it be ministered in the rite of Con- 
 firmation, which is an admirable 
 suppletory of ax early baptism, 
 and intended by the holy 
 Ghost for a corroborative of 
 Baptismal grace, and a defen- 
 
 SATI VE AGAINST DANGER ;] 01' that, 
 
 lastly, it be performed by an inter- 
 nal and merely spiritual ministry, 
 when we, by acts of our own elec- 
 tion, verify the promise made in 
 Baptism, and so bring the rite by 
 receiving the effect of Baptism ; 
 that is, whenever the filth of our 
 flesh is washed away, and that we 
 have the answer of a pure con- 
 science towards God, which S. Peter 
 affirms to be the true Baptism, and 
 which, by the purpose and design 
 of God, it is expected we should not 
 defer longer than a great reason or 
 a great necessity enforces; when 
 our sins are first expiated, and the 
 sacrifice and death of Christ is made 
 ours, and we made God's by a more 
 immediate title, (which at some 
 time or other happens to all Christ- 
 ians, that pretend to any hopes of 
 heaven :) then let us look to our 
 standing, and take heed lest we 
 fall. 
 
 " When we once have tasted of 
 the heavenly gift, and are made 
 partakers of the Holy Ghost, and 
 have tasted the good word of God, 
 and the powers of the world to 
 come, that is, when we are re- 
 deemed by an actual mercy and pre- 
 scntial application, which every 
 
109 
 
 Christian that belongs to God is, at 
 some time or other of his life ; then 
 a fall to a deadly crime is highly 
 dangerous, but a relapse into a con- 
 trary state is next to desperate." — 
 Taylor's Life of Christ, Part II. ad 
 Sect. xii. Disc. 9. — Of Repentance. 
 
 Mr. Goode next sends us to Sermon I. for Whit- Sunday. 
 Why did not Mr. Goode finish the quotation ? it is ad rem 
 as drawing a distinction between having been once born of 
 the Spirit and now bearing the fruits of the Spirit : — 
 
 " They would think the preacher rude, if he should say they are not 
 Christians, they are not within the covenant of the Gospel, but it is 
 certain that the spirit of manifestation is not yet upon them, and that 
 is the first effect of the Spirit, whereby we can be called sons of God, 
 or relatives of Christ. 
 
 " If we do not apprehend and greedily suck in the precepts of this 
 holy discipline as aptly as merchants do discourse of gain, or farmers of 
 fair harvests, we have nothing but the name of Christians j but we are 
 no more such, really, than mandrakes are men, or sponges are living 
 creatures." 
 
 In the same sermon, later on, he says : — 
 
 <( First, we are enlightened in Baptism, and by the Spirit of manifes- 
 tation, the revelations of the Gospel ; then we relish and taste interior 
 excellences, and we receive the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Confirma- 
 tion, and he gives us a taste of the powers of the world to came ; that is 
 of the great efficacy that is in the article of Eternal life, to persuade 
 us to religion and holy living; then we feel, that as the belief of that 
 article dwells upon our understanding, and is incorporated into our 
 wills and choice, so we grow powerful to resist sin by the strength of 
 the Spirit, to defy all carnal pleasure, and to suppress and mortify it by 
 the powers of this article : those are the powers of the world to come. 
 
 The Spirit of God is given to all who truly belong to Christ, as an 
 antidote against sorrows, against impatience, against the evil accidents 
 of the world, and against the oppression and sinking of our spirits 
 under the Cross. 
 
 There are in Scripture noted two births, beside the natural, to which 
 also by analogy we may add a third. 
 
 The^-s* is to be born of water and the Spirit. It is Zv 81a. bvcuv — one 
 thing signified by a divided appellative, by two substantives [water and 
 the Spirit] ; that is, Spiritus aqueus — the Spirit moving upon the waters 
 of Baptism." — Sermon I. vol. ii.p. 15. London, 1817. 
 
110 
 
 Thus it will be seen that Bishop Taylor, though he writes 
 unguardedly ; yet, when he is fairly compared with himself, 
 he is in no wise inconsistent with catholic verity. It is ac- 
 quaintance with writings such as his, and knowledge of the 
 general tendency of human nature to exaggerate the particular 
 point which is the subject of defence, which makes us hope 
 that many whose leading idea is the turning to God of care- 
 less Christians, do on that account use language in respect of 
 conversion which is more inconsistent than they intend it to 
 be with the teaching of Holy Scripture in respect of the 
 ordinary beginnings of the new life. And if we could find 
 in Mr. Gorham, or in Mr. Goode, strong statements of the 
 true doctrine, such as Jeremy Taylor's, when writing ex- 
 pressly on that doctrine, we should not quarrel with their 
 incidental use of expressions such as those which have been 
 alleged from this Bishop's writing's in defence of their 
 opinions. 
 
 The next authority in question is the great Bishop Pear- 
 son, of whom the learned Dr. Bentley tells us, " that the 
 very dust of his writings is gold." If Mr. Goode can get 
 this great and learned expositor of the Creed on his side, 
 he then may indeed think that he has made out a case 
 which requires some serious attention ; but if Jeremy Taylor 
 fails him, he may be sure Bishop Pearson will not support 
 him. This great man is cited to vindicate the new theorv 
 of charitable presumption in matters where God has spoken 
 plainly and fully. 
 
 The Bishop of Exeter thus Mr. Goode thus states the 
 states the manner in which he manner in which the Bishop 
 is cited. — Bishop of Exeter s of Exeter has spoken in re. — 
 Letter, pp. 42, 43. Mr. Goode 's Letter, pp. 51,52. 
 
 " The first is a greater than any " The first quotation is the fol- 
 
 of the very great men to whom you lowing from Bishop Pearson : — 
 
 have before appealed — Bishop Pear- 'When the means are used, without 
 
 so)i, the most judicious, the most something appearing to the con- 
 
Ill 
 
 accurate, and one of the most learn- trary, we ought to presume of the 
 ed, of all the theologians of whom good effect.' On this your Lord- 
 our Church can boast. He says ship exclaims — ' He says it of 
 what you cite ; but he says it of adults ...... 
 
 adults [and of the actual state of 
 adults whose lives are before the 
 world]. His words are these : — 
 ' "When the means are used, without 
 something appearing to the con- 
 trary, we ought to presume of the ....... 
 
 good effect.' He says nothing of He says nothing'of infants here ; 
 infants here ; nothing of the effect nothing of the effect of Baptism to 
 of Baptism to them." them." 
 
 And then, having thus left out the few words which showed 
 that the Bishop of Exeter did not mean that Bishop Pearson 
 was not speaking of those who might have been baptized in 
 infancy, though he was clearly speaking of those no longer 
 infants, Mr. Goode proceeds in the following strain : — 
 
 " I beg to ask where your Lordship picked up tliis piece of information ? 
 Are we to receive it upon your ipse clixi ? Mark the position hi which 
 you leave Bishop Pearson — that in a church where all, with scarcely 
 the exception of one in five thousand, receive Baptism in their infancy, 
 he meant to limit what he said generally about baptized persons to those 
 cases which hardly ever occur (sic) ? Truly, a very reasonable hypothesis! 
 But my Lord, we shall find more to our purpose in the context of these 
 words." — Letter, p. 51. 
 
 If Mi\ Goode would have printed the Bishop's words — 
 " and of the actual state of adults whose lives are before the 
 world," he would have helped his readers to see that his 
 Lordship "picked up" f! J " this piece of information" from 
 Bishop Pearson's words which Mr. Goode dismisses with an 
 &c. I will print them in cxtenso from the point at which Mr. 
 Goode recedes from them : — 
 
 " Secondly, in respect of their conversation, for as He which hath 
 called them is holy, so are they holy in all manner of conversation : 
 adding to their faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge 
 temperance, and to temperance patience, and to patience liro'herly- 
 kindness, and to brotherly-kindness charity, lhat they may neither be 
 barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
112 
 
 Such persons, then, as are called by a holy calling, and not disobedient 
 unto it ; such as are endued with a holy Faith, and purified thereby ; 
 such as are sanctified by the Holy Spirit of God, and by virtue thereof 
 do lead a holy life, perfecting holiness in the fear of God; such persons, 
 I say, are really and truly saints; and being of the Church of Christ 
 (as all such now must of necessity be), are the proper subject of this 
 part of the Article, the Communion of Saints, as it is added to the 
 former, the Holy Catholic Church." — Pearson on the Creed. Art. IX. 
 p. 354. 
 
 Now, what " conversation " — what " obedience to a holy 
 calling " — what " perfecting of holiness in the fear of God " — 
 can infants evidence ? Is it not clear, as the Bishop says, 
 that Bishop Pearson is speaking " of the actual state of adults 
 whose lives are before the world?" We are thus saved giving 
 serious notice to Mr. Goode's sneers about the numbers 
 baptized as adults, compared with those baptized in infancy, 
 seeing that, whether baptized as infants or as adults, the}' 
 were adults when Bishop Pearson was speaking of their 
 spiritual condition. If it were otherwise, Mr. Goode might 
 perhaps be reminded that as Bishop Pearson published the 
 first edition of his "Exposition of the Creed" in 1659, and the 
 growth of Anabaptism had been so great as to render it 
 necessary to add the " office for the Baptism of adults" to 
 the Prayer Book in 1662, the question of the Baptism of 
 adults might even be more in the mind of one of the parties 
 at the Savoy Conference, and the Divine chosen to present 
 the Prolocutor of the Lower House to the Upper House of 
 the subsequent Convocation, than Mr. Goode imagines. Be 
 this as it may, the passage as it stands is nihil ad rem to 
 the question of the effect of lawful Baptism in the case of 
 our infant children. What Pearson did hold and teach on this 
 subject, I have already intimated in the passage in which 
 he deals with Mr. Gorham's doctrine as that of Socinus. 
 But it may be well to add one or two passages from that 
 noble " storehouse and armoury of the well-furnished theo- 
 logical student," from which the extract just dismissed as 
 irrelevant is made. 
 
113 
 
 In the article on the Holy Catholic Church we read : — 
 
 " Thirdly, many persons and churches, howsoever distinguished by 
 time or place, are considered as one Church, because they acknowledge 
 and receive the same Sacraments, the signs and the badges of the peo- 
 ple of God. When the Apostles were sent to found and build the 
 Church, they received the commission ' Go and teach all nations, 
 baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of 
 the Holy Ghost.' Now as there is but one Lord, and one Faith, 
 so also is there but one Baptism ; and consequently they which are 
 admitted to it, in receiving it are one. Again, at the institution of 
 the Lord's Supper, Christ commanded, saying, ' Eat ye all of this, 
 drink ye all of this,' and all by communicating of one, became as to 
 that communication one. For we being many are one bread, and one 
 body ; for we are all partakers of that one bread. 
 
 " As therefore the Israelites were all baptized unto Moses in the 
 cloud and in the sea, and did all eat the same spiritual meat, and did 
 all drink the same spiritual drink, and thereby appeared to be one peo- 
 ple of God ; so all believing persons and all Churches congregated in 
 the name of Christ, washed in the same laver of Regeneration, eating 
 of the same bread, and drinking of the same cup, are united in the 
 same cognisance, and so known to be the same Church. And this is 
 the unity of the Sacraments."— Art. IX. The Holy Catholic Church, 
 j). 340. 
 
 But that Mr. Goode may be brought to see how idle it is 
 to quote Pearson on his side, I will once again cite this 
 great authority, to tell him that the theory which he has 
 now propounded is that by which " doubting and fluctuating 
 Socinus" "in vain doth' 1 " endeavour to evacuate the evidence 
 of the Scripture," (Acts ii. 38,) which shows that "the 
 benefit" of the ordinance of Baptism " is Remission of 
 Sins." 
 
 " First, it is certain that Forgiveness of Sins was promised to all who 
 were baptized in the name of Christ ; and it cannot be doubted but 
 all persons who did perform all things necessary to the receiving the 
 Ordinance of Baptism, did also receive the Benefit of that Okdi- 
 nance, which is Remission of Sins. John did baptize in the wilder- 
 ness, and preach the Baptism of Repentance for the Remission of 
 Sins. And St. Peter made this the exhortation of his first sermon, 
 ' Repent and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus 
 Christ for the Remission of Sins.' In vain doth doubting and fluctu- 
 ating Socinus endeavour to evacuate the evidence of this Scripture ; 
 attributing the Remission either to Repentance, without consideration 
 
 I 
 
114 
 
 of Baptism, or else to the public profession of Faith made in Baptism ; 
 
 Or IF ANYTHING MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO BAPTISM ITSELF, IT MUST BE 
 NOTHING BUT A DECLARATION OF SUCH REMISSION. For how WILL THESE 
 
 shifts agree with that which Ananias said unto Saul, without any men- 
 tion either of Repentance or Confession — Arise and be baptized, and 
 wash away thy sins — and that which St. Paul, who was so baptized, hath 
 taught us concerning the Church, that Christ doth sanctify and cleanse 
 it with the washing of water? It is therefore sufficiently certain, that 
 Baptism as it was instituted by Christ, after the pre-administration of St. 
 John, wheresoever it was received with all qualifications necessary in 
 the person accepting, and conferred with all things necessary to be 
 performed by the person administering, was most infallibly efficacious 
 as to this particular, that is, to the Remission of all Sins committed 
 before the Administration of this Sacrament." — Pearson on the Creed, 
 Art. X. The Forgiveness of Sins, p. 868. 
 
 And that we not only receive remission of sins in Baptism, 
 but also that filial condition which is the assurance of mercy, 
 even a relation of forgiveness — for future post-baptismal 
 falls, is thus set forth : — 
 
 " As those which are received into the Church by the Sacrament of 
 Baptism, receive the Remission of their Sins, of which they were guilty 
 before they were baptized : so, after they are thus made members of the 
 Church, they receive Remission of their future sins by their Repentance. 
 Christ, who hath left us a pattern of Prayer, hath thereby taught us 
 for ever to implore and beg the Forgiveness of our Sins ; that as we 
 through the frailty of our nature are always subject unto sin, so we 
 should always exercise the acts of Repentance, and for ever seek the 
 favour of God. This then is the comfort of the Gospel, that as it 
 discovereth sin within us, so it propoundeth a remedy unto us. While 
 we are in this life encompassed with flesh, while the alluraments of 
 the world, while the stratagems of Satan, while the infirmities and cor- 
 ruptions of our nature betray us to the transgression of the Law of 
 God, we are always subject to offend, (from whence whosoever saith 
 that he hath no sin is a liar, contradicting himself, and contracting ini- 
 quity by pretending innocency,) and so long as we can offend, so long 
 we may apply ourselves unto God by Repentance, and be renewed by 
 His Grace, and pardoned by His Mercy. 
 
 " And therefore the Church of God, in which Remission of Sin is 
 preached, doth not only promise it at fir^t by the Laver of Regenera- 
 tion, but afterwards, also, upon the Virtue of Repentance, and to deny 
 the Church this power of Absolution is the heresy of Novatian." — 
 Art. Forgiveness of Sins, p. 368. 
 
 And the entire article is thus summed up : — 
 
115 
 
 " God, who was by our sins offended, became reconciled, and being 
 so, took off our obligation to eternal punishment, which is the guilt of 
 our sins, and appointed in the Church of Christ the Sacrament of 
 Baptism for the first remission, and repentance for the constant forgive- 
 ness of all following trespasses. And thus i" believe in the forgiveness 
 of sins."— Art. X., p. 370, Fol. Ed. 1704. 
 
 And lest it should be said that Pearson excludes infants 
 from the universal application of this remission of sins in 
 Baptism, because he speaks of " all the qualifications necessary 
 in the person accepting" — (though even with these, Mr. Gor- 
 ham will not attribute any regenerating or adopting grace to 
 God in Baptism, nor Mr. Goode allow that there is more 
 than a "making over," "shift" of "nothing but a declara- 
 tion of such remission)," let us just see who it is that Bishop 
 Pearson considers to have all the qualifications necessary. 
 
 "We find that Pearson was one of three divines " to whom 
 the revision of all the additions and amendments" in the 
 Book of Common Prayer " was committed, in order to its 
 being received and subscribed to by the members of both 
 houses, which was done Dec. 20, 1661." This was the Book 
 subsequently authorised in 1662, and is the form in which 
 we at present have it. In this book for the first time was 
 inserted the office for the Baptism of those of riper years. 
 Whenever practicable, this office corresponds with that for 
 the Baptism of infants; and wherever alterations occur, they 
 may be expected to be such as are rendered necessary by 
 the difference of circumstances under which infants and 
 adults come to Baptism : and thus we shall be able to deter- 
 mine what qualifications are required to be present in the 
 one which are not expected in the other, what benefits are 
 to be expected in the one case which do not accrue in the 
 other. Let us then, though rather more than is necessary 
 to our immediate purpose, as to Pearson's views, here 
 make a comparison of the two services, which will be of 
 authority as regards the general question. 
 
 i2 
 
116 
 
 First, as to the care to be had about those to be baptized. 
 As respects infants — Parents are to be admonished, " not 
 to defer the Baptism of their children longer than the first 
 or second Sunday next after birth, or other holy day falling 
 between." A clear testimony to the fact that innocency from 
 actual sins is that to which Christ has regard in His loving- 
 mercy towards infants, allowing them to come to His Holy 
 Baptism. 
 
 As regards notice, the directions are as follows : — 
 
 BAPTISM OF INFANTS. 
 
 " When there are children to be 
 baptized, the parents shall give 
 knowledge thereof over night, or 
 in the morning before the begin- 
 ning of Morning Prayer, to the 
 Curate. And then the Godfathers 
 and Godmothers, and the people 
 with the Children, must be ready 
 at the Font, either immediately 
 after the last Lesson at Morning 
 Prayer, or else immediately after 
 the last Lesson at Evening Prayer, 
 as the Curate by his discretion 
 shall appoint. And the Priest 
 coming to the Font, (which is then 
 to be filled with pnre Water), and 
 standing there shall say. . . .*' 
 
 N.B. Here the notice has evi- 
 dently reference to all things being 
 in readiness. 
 
 BAPTISM OF ADULTS. 
 
 " When any such persons as are 
 of riper years are to be baptized, 
 timely notice shall be given to the 
 Bishop, or whom he shall appoint 
 for that purpose, a week before at 
 the least, by the parents, or some 
 other discreet persons: that so due 
 care may be taken for their ex- 
 amination, whether they be suffi- 
 ciently instructed in the Principles 
 of the Christian Religion ; and 
 that they may be exhorted to pre- 
 pare themselves with Prayers and 
 Fasting for the receiving of this 
 holy Sacrament. 
 
 " And if they shall be found Jit, 
 then the Godfathers and God- 
 mothers (the people being assem- 
 bled upon the Sunday or Holy- 
 day appointed) shall be ready to 
 present them at the Font imme- 
 diately after the second Lesson, 
 &c." 
 
 N.B. Here the inquiries and 
 preparations are ordered to secure 
 right reception, which is taken fur 
 granted in case of infants. 
 
 The exhortations differ in the opening sentences 
 
 " Dearly beloved, forasmuch as 
 all men are conceived and Lorn 
 
 " Dearly beloved, forasmuch as 
 all men are conceived and born 
 
117 
 
 in sin ; and that our Saviour in sin, (and that which is born of 
 Christ saith, ' None can enter into the flesh is flesh,) and tiiey that are 
 the kingdom ....'" , in the flesh cannot please God, but 
 
 live in sin, committing many actual 
 transgressions ; and that our Sa- 
 viour Christ saith, ' None can enter 
 into the kingdom . . . .'" 
 
 From which we gather that Infants come to have the sin 
 pardoned in which they were conceived and born ; while 
 adults seek also the blessing of pardon for the " many actual 
 sins" which they commit who " are in the flesh." In each 
 case coming to Baptism is to take from a fleshly to a spiritual 
 condition : and thus the prayers — for the sanctification of 
 the water — are the same, with one exception. Whereas in 
 the office for infants, our Lord is said by His Baptism to 
 have "sanctified water," &c; in the other office, He is said 
 to have done the like to " the dement of water," an insertion 
 rendered necessary by the growth of anabaptisin, and the 
 scandalous glosses of the Quakers, Socinians, and Calvin- 
 ists, as to water not being water, to which I have called 
 attention already in an extract from Calvin himself, and 
 which the learned Charles Leslie was so successful in ex- 
 posing at a subsequent period. The prayer for the full 
 reception of the blessings of the Sacrament is in each case 
 the same. The words of the Gospel are, as might be ex- 
 pected, different, — that for infants simply sets forth the 
 gracious promise, that such may be brought to Him ; that 
 for adults proves the Church to interpret our Lord's conver- 
 sation with Nicodemus of Baptism, as the Communion 
 Service shows us, that John vi. is to be interpreted of the 
 Eucharist. The exhortations founded upon these are in 
 like manner different. That for infants sets forth that, as 
 being innocent from actual sin, they are admissible to the 
 Sacrament in which original sin is washed away, and that the 
 bringing of infants to Baptism is a charitable work, favour- 
 ably allowed of God. The exhortation for adults first con- 
 
118 
 
 cerns itself with affirming the great necessity of the Sacra- 
 ment where it can be had ; it shows this from our Lord's 
 words to Nicodemus, from the preaching of St. Peter, 
 recorded in the Acts, and from the testimony of the same 
 Apostle in another place, i. e. one of his Epistles. And now, 
 observe how differently the Church feels as to the certain 
 effects of the Sacrament in the two cases : 
 
 INFANTS. ADULTS. 
 
 " Doubt ye not, therefore, but " Doubt ye not, therefore, but 
 
 earnestly believe, that he will like- earnestly believe, that he will fa- 
 wise favourably receive this pre- vourably receive these present per-. 
 sent Infant ; that he will embrace sons, truly repenting, and com- 
 him with the arms of his mercy ; ing unto htm by faith ; that he 
 that he will give unto him the will grant them remission of their 
 blessing of eternal life, and make sins, and bestow upon them the 
 him partaker of his everlasting Holy Ghost ; that he will give them 
 kingdom." the blessing of eternal life, and 
 
 make them partakers of his ever- 
 lasting kingdom." 
 
 Thus, in the judgment of Bishop Pearson and his co-ad- 
 jutors, " all the qualifications necessary" in infants are their 
 innocency of actual sin, in connexion with the Lord's gra- 
 cious promise ; but adults must come truly repenting and 
 by faith. Nothing can be more conclusive. Engaged in 
 reviewing a newly compiled office, the words of the old 
 are allowed by them, because adapted to the different cir- 
 cumstances of the recipients of the new office. And al- 
 though it is felt that they cannot bid the congregation not 
 doubt but earnestly believe, that God will under all circum- 
 stances receive those capable of actual sin, favourably; and 
 it is therefore added, that they must be truly repenting and 
 coming unto Him by faith : yet, at the same time, there is 
 no alteration made in this particular in the existing Prayer 
 Book — albeit, above 600 alterations were at this time intro- 
 duced in its different parts, but it is still unhesitatingly 
 declared of all infants that God will give them spiritual 
 
119 
 
 regeneration, that blessing being a present title to God's 
 favour here and hereafter.* 
 
 Now, but for the insertion of these words, the whole re- 
 maining part of the office would have required alteration. As 
 it is, the charity which thinketh no evil is required to affirm 
 of those whose hearts it cannot search, not only that, avow- 
 ing as they do their repentance and faith under inquiries and 
 tests calculated to probe their sincerity, they are regenerate 
 persons, but also to pray that they may lead the remainder 
 of their life according to the beginning which belongs to 
 Baptism rightly received. Nor let Mr. Goode answer that 
 this is exactly what is alleged concerning the Baptism of 
 Infants. It is the introduction of the qualification of re- 
 pentance and faith in the case of adults, which supplies 
 an element of uncertainty in that case which does not 
 find a place in respect of infants. All " the qualifications 
 necessary in their case are, that they should be brought 
 to Baptism, but adults must come with true repentance 
 and faith." And whatever Mr. Goode may think, this does 
 require " serious refutation. "f 
 
 Let us not, then, have again to show that Bishop Pearson 
 is doubtful of the certain efficacy of Baptism in the case of 
 infants, because he admits that in the case of adults baptized 
 in infancy, something may appear which shows that the good 
 effects of a past time do not continue. 
 
 And here it ma}' - be convenient to say, in reference to Mr. 
 Goode's allusion to the Savoy Conference, ^Letter, p. 56,) 
 
 * In his larger work, Mr. Goode claims (p. 4*24) that nothing shall 
 be thought to be asserted positively here in respect of even infants, 
 because of the mention of the gift of eternal life. One would have 
 thought the answer of the Catechism — " Wherein I was made a mem- 
 ber of Christ, the child of God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of 
 heaven," would be enough to show that this is the giving the blessing 
 of eternal life and making him partaker of his everlasting kingdom, 
 just as the apostle speaks of our being already seated together with 
 Christ in heavenly places. 
 
 f Effects of Infant Baptism, p. 425. 
 
120 
 
 that it does not follow that because the divines at that con- 
 ference accepted a charitable construction of language, which 
 is clearly hypothetical in its circumstances, that the same rule 
 is therefore applicable to cases where what is in question is 
 not man's sincerity but God's truthfulness. When there is 
 no uncertainty, as in the case of infants, who differ not one 
 from another, then the " plain sense" as Hooker says, must 
 stand ; but when there is a doubt arising out of the possible 
 hypocrisy of those who yet profess to come with repentance 
 and faith, then of necessity positive statements are to that 
 extent contingent on the premises upon which they follow. 
 There can be no doubt as to what was understood at the 
 time upon this point. Dr. Cardwell shall tell us what was 
 done at the last review in this matter, and how it was re- 
 garded by the parties to whose views concession was 
 denied : — 
 
 " A new office was appointed for the ' Baptism of such as are of 
 riper years ;' and some alterations made in the other offices of Baptism. 
 The preface to Confirmation was curtailed, and the clause respecting 
 the undoubted salvation* of Baptized infants dying before the commis- 
 sion of actual sin, was placed after the office for Infant Baptism." — 
 Cardwell Confer. Oxford, 1841. p. 383. 
 
 We now come to notice the great advantage which Mr. 
 Goode takes of an error into which the Bishop had been 
 led in respect of the number of editions of Bullinger's 
 Decades ; and although his Lordship published within two 
 or three days of the appearance of the letter, a P. S. abating 
 whatsoever of force his argument might receive from this 
 part of his statement, had it been accurate, Mr. Goode 
 
 * " This was one of the greatest grievances complained of by the 
 Dissenters, being, as they said, a declaration that that is certain by 
 God's word, which at best can only be proved as a probable deduction 
 from it. Baxter was so inexorable on this point, as to maintain, ' That 
 of the forty sinful terms for a communion with the Church party, if 
 thirty-nine were taken away, and only that rubric, concerning the salva- 
 tion of infants dying shortly after their Baptism, were continued, yet 
 they could not conform.'" — Long 1 s Vox CleH, an. 1690, p. 18. 
 
121 
 
 ignores the existence of this P. S., except in the last page 
 of his work, although he does not pretend that his remarks 
 on that subject were printed when that P. S. appeared. 
 
 It is easy to understand the pertinacity with which Mr. 
 Goode endeavours to maintain the authority of this work : 
 but those who have tested the value to be attached to his 
 citation of authorities, will not be misled by the array of 
 statistics by which he seeks to identify the doctrine of Bul- 
 linger with that of the Church of England. We are fresh 
 from witnessing Mr. Goode call into court an Archbishop, 
 two Bishops, and a Presbyter, as holding views corre- 
 spondent to those of Mr. Gorham, and we have seen how 
 the case breaks down in the hands of his own witnesses. 
 The Archbishop refuses to acknowledge the offspring im- 
 puted to him. The Bishops and the Presbyter indignantly 
 repudiate all respect for the party whose character it was 
 hoped they would establish as irreproachable. They claim 
 to be judged by what they have uniformly taught, and in 
 their behalf it is urged that they be not held responsible for 
 the language of an adversary whom they quote to refute it — 
 that they be not made to speak of Regeneration when their 
 argument is of Sanctification, and that they be not required 
 to give up that which they have maintained dogmatically 
 and controversially, because, b} r a garbling of their writings, 
 they be made to appear to speak incidentally that which is not 
 agreeable to their formal doctrine. But though Jewell, as we 
 shall see directly, has been misrepresented — Hooker mis- 
 quoted — Taylor perverted — and Usher personated — yet maj*- 
 hap somewhat may become of Bullinger. He it seems was at 
 one time "required to be studied in our Church," and that he 
 was Zuingiian enough to empty Christ's Sacraments of their 
 grace and make them mere declaratory signs, is, alas! too 
 true. But how is it sought to prove this ? We are told that 
 an "order" was enforced by Whitgift, "whereby every minis- 
 ter under the degree of Master of Arts was required to take 
 
122 
 
 for his model the decades of Bullinger, as presented by the 
 Queen and Upper House of Convocation." Now the Uni- 
 versity of Cambridge requires "Paley's Moral Philosophy" 
 to be studied. Is it thereby implied that the University 
 adopts all the miserable paltering with high principles 
 which is to be found in that book — or would have all its 
 moral dicta to be taken for certain truth ? Many of our 
 Bishops used to require Tomline's Introduction to the 
 Study of Holy Scripture, and his Treatise on the Articles, 
 to be studied by Candidates for Holy Orders. Others 
 would require Bridge's Christian Ministry; and I have 
 heard, within the last few months, of the Zurich Letters' 
 being made a sine qua non under similar circumstances. 
 But was it thereby implied that such " assent and consent" 
 (as is required for the doctrine taught in the Book of 
 Common Prayer from every minister of the Church,) was 
 given to every doctrine therein contained ? Nay, if every 
 Bishop on the Bench " enforced" an order agreed upon by 
 and among themselves, that every Candidate for the 
 Ministry should in future stud}' Mr. Goode's " Effects of 
 Infant Baptism," I would still ask, would this imply that the 
 Church of God in these realms required such doctrine as is 
 therein contained " to be studied" as certain truth ? No, 
 even though a Prime Minister should advise the Crown to 
 lend that book its Royal sanction, it could not therefore be 
 that the Church of England" received and taught that doc- 
 trine, unless her whole Convocation in lawful synod assem- 
 bled enacted it. No doctrine can be enforced on the 
 Church of Christ in this land without the assent of the 
 Lower House of Convocation, as well as the assent of the 
 Queen and of the Upper House. There is sufficient parallel 
 between the constitution of the two Houses of Convocation 
 in matters of the spirituality, and that of the two Houses of 
 Parliament in the general affairs of the realm, to justify me 
 in asking Mr. Goode, what would be thought of an order 
 
123 
 
 made and enforced by the Queen and House of Lords, and 
 carried out by the Prime Minister irrespective of the House 
 of Commons ? And yet this order would have as j much 
 civil force as the order he finds in the State Paper Office has 
 ecclesiastical authority. 
 
 But, after all, what does this order "require?" It says 
 that "every minister under," &c, "was required to study 
 and take for his model the Decades of Bullinger." What 
 does that mean '? his model for what '? His sermons ? 
 The " minister" to whom this refers was not allowed to 
 preach any. His doctrine ? This could not be. The 
 Articles and formularies had already decided the true doc- 
 trine of the Church of England, which was agreeable to 
 God's Word. But let us see if there is not an account of 
 this matter more agreeable to the honesty of those by whom 
 this order was enforced, than that given hj Mr. Goode. 
 Every reader of English history is fully aware of Elizabeth's 
 determination to put down every tendency to the growing 
 Puritanism of the day, and well was she seconded by 
 Whitgift.* 
 
 Amongst other things put down by the Queen were the 
 "Prophesyings." As an evident substitute for these in 
 1585, "certain orders for the increase of learning in the 
 unlearned sort of ministers" were brought forward, " but it 
 does not appear, nor is it probable that they Avere generally 
 adopted. "f The Second Order was to this effect — "The 
 ordinary of the place shall assign unto such as are not 
 Masters of Art, or Preachers, one chapter at the least, of 
 the Old and New Testament every week, to be diligently 
 studied upon by them in such sort, as the} r be able to make 
 accompte of the principall contents thereof in Latten, and 
 bring notes in Latten, collected out of the same ;" and for 
 
 * Hallam, Vol. i. p. 269, et seq. Collier, Vol. vi. 519, et scq. 
 Cardwell, &c. &c. 
 
 f Cardwell's Doc. Ann. Vol. ii. pp. 21, 22. 
 
124 
 
 the due execution of the said order, it was further declared 
 in the Fifth Order, " that the ordinary shall examine himself, 
 or hy some learned preacher call them to accompte for 
 their exercises every quarter, and shall examine them also att 
 their synods and visitations, how they have profited," &c. 
 This Fifth Order gives us a direct clue to the object which 
 was aimed at. These "ministers" were preparing themselves 
 gradually under the direction of some more learned men, by 
 a course of study, for higher duties. We have seen, how- 
 ever, that these " orders" were not generally adopted, and so 
 in 1586, the Archbishop of Canterbury introduced into the 
 Upper House of Convocation certain " Orders for the better 
 increase of learning in the inferior ministers, and for more 
 diligent preaching" (this last part having reference to the 
 licensed preachers, which these " ministers" were not) and 
 " catechising." 
 
 We have already shown, that as orders binding on the 
 Church, they were null and void. We learn from Dean 
 Jackson, that certain writers were made use of in his time 
 as being most conformable to the Book of Homilies, and he 
 mentions Bullinger ; and, therefore, it may be well to inquire 
 whether, even if the appointment to study them was binding 
 upon the clergy, they could in any way affect the doctrine and 
 teaching of the Church. The reference I have just made shows 
 that they were only used so far forth as they were agreeable 
 to the Book of Homilies. The doctrine of the Book of 
 Homilies on this question we have already seen, and there- 
 fore Bullinger' s views of Baptism, contradicting those set 
 forth in the Homilies, the "Learned Preacher" — under whose 
 direction these unlearned ministers had to study so as " not to 
 swerve" from the doctrine thus set forth by these writers 
 conformable to the Book of Homilies, but for the most part 
 to translate — surely would require them to reject Bullinger's 
 doctrine in so far as it contradicted the Church's doctrine. 
 This is evident from the Orders themselves. In the First 
 
125 
 
 Order it is required that " every minister having cure, and 
 being under the degree of Master of Arts and Batchelor of 
 Law, and not licensed to be a public 'preacher, shall provide 
 Bullinger's Decads in Latin or English, and shall every 
 weeke read over one sermon in the said Decads, and note 
 likewise the chief matters contained in the said paper, and 
 shall once in every quarter shewe his said note to some 
 preacher nere adjoyninge to be assigned for that purpose." 
 The Second Order is for the appointing of "grave and learned 
 preachers" to " examine the diligence and view the notes of 
 the said ministers." Now what do these " orders" of which 
 so much is made, prove ? "Without a shadow of doubt, one 
 fact, very different from what is intended by Mr. Goode. It 
 is this — that Bullinger's Decades were set forth to be 
 studied for their learning, and their information. They 
 could have no dogmatic authority. They were to be read, 
 studied, " noted" and shown to a learned preacher — one 
 selected for gravity and learning, for his approval (just as a 
 Thesis would now be to a College tutor); not to be preached 
 or taught by the said ministers, they not having function 
 therein, but simply and entirely as "exercises." The Eighth 
 Order prescribes that the " exercises above written, and no 
 other, shall be henceforth publickly or privately used within 
 anie part of this province ;" but it is quite evident that this 
 could not apply to the teaching or preaching of them by the 
 " ministers," as none could preach but " licensed preachers," 
 selected for gravity and learning; and all that the "minis- 
 ters" were permitted to do "after examination and tryall" 
 was " to expound" the "pointes of the catechisme onlie 
 with the additions," " and this not until they shall be meete 
 to be by the Bishop tolerated, or authentic allie licensed 
 to preach" (Order Fourth). 
 
 The whole Orders plainly prove that great care was taken 
 to guard against unlearned men undertaking to teach 
 erroneous doctrine. Had Bullinger's sermons been ap- 
 
126 
 
 proved and licensed to be " used" as sermons, some argu- 
 ment might have been built upon it in the direction Mr. 
 Goode desires. But so far from this being the case, we 
 find that this book upon which so much stress has been laid 
 was set forth by the TJf^er House of Convocation, to be 
 used as a book from which " notes" may be taken by the 
 unlearned; but so careful were the Bishops, that they 
 further ordered that these " notes" should be subjected to 
 careful examination of " grave and learned" persons licensed 
 for that purpose. 
 
 And this conclusion well agrees with the fact that the 
 learned Bishop Barlow, in his Directions to a Young Divine,' 
 omits all mention of Bullinger from a list of authors* which 
 he names as those whose writings furnish helps to know the 
 true meaning of our authoritative documents; and certainly 
 among those authoritative documents there is no place given 
 to Bullinger's Decades. Let us, then, hear no more of Bul- 
 linger's doctrine as authoritative Anglican doctrine, on 
 grounds which would, as the learned advocate in the cause 
 observed, abundantly justify the assertion that the Church of 
 England certified the falsehoods in Foxe's Book of Martyrs.f 
 
 Lord Campbell, in the hearing of the cause, remarked, 
 that Foxe had never been considered other than as a his- 
 tory. And so say we, Bullinger's Decades have never been 
 considered as manuals of doctrine, but rather as a fasciculus 
 of learned theses, forming an excellent model for imitation in 
 respect of their method and learning, and to be translated as 
 they stood, so far forth as they might agree with the Church's 
 authorised doctrine ; and of this " grave and learned 
 preachers" were to be the judges, it being their business to 
 look over the "exercises" made from these Decades. 
 
 * " Cranmer, Bucer, Pet. Martyr, Jewell, Reynolds, Wliifgift, Ban- 
 croft, Hooker, Joh. White, Davenant, Abbot, Crakanthorp, Field, 
 Laud, Cliilling worth." 
 
 ■f Badeley's Speech, pp. 179, et seq. 
 
127 
 
 So much for the ado which has been made about Bullin- 
 ger. Mr. Goode's next authority, Bishop Carleton, I have 
 considered in a pamphlet* which I have already published 
 on this subject. I therefore now address myself to Mr. 
 Goode's assertion (p. 45). 
 
 " For a long period after the Reformation, you have not a single wit- 
 ness that you can lean upon in our Church. And even 'when the current 
 of theology among us began to change in Laud's time, so entirely different 
 were even Laud's views from those of your Lordship, as to the character 
 of such doctrine as that of Mr. Gorharn, that he not only made no oppo- 
 sition to the promotion in the Church of men holding it, hut actually 
 recommended them for the Episcopal office." — Letter, p. 49. 
 
 At a subsequent page of Mr. Goode's Letter, he quotes 
 Mr. Maskell in support of his views : it is beside my present 
 purpose to state my opinion of Mr. Haskell's change of view 
 on this matter, further than to say that there is something 
 very amusing in the way in which writers, having given to 
 the world arguments in favour of specific views, at a later 
 period of their career, quietly deny their conclusions, but 
 wholly ignore the arguments by which themselves had es- 
 tablished those conclusions. If Mr. Goode thinks he can 
 claim Mr. Maskell, he is welcome to whatsoever of support 
 his later works may afford him ; but I believe Mr. Maskell 
 is returning to old associations, in thinking that the Puritan 
 view is the view of the Church of England. Be tins as it 
 ma}r, let us see what comes of Mr. Haskell's assertion 
 that— 
 
 " the Elizabethan age is the age of the present Prayer Book in its chief 
 particulars and of the book of Homilies and of the XXXIX. Articles, 
 and that, without two exceptions, all the Divines, Bishops, and Arch- 
 bishops, taught doctrines inconsistent with the true doctrine of Bap- 
 tism." 
 
 Now, what is the fact with respect to the Prayer Book 
 
 * " Words of Common Sense for Com.non People." Masters : 
 London. 
 
128 
 
 being the work of the Elizabethan age ? In the reign of 
 Henry VIII., sundry Liturgical works appeared. Edward 
 VI., on his accession, issued orders for the arranging " an 
 uniform order of Communion, according to the Order of 
 Scripture and the use of the Primitive Church." This 
 service was set forth in English, and had added to it offices 
 for Sundays and Holy Days, for Baptism, Confirmation, 
 Burial of the Dead, and other special occasions. This was 
 the first Book of Edward. It was then changed in form, 
 and the Book so altered was called the second Book of 
 Edward VI. It did not, however, continue long in unin- 
 terrupted use. Queen Mary set on foot her cruel persecu- 
 tions, and abrogated the laws by which it was enjoined. 
 Being suppressed during this reign, it was, however, restored, 
 with very slight alterations, at the accession of Queen Eliza- 
 beth ; and during her reign it remained, with these excep- 
 tions, intact. Thus, then, whatever might be the Calvinism 
 of the Elizabethan divines, their peculiarities did not reach 
 to the Prayer Book. Neither did the Articles bear the im- 
 press of what is alleged to be the bias of their minds ; for 
 when, in the early part of the reign of King James, an at- 
 tempt was made to force on these views, this effort took the 
 form of a desire to add to the Articles of the Church. The 
 attempt was unsuccessful. The Roj T al declaration required 
 a " plain and full meaning" to be given to the Articles, and 
 no change was permitted in the Prayer Book. Then ensued 
 the lawlessness of the Great Rebellion, when the Book of 
 Common Prayer was superseded, though not by due force of 
 law. Nor was it until after the Savoy Conference, nor with- 
 out " great diligence" subsequently, on the part of the Convo- 
 cation, which held mairy sessions on this very matter, and 
 made modifications more or less important, that our Prayer 
 Book reached its present shape. But on the 20th of De- 
 cember, 1001, the work was brought to an end, and in 1662 it 
 became the law of this Church and realm. 
 
129 
 
 Now, it is manifestly absurd to assert that the private 
 opinions of the Elizabethan Divines are to be the rule for 
 interpreting the statements of the Prayer Book. Among its 
 original framers were Cranmer and Ridley, martyrs ; and 
 those who imposed it upon us in its present shape, were 
 those whom Mr. Goode so often excepts to as the Laudian 
 Divines. But I altogether reclaim against public documents 
 having coactive legal efficacy being interpreted by any other 
 intention of their framers than that which obviously appears 
 in immediate connexion with the documents themselves. 
 Who would think it just to interpret a statute against gam- 
 bling, by the known habits of certain members of Parliament 
 who were privy to the passing of the Bill ? The Prayer 
 Book must be judged by its own statements, and it must be 
 made consistent with itself, assistance herein being accepted 
 from all those documents which have more or less official 
 connexion with any changes which may have been from time 
 to time introduced. And while the opinions of Cranmer and 
 Ridley may be of importance, those of Prideaux and Carleton 
 cannot ; but the documents which really are of value are 
 records such as those of the Savoy Conference. 
 
 But what is the force of the main objection alleged — viz. 
 that for a considerable time after the Reformation no writer 
 is found to advocate the Church doctrine, or, as Mr. Maskell 
 states it, with somewhat more of precision, that this is so 
 with not two exceptions, and that in some cases the same 
 writer, in the same work, may be found to state the sound 
 doctrine broadly in one place, and to modify it or contradict 
 it in another ? 
 
 Granting* for the moment that this were so, what does it 
 prove? Is it conclusive to show that the doctrine of Rege- 
 neration in Holy Baptism was not acknowledged as the doc- 
 trine of the Prayer Book, and that it was not held and 
 taught in the English Church ? Assuredly not. It might 
 as well be inferred from the absence of any present contro- 
 ls 
 
130 
 
 versy on the Nestorian heresy, that the proper Godhead 
 of the Son of Mary is not received and held : or, it might 
 be but too easy to find in our theological writers statements 
 of a Sabellian or a Pantheistic character, and to argue thence 
 that we had deliberately resigned our conscious adherence 
 to the Athanasian verities. Reference to statements com- 
 bating these views would of course be a more satisfactory 
 evidence that this charge against the Church was not well 
 founded ; but the necessity of having such statements to 
 which to refer, would depend much upon the general preva- 
 lence of the errors ; for it would be this general prevalence 
 which would call forth a vindication of the truths assailed. 
 Or, because controversy has not } r et become rife on the 
 Divine inspiration of Holy Scripture, because as yet that 
 is a truth which we receive as a starting-point, and a founda- 
 tion on which to build other doctrines, would an historian 
 of these times be justified in saying that the Church of Eng- 
 land does not teach that the canon of Scripture is sacred and 
 inspired ? It must be remembered that the subjects of con- 
 troversy are continually changing. The point of defence is 
 not chosen by the Apologist, but by the Assailant. It is no 
 concern of the divine to defend in controversial phraseology 
 that which nobody denies or questions. And if in maintain- 
 ing kindred truths against current objections, he but in- 
 cidentally mentions another truth subsequently called into 
 question, such incidental mention is sufficient evidence of 
 the general acceptance of that truth at the time it is in this 
 manner alluded to. And if it can be shown that parties 
 desiring to hold specific opinions not in harmony with the 
 traditional theology, are driven to make a schism in conse- 
 quence of the peculiarity of their views for which there is 
 neither room nor sympathy in the Church, then it would 
 seem to be unquestioned that the doctrine which is denied, 
 or so differently held as to make schism necessary, must in 
 a form different from the gloss or opposite to the denial, be 
 
131 
 
 held by the Church from which separation is made. Now, 
 applying these tests of incidental mention and of express 
 denial, and partial rejection, to the doctrine of Baptismal 
 Regeneration, it will be abundantly clear that it has been 
 continuously and consciously the doctrine of the Church 
 from the time of the Reformation downwards. He who had 
 " disputed with great exactness,"* and had helped to settle 
 our present Prayer Book, is our witness that it is Faustus 
 Socinus who holds Baptism to be a mere declaratory ordinance 
 technically and formally making over that which has been 
 already given by Repentance, or Faith, or in some other 
 manner. Bishop Barlow, in stating the points of difference 
 between the Socinians and others, on the one hand, and the 
 Reformed Church and Romish divines, on the other,f gives 
 us the following propositions, the one affirmed, the other 
 denied by the Socinians, in the places referred to in the 
 opposite column : — 
 
 Qu. 10. — An Baptismus sit Qu. 10. — Catech. Racov. de 
 
 solum signum exterius et ad Prophetico Christi munere, c. 4, 
 Regenerationem nihil condu- p. 197- Instit. Brev. c. 17. 
 cens. — Aff. Soc. in Ep. 3, ad Matt. Rade- 
 
 rium, p. 127, 128. 
 Qu. 24. — An infantes sunt Qu. 24. — Cat. Rac. de Pro- 
 
 baptizandi. — Neg. phetico Christi munere c. 4. De 
 
 Baptismo, p. 145, 146. Institut. 
 Brevis. c. 17. De Baptismo, p. 52. 
 
 Now, although this Catechism be not a definitively authori- 
 tative document of the Socinians, and was never accepted by 
 them as a sufficient confession of their meagre faith, jet it 
 is quite clear, that this robbing the sacraments of grace, and 
 this denial of Regeneration to Baptism, and this withhold- 
 ing of Baptism from infants, on account of its want of sacra- 
 mental efficacy, were points of Socinian doctrine, and in the 
 
 * Collier, vol. viii. p. 442. 
 
 f " Sylhbus questionum prscipuarum, qua.> inter Socinianos, reliqu- 
 osque ; Ecclesias reformats? simulac Pontificia? Theologos ventilan- 
 tur." — Remains, p. 73 : Ed. 1G93. 
 
 K 2 
 
132 
 
 recognition of the questions involved, as points on which 
 the impugners could and would he met alike by the Reformed 
 Church and the divines of Rome, we see exactly that 
 testimony to the prevalence of true doctrine which it is now 
 sought to ignore. 
 
 Precisely to the same point is the rise of the sect 
 of Anti-Psedobaptists. It is no concern of mine now to 
 enter into the peculiarities which distinguish the General 
 from the Particular Baptists ; it is enough for me to 
 call attention to the fact, that certain persons attaching 
 great efficacy to Baptism, and, in one of their divisions, 
 having no repugnance to its repetition, but maintaining, 
 that, in order to its efficacy, there must be previous actual 
 faith and repentance and conscious acceptance of the 
 Redeemer as an act of interior faith, became, in consequence 
 of these opinions, a sect in schism from the Church. Now, 
 they had no need to separate unless the Church held Bap- 
 tismal Regeneration. If it had happened that Mr. Gorham's 
 theory had been elaborated and accepted as the Anglican 
 theory of Baptism, then it need have occasioned the teacher of 
 the Anti-Psedobaptist doctrines no concern that his child was 
 baptized in infancy, the grace not being tied to the rite, he 
 would have had only to accommodate his theory to the 
 " before, in, or after" formula, and he could have had no plea 
 for separation. But he did separate, because both he and the 
 Church held, that great grace is given in and by Baptism ; 
 but the Church taught, and he refused to believe, that infants 
 are capable and permitted recipients of that grace. Baptism 
 was clearly held by the Church to bestow what Divines call 
 yapo.KTT]p, in other words, an indelible idiosyncrasy, or 
 personality, such as birth alone can give; and, hence, 
 the schismatic position resulting from the heresy of the 
 Donatists and Novatians in early times, and of the Anti- 
 Pffidobaptists in a later age. Believing as this last-men- 
 tioned sect do of their Baptism, it is plain, that they did not 
 
133 
 
 allege that the Church held inadequately of the grace of 
 this Holy Sacrament; but they thought it mockery, and 
 worse, to suppose that such grace could be given to infants. 
 And so in like manner in all the passages with which the 
 writings of Cranmer, and Jewell, and Ridley, abound, it is 
 manifest that the grace of Baptism was a ruled and unques- 
 tioned thing; and from the very greatness of this grace, 
 while yet it was not alleged that the substance of the water 
 was really changed into blood, they argued in answer to the 
 Popish encroachments in respect of the other sacrament. 
 
 And what are the real facts of the case ? The offices in 
 the Book of Common Prayer un equivocally assert a truth 
 which ?/»ivocally had been asserted from the days of the 
 Apostles to the Reformation. Disputes there had been — as 
 to the time of Baptism : the administrators of Baptism : the 
 repetition of Baptism : the sacredness of Baptism, as that hi 
 which the Holy Ghost was so awfulry given, that sins after 
 Baptism were excluded from forgiveness : — but never had it 
 been gainsaid, that Baptism gives us the relation of sons to 
 God, by making us members of Christ, and then consigning 
 to us the kingdom of heaven in expectancy. The offices 
 which assert the doctrine had been subjected to the fiercest 
 opposition from those who could not conform to a Church 
 which would not evacuate Christ's sacraments of grace. But 
 there they stood, and stand unchanged and undiluted in their 
 maintenance of tins cardinal verity. There were reviews and 
 alterations, there were modifications even on this very point 
 of speaking positively where there was only warrant for an 
 hypothetical declaration. Thus the Book of 1559 had spoken 
 with apparent certainty of the state of each person buried, 
 and this seeming judgment was omitted in the Book of 1662. 
 
 1559. 166-2. 
 
 "That we, with this our brother, " That we, with all those that 
 
 and all other departed in the true are departed in the true faith," 
 faith of thy holy name," &c. &c. 
 
134 
 
 But where is there any such alteration in the Baptismal 
 offices ? They were adopted when they might have heen 
 rejected — they were repeatedly accepted without material 
 alteration when they might have been wholly changed to 
 suit, as is alleged, prevailing belief, or altogether rejected, 
 as contrary to it. But so it was not done. Nor was it 
 likely it should; for it was to be a book for the use of 
 Churchmen, not of those who did not hold Church doctrine. 
 No, in truth, it was not likely; for to this same doctrine 
 Cranmer, and Ridley, and Jewell, had borne noble testimony. 
 Let us hear what they had to say ; and, first, how taught 
 Archbishop Cranmer. We have already seen his doctrine 
 in the Homily on Salvation.* Let us find it alike in his 
 Catechism, and in his famous controversy with Grardyner, and 
 in his Defence of the True Doctrine of the other Sacrament. 
 
 First, what sympathy has the Archbishop with those who 
 make Sacraments mere signs and tokens, signs of a professed 
 faith, declarations of a pre -received grace ? 
 
 " But how can he be taken for a good Christian man that thinketh 
 that Christ did ordain his sacramental signs and tokens in vain without 
 effectual grace and operation ? For so might we as well say that the 
 water in Baptism is a bare token, and hath no warrant signed 
 by Scripture for any apparel at all : for the Scripture speaketh not of 
 any promise made to the receiving of a token or figure only. And so 
 may be concluded after your manner of reasoning, that in Baptism is no 
 spiritual operation in deed, because that washing in water in itself is but 
 a token. 
 
 " But to express the true effect of the sacraments : as the washing out- 
 wardly in water is not a vain token, but teacheth such a washing as 
 God worketh inwardly in them that duly receive the same ; so likewise 
 
 * It is instructive to notice how, in " An Apology for those of the 
 Regular Clergy of the Establishment who are sometimes called Evan- 
 gelical Ministers," by John Overton, A.B. York, 1801, the statements 
 of this Homily are felt to tell against those who deny the Church's 
 doctrine of Baptism. Mr. Overton does not scruple to quote the 
 Homily to favour his views ; but in the true spirit of the quotations 
 we have been considering, he quite ignores all the allusions to Bap- 
 tism with four dots — thus . . . . — Apology, p. 200. 
 
135 
 
 is not the bread a vain token, but showeth and preacbeth to the godly 
 receiver, what God worketb in him by his almighty power secretly and 
 invisibly. And, therefore, as the bread is outwardly eaten in deed in the 
 Lord's Supper, so is the very body of Christ inwardly by faith eaten in 
 deed of all them that come thereto in such sort as they ought to do, which 
 eating nourisheth them unto everlasting life." — Cranmer, Vol. iii. p. 49. 
 Book i. Jenhyn's Edition, Oxford, 1833. 
 
 Or what for those who say Baptism gives nothing ? 
 
 "And where you say that in Baptism we receive the Spirit of 
 Christ, and in the sacrament of his body and blood we receive his 
 very flesh and blood: this your saying is no small derogation to 
 Baptism, wherein we receive not only the Spirit of Christ, but also 
 Christ himself, whole body and soul, manhood and Godhead, unto ever- 
 lasting life, as well as in the holy communion. For St. Paul saith, 
 Quicunque in Christo baptizati estis, Christum induistis — (As many as be 
 baptized in Christ, put Christ upon them). Nevertheless, this is done in 
 divers respects ; for in Baptism it is done in respect of regeneration, and 
 in the holy communion, in respect of nourishment and augmentation." — 
 Ibid. p. 65. 
 
 "You conclude your book with blasphemous words against both 
 the sacrament of Baptism and of the Lord's Supper, niggardly 
 pinching God's gifts, and diminishing his liberal promises made 
 unto us in them. For where Christ hath promised in both the Sacra- 
 ments to be assistant with us whole, both in body and spirit, (in the one 
 to be our spiritual regeneration and apparel ; and in the other, to be our 
 spiritual meat and drink), you clip his liberal benefits in such sort, that 
 in the one you may make him to give but only his Spirit, and in the 
 other but only his body. And yet you call yom 1 book an explication and 
 assertion of the Time Catholic Faith." — Ibid. p. 86. 
 
 How does he dispose of those who require active faith for 
 the receiving of the benefits of the Sacrament ?* 
 
 " Therefore as, after a certain manner of sjwech, the sacrament of 
 Christ's body is Christ's body, the sacrament of Christ's blood is Christ's 
 biood : so likewise the sacrament of faith is faith. And to believe, 
 
 * To this point is the following passage from AVall. — " And so an 
 infant, though he be not yet constituted a Fidel (a faithful Christian) 
 by that Faith which consists in the will of believers ; yet he is by 
 the Sacraments of that Faith : for as he is said to believe, so he is 
 caUed a Fidel, not from his having the thing itself in his mind, but from 
 his receiving the Sacrament of it." 
 
136 
 
 is nothing else but to have faith : and therefore, when we answer 
 for young' children in their Baptism, that they believe which have 
 not yet the mind to believe, wc answer that they have faith, because they 
 have the sacrament of faith. And we say also, that they turn unto God, 
 because of the sacrament of conversion unto God ; for that answer per- 
 taineth to the celebration of the sacrament. And likewise speaketh the 
 apostle of Baptism, saying, that '■by baptism ice be buried with him unto 
 death.'' He saith not that 'ice signify burial;' but lie saith plainly that 
 ' ice be buried.' So that the sacrament of so great a thing is not called 
 but by the name of the thing itself." — Ibid. p. 385, vol. ii. 
 
 Would any know what it is which is given in Baptism, 
 and who gives it, and why the water is efficacious ? — let him 
 read the following from " Cranmer's Catechism :" — 
 
 "Learn diligently, I pray you, the fruit and operations of Baptism. 
 For it worketh forgiveness of sins, it deliveretb from death and the 
 power of the Devil, it giveth salvation and everlasting life to all them 
 that believe, as the words of Christ's promise doth evidently witness." 
 (Doubtless, he that believeth and is baptized, &c.) " But peradventure 
 some will say, how can water work so great things ? To whom I 
 answer, that it is not the water that doth so great things, but the 
 Almighty word of God (which is knit and joined to the water} and 
 faith which receiveth God's word and promise. For without the word 
 of God water is water, and not Baptism. But ichen the word of 
 the living God is added and joined to the water, then is it the bath of 
 regeneration, and Baptism water, and a living spring of eternal salva- 
 tion, and a bath that washeth our souls by the Holy Ghost." 
 
 Or would he be assured that sin is forgiven in and by 
 Baptism ? — 
 
 " Item. — That infants must needs be christened, because they be 
 born in original sin, which sin must needs be remitted, which cannot 
 be done but by the sacrament of Baptism. 
 
 " Item. — That men or children, having the use of reason, and willing 
 and desiring to be baptized, shall, by virtue of that holy sacrament, 
 obtain the grace and remission of their sins. 
 
 " Finally, — This sacrament of Baptism may well be called a covenant 
 between God and us, whereby God testifieth that He, for His Son 
 Christ's sake, justifieth us ; that is to say, forgiveth our sins, and endueth 
 us with His Holy Spirit, and giveth us such graces, that thereby we be 
 made able to walk hi the works of justice ordained by God to be exercised 
 of us in this present life to the glory and praise of God, and so persever- 
 ing, to enjoy the fruit of life everlasting." 
 
137 
 
 Necessary Doctrine and Erudition of a Christian Man. (Cranmer, 
 chiefly.) A.D. 1545. 
 
 And to the same purpose, in the same celebrated answer 
 to Gardyner to which Mr. Goode has directed our attention : 
 showing that the grace of Baptism is not only remission of sins, 
 hut spiritual regeneration and clothing with Christ Himself: — 
 
 '• As in Baptism we must think, that as the priest putteth his hand 
 to the child outwardly, and washeth him with water, so must we think 
 that God putteth to his hand inwardly and washeth the infant, with 
 His Holy Spirit, and moreover that Christ himself cometh down upon 
 the child, and apparellcth liim with his own self." — Answer to Gardyner, 
 p. 553. 
 
 And yet again, — 
 
 " The Divinity may be said to be poured or put sacramentally into 
 the bread, as the Spirit of God is said to be in the water of Baptism, 
 when it is truly ministeued ; or in his Word, when it is sincerely 
 preached, with the Holy Spirit working mightily in the hearts of the 
 hearers. And yet the water in itself is but a visible element, and the 
 preacher's word itself is but a sound in the air, which, as soon as it is 
 heard, vanisheth away, and hath in itself no holiness at all ; although 
 for the use and ministry thereof, it may be called holy. And so, like- 
 wise, may be said of the Sacraments, which, as St. Augustine saith, be 
 as it were God's visible word." — Answer to Gardyner, p. 283. 
 
 And here let it he observed, that in all these passages the 
 martyred Archbishop is less stating the doctrine, than as- 
 suming it and arguing from it. 
 
 Bishop Hooper can tell us, that — 
 
 " I believe that Baptism is the sign of the new league and friendship 
 between God and us, made by Jesus Christ ; and it is the mark of the 
 Christians now in the time of the Gospel, as in time past circumcision 
 was a mark unto the Jews, which were under the law. Yea, Baptism 
 is an outward washing, done -with water, thereby signifying an inward 
 washing of the Holy Ghost, wrought through the blood of Christ. The 
 which Baptism ought as well to be given and communicated to little 
 children as to those that be great, according to Jesus Christ — His 
 ordinance once for all, without any rebaptizing. This Baptism is the 
 Red Sea, wherein Pharaoh — that is to say, the devil — with his army of 
 sins are altogether drowned 
 
 " I believe, also, that Baptism is the entry of the Church, a washing 
 into a new birth, and a renewing of the Holy Ghost, whereby we do 
 forsake ourselves, the devil, the flesh, sin, and the world. For, being 
 
138 
 
 once rid of the old man, with all his concupiscences, we are clothed 
 with the new man, which is in Jesus Christ, in righteousness and holi- 
 ness, and with him we die and are buried in his death, to the end tliat 
 with Christ we may rise from death to the glory of the Father. And 
 even likewise, beiny thus new-born, we should walk in newness of life, 
 always mortifying in us that which is of us, that thereby the body of 
 
 sin may be utterly destroyed and plucked up by the root 
 
 " By this Baptism we are changed and altered from the children of 
 wrath, of sin, of the devil, and of destruction, into the children of God, 
 of grace and salvation, thereby to be made the Lord's heirs, and co-heirs 
 with Christ of eternal life ; and for that cause the same ought to be 
 given and communicated only to reasonable creatures, which are apt 
 and meet to receive such things, and not unto bells and sucli like, 
 which neither can receive nor use the thing signified by Baptism." — 
 Article upon the Creed, LVIII., LXI., edit. 1583. 
 
 Ridley, Bishop and Martyr, in a conference with Latimer, 
 shows his confidence in the presence of the grace in the 
 Sacrament without the conscious faith of the recipient, dis- 
 tinguishing between the necessity of the service of Baptism 
 and that of Holy Communion being in Latin or English, and 
 saying — 
 
 " Baptism is given to children, who by reason of their age are not 
 able to understand what is spoken unto them, (in) what tongue soever 
 it be. The Lord's supper is and ought to be given to them that are waxen. 
 Moreover, in Baptism, which is accustomed to be given to children in 
 the Latin tongue, all the substantial points, (as a man would say,) which 
 Christ commanded to be done, are observed. And, therefore, I judge 
 that Baptism to be a perfect and true Baptism, and that it is not only not 
 needful, but also not lawful for any man so christened, to be christened 
 again. 
 
 " But yet, notwithstanding, they ought to be taught the Catechism 
 of the Christian Faith, when they shall come to years of discretion ; 
 which Catechism, whosoever despiseth, or will not desirously embrace 
 and willingly learn, in my judgment he playeth not the part of a 
 Christian man." 
 
 In a disputation at Oxford, this same divine gave the 
 following definition of a Sacrament : — 
 
 Ridley : — " I remember there be many definitions of a sacrament in 
 Augustine : but I will take that which seemeth most fit to this present 
 purpose. A sacrament is a visible sign of invisible grace." To this his 
 opponent replied — 
 
 " Ergo, Grace is given to the receivers." 
 
 Ridley answered, — " The society or conjunction with Christ through 
 
139 
 
 the Holy Ghost, is grace : and by the sacrament, we are made the 
 members of the mystical body of Christ, for that by the sacrament the 
 part of the body is grafted in the head." 
 
 It was then alleged : — " Every sacrament hath a promise of grace 
 annexed unto it ; but bread and wine have not a promise of grace 
 annexed unto them -." 
 
 " Ergo, The bread and wine are not sacraments." 
 
 Ridley replied : — " True it is, every sacrament hath grace annexed 
 unto it instrum en tally. But there is divers understanding of this word 
 ' habet,' hath : for the sacrament hath no grace included in it ; but to 
 those that receive it well, it is turned to grace. After that manner, the 
 water in baptism hath grace promised, and by that grace the Holy Spirit 
 is given : not that grace is included in water, but that grace cometh by 
 water!' — Parker Society Ed. p. 240. 
 
 But there is one authority who must not be overlooked ; 
 with strange fatuity he is quoted in the Judgment, and Mr. 
 Gorham thus alludes to him :* — 
 
 " Among the dispensations of Providence which attended that won- 
 derful event — ths Protestant Reformation in England — one of the most 
 remarkable was that Jewell, the brightest gem of the Church, was per- 
 mitted to survive till her doctrine had been firmly established by the 
 final setting forth by authority of Parliament, the Thirty-nine Articles, 
 to which his masterly hand applied the latest touch.'' — Gotham's 
 Efficacy of Baptism, p. 79. 
 
 None will he disposed to gainsay the authority of this 
 learned divine, thus called into court by our opponents, 
 and if his cross-examination shall lead to the conclusion 
 that he would of a certainty have been called as a prin- 
 cipal witness in behalf of the Church's doctrine by myself, 
 that conclusion is just. So great, indeed, was the repute of 
 Jewell's Apology, that I am informed that in the " Harmony 
 of Confessions," published in the name of the Churches 
 of France and Belgium, and translated into the English, 
 
 * I have not thought it necessary to refute the inferences Mr. Gor- 
 ham draws in this note from extracts from Cranmer and Hooper, and 
 Ridley and Jewell — these divines are in those passages so evidently 
 speaking of adults coming to the sacraments, that they are nihil ad rem 
 in the present controversy, wherein it is conceded (id supra, p. 35) that 
 those coming as Cranmer says, " feignedly," fail of the saving grace of 
 the sacrament. 
 
140 
 
 and imprinted by the printer to the University of Cam- 
 bridge, .1516, the English Confession therein presented is 
 not our XXXIX Articles, but Jewell's Apology. 
 
 Let us then see what it is which Jewell affirms in this 
 matter, and first let us take the passage partially quoted 
 in the Judgment : — 
 
 " Cyrillus saith, that as many as believe in Christ, whether they be 
 far or near, whether they be Jews or Gentiles, free or bond, they are all 
 one body in Christ Jesus. This thing neither is denied nor in any 
 point toucheth the private mass. We confess that Christ, by the Sacra- 
 ment of Regeneration, as Chrysostom saith, hath made us flesh of His 
 flesh, and bone of His bones ; that we are the members, and He is the 
 head. We confess also, that all the faithful are one body, all endued 
 with one Spirit. And be that distance never so great, yet are we one 
 another's members. 
 
 " This marvellous conjunction and incorporation is first begun and 
 wrought by faith ; as saith Paulinus unto St. Augustine: ' By our faith we 
 are incorporate or made one body with Jesus Christ our Lord.' After- 
 ward the same incorporation is assured unto us, and increased in our bap- 
 tism ; so saith St. Augustine : To thisavaileth baptism, that men being 
 baptized, may be incorporate into Christ and made His members." — 
 Controversy with M. Harding on Private Mass. 
 
 He says in his " Treatise on the Sacraments " — 
 
 " In Baptism, the water is the sign, and the thing signified is the 
 grace of God. We see the water, but the grace of God is invisible." 
 
 4i So, when in Baptism our bodies are washed with water, we are 
 taught that our souls are washed in the Blood of Christ. 
 
 " The outward washing or sprinkling doth represent the sprinkling or 
 washing which is wrought within us : the water doth signify the blood 
 of Christ. If we were nothing else but soul, He would give us His 
 grace barely and alone, without joining it to any creature, as He doth 
 to His angels, but seeing our spirit is drowned in our body, and our 
 flesh doth make our understanding dull, therefore we receive His grace 
 by sensible means." 
 
 " What ? are they nothing else but bare and naked signs ? God 
 forbid! They are the seals of God ; heavenly tokens and signs of the 
 grace and righteousness, and mercy, given and imputed to us. Circum- 
 cision was not a bare sign ; ' That is not circumcision which is outward 
 in the flesh,' saith Paul, ' but the circumcision of the heart.' And 
 again : ' In Christ ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without 
 hands, by putting off the sinful body of the flesh, through the circumci- 
 sion of Christ.' Even so is Baptism not any bare sign." 
 
141 
 
 " They are not bare signs, it were blasphemy so to say." 
 
 " The grace of God doth always work with His Sacraments, but we 
 are taught not to seek the grace in the sign, but to assure ourselves by 
 receiving the sign, that it is given us by the thing signified — we are 
 not washed from our sins by the water, we are not fed to eternal life 
 by the bread and wine, but by the precious Blood of our Saviour Christ, 
 that lieth hid in these Sacraments." 
 
 " Therefore these two," (Baptism and the Lord's Supper,) " are truly 
 called the Sacraments of the Church, because in them the element is 
 joined to the word, and they take their ordinance of Christ, the visible 
 signs of invisible grace." 
 
 " I will now speak briefly of the Sacraments in several, and leave all 
 idle and vain questions, and only lay open so much as is needful and 
 profitable for yon to know. Baptism, therefore, is our Regeneration or 
 new birth, whereby we are born anew in Christ, and are made the sons 
 of God, and heirs of the kingdom of heaven : it is the Sacrament of 
 the Remission of Sins, and of that washing which we have in the Blood 
 of Christ." 
 
 " Hereof speaketh our Saviour, ' That which is born of the flesh,' 
 &c. And for this cause, saith He, ' Except a man be bom of the 
 water and the Spirit,' &c. For this cause are infants baptized, because 
 they are born in sin, and cannot become spiritual, but by this new 
 birth of the Spirit. They are the heirs of the promise ; the covenant 
 of God's favour is made unto them." 
 
 " Such a change is made in the Sacrament of Baptism : thus by the 
 power of God's working, the water is turned into blood ; they that be 
 washed in it receive the remission of sins ; their robes are made clean 
 in the blood of the Lamb. The water itself is nothing ; but the 
 working of God's Spirit, the death and merits of our Lord and Saviour 
 Christ are thereby assured unto us." 
 
 " A figure was given at the Red Sea even so in the fountain of 
 
 Baptism, our spiritual Pharaoh, the Devil, is choked : his army, i. e„ 
 our sins, are drowned, and we saved* 
 
 " Whether the infant be signed with the sign of the cross, or be put 
 into the water once or twice ; whether one, two, or three, or more, be 
 Godfathers or witnesses of the Baptism, it maketh nothing to the virtue 
 of the Sacrament ; they are no part thereof; without these, Baptism is 
 whole and perfect." 
 
 " If any be not baptized, but lacketh the mark of God's fold, we 
 cannot discern him to be one of the flock. If any take not the seal of 
 regeneration, we cannot say he is bom the child of God. This is the 
 ordinary way ; let us use it, let us not despise, nor be slow to receive 
 the Sacraments ; they are the means by which God maketh sure His 
 good will towards us." 
 
 This is the same simile as Hooper uses, supra. 
 
142 
 
 And in his Apology, written in defence of the Church's 
 doctrine, and received as we have stated, he says — 
 
 11 We confess and have evermore taught, that in the Sacrament of 
 Baptism, by the Death and Blood of Christ, is given the remission of 
 sins, all manner, often, and that not in half or in part, or by way of 
 imagination, or by fancy ; hut whole, full, and perfect, of all together, 
 so that, as St. Paul saith, ' There is no condemnation to them that be 
 in Christ Jesus.' " — Pt. 2, c. II. sect. 111. 
 
 " And we say that Baptism is the Sacrament of the remission of sins, 
 and of that washing which we have in the Blood of Christ, and that 
 none are to be denied that Sacrament who will profess the faith of 
 Christ : no, not the infants of Christians, because they are bom in sin, 
 and belong to the people of God." — Pt. 1, c. II. sect. 513. 
 
 In the Zurich Letters published by the Parker Society, 
 there are thirty-six letters from Jewell to P. Martyr, Bul- 
 linger, Gualter, and Latimer, on matters connected with the 
 Chinch of England. Can a single passage be produced 
 from this correspondence to favour the view taken by the 
 Judges and Mr. Gorhani respecting Jewell's opinion in the 
 Sacrament of Holy Baptism ? No. 
 
 Hear Jewell to P. Martyr (Letter ix.): — 
 
 " As to religion, it has been effected, I hope, under good auspices 
 that it shall be restored to the same state as it was during your latest 
 residence among us, under Edward." 
 
 To P. Martyr (Letter xxiv.): — 
 
 " Religion among us is in the same state which I have often de- 
 scribed to you before. 27ie doctrine is evert/where most pure ; but as 
 to ceremonies and maskings, there is a little too much foolery." 
 
 To Bullinger (Letter xci., in 1570): — 
 
 " For both our Queen, by the blessing of our good and gracious 
 God, still holds the government, and religion is in the same state as 
 heretofore, and as we ivish it to be? 
 
 This learned man died in 1571. He was soon succeeded 
 in his witness for the true doctrine by Hooker (1554 — 1000), 
 by Andrewes (1555— 1636), by Donne (1573—1631), by the 
 
143 
 
 learned Dean Jackson (1579 — 1640), by the good George 
 Herbert (1593 — 1632), and then by that bright phalanx of 
 worthies — Hammond, and Bramhall, and Cosm, and Pearson, 
 and Taylor, and Beveridge, and Comber, and Patrick, and 
 Bull, and all others whom Mr. Goode so sneeringly dismisses 
 as Laudian divines ; and never since has the pure flame of 
 baptismal grace been allowed to go out for want of faithful 
 men to tend and hand on that which they received as the 
 light of their faith and the joy of their obedience. I had 
 extracted a catena which would fill very many pages, all tes- 
 tifying to the truth which Heylin thus states in his " Com- 
 mentary on the Creed," article Forgiveness of Sins, answering 
 the question—" What is Baptism ? " as follows : — 
 
 And first for Baptism, it is not only a sign of profession and mark 
 of difference, whereby Christian men are discerned from others which be 
 not e/iristened, (as some Anabaptists falsely taught,) but it is also a sign 
 of regeneration or new birth, whereby, as bg an instrument, they that 
 receive Baptism rigidly, are grafted into the Church, the promises of 
 the forgiveness of sin, and of oar adoption to be the sons of God bg the 
 Holy Ghost, are visibly signed and sealed ; faith is confirmed, and 
 grace increased bg virtue of prayer unto God* This is the public 
 doctrine of the Church of England delivered in the authorised Book of 
 Articles, Anno 1.362. In which, lest any should object, as Harding did 
 against Bishop Jewel, that we make Baptism to be nothing but a sign of 
 Regeneration^ and that we dare not say, as the Catholic Church teach- 
 eth, according to the Holy Scriptures, that in and by Baptism sins are 
 fully and truly remitted and put away, we will reply, with the said 
 most reverend and learned Prelate (a man who very well understood 
 the Church's meaning), that we confess, and have ever taught, that 
 in the Sacrament of Baptism, by the death and blood of Christ, is 
 given remission of all manner of sins ; and that not in half or in part, 
 or by way of imagination and fancy, but full, whole, and perfect of all 
 together ; and that if any man affirm that Baptism giveth not full re- 
 mission of sins, it is no part nor portion of our doctrine. To the same 
 effect also, saith judicious Hooker, "Baptism is a surra mod which God 
 hath instituted in his Church, to the end that they which receive the 
 same might, thereby, be incorporated into Christ, and so, through Iris 
 
 * Articles of Religion, 27, Anno 1562. 
 f Defence of the Apol. part 2, cap. ii. sect. 3. 
 
144 
 
 most precious merit, obtain as well that saving grace of imputation, 
 which taketh away all former guiltiness ; and also that infused Divine 
 virtue of the Holy Ghost which giveth to the powers of the soul the 
 first dispositions towards future newness of life.* 
 
 But out of the man} 7 passages I have thus extracted, I only, 
 however, print the following, rather because they state the 
 doctrine with respect to this holy Sacrament independently 
 of the present controversy, and yet, by anticipation, refute 
 the technical and making-over theory, and disclaim the mere 
 formally declaratory nature of the ordinance, than as any- 
 thing like a full specimen of the testimony borne by the 
 glorious cloud of witnesses who have preceded us in the 
 good fight of faith; and are, as we trust, in patient and 
 peaceful waiting for the bestowal of their eternal crown.f 
 
 Thus writes 
 
 Dr. Donne (1573—1611). — The water of Baptism is the water that 
 runs through all the fathers : all the fathers that had occasion to dive or 
 dip in these waters (so say anything of them), make these first waters, 
 in the creation, the figure of Baptism. And therefore St. Jerome calls 
 these waters the mother of the world ; and this in the figure of Baptism. 
 The waters brought forth the whole world, were delivered of the whole 
 world, as a mother is delivered of a child ; and this, to foreshow that the 
 waters also should bring forth the Church ; that the Church of God 
 
 SHOULD BE BORN OF THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. The divine Basil 
 
 saith : " The Spirit of God wrought upon the waters in the creation, 
 because He meant to do so after, in the regeneration of man. And, 
 therefore, till the Holy Ghost have moved upon our children in Baptism, 
 let us not think all done that belongs to those children ; and when the 
 Holy Ghost hath moved upon those waters, so in Baptism let us not 
 doubt of His power and effect upon all those children that die so. We 
 know no means how those waters could have produced even a minnow, 
 a shrimp, without the Spirit of God had moved upon them ; and by 
 
 * Hook. Eccl. Pol. i. v. §. 59 and 67. Heylin, p. 445. London, 
 1654. 
 
 f Of course it is not meant for one moment to concede, by citing these 
 authorities, that the doctrine of the Prayer Book depends upon the private 
 opinions of those concerned in drawing it up, still less of those who have 
 used it when drawn up. 
 
145 
 
 this motion of the Spirit of God, we know they produce whales and 
 leviathans. We know no ordinary means of any saving grace for 
 A CHILD BUT Baptism ; neither are we to doubt of the fulness of salvation 
 in them that have received it. And for ourselves, in Baptism we are sunk 
 under water, and then raised above the water again ; which was the 
 manner of Baptizing in the Christian Church — by immersion, and not by 
 aspersion, till of late times: our corrupt affections, and our inordinate 
 love of this world, is that that is to be drowned in us : a love of peace, 
 and holy assurance, and acquiescence in God's ordinance, is that that lifts 
 us above water."* 
 
 " Therefore, that father puts all upon the due consideration of our 
 Baptism ; and, as St. Jerome says, ' Certainly he that thinks upon the 
 last judgment advisedly, cannot sin thus ;' so he that says with St. 
 Augustine, ' Let me make every day to God tbis confession : ' O Lord 
 my God, O holy, holy, holy Lord my God, I consider that I was baptized 
 in Thy Name, and what Thou promised me, and what I promised Thee 
 then, and can I sin this sin? Can this sin stand with those con- 
 ditions, those stipulations which passed between us then ? ' The Spirit 
 of God is motion, the Spirit of God is rest too ; and in due consideration 
 of Baptism, a true Christian is moved and settled too : moved to a sense 
 of the breach of his conditions, settled in the sense of the mercy of his 
 God, in the merits of his Christ, upon his godly sorrow. So these 
 waters are the waters of Baptism.'' — Dr. Donne, quoted in '• Holy Bap- 
 tism." London : LS44. 
 
 Donne also says in a prayer, 
 
 " That name of Sons of God Thou gavest us all at once in Adam ; and 
 he gave it away from us all by his sin. And Thou hast given it again 
 to even/ one of us in our regeneration by Baptism," &c. 
 
 Thus simply and sweetly teaches the author of the 
 " Country Parson," touching Holy Baptism : — 
 
 " Since, Lord, to Thee 
 A narrow way and little gate 
 
 Is all the passage, on my infancy 
 Thou didst lay bold and ante-date 
 
 My faith in me."' 
 
 * " See how many are the largesses of Baptism ; and whereas some 
 think that the heavenly grace consists only in the remission of sins, lo, 
 we have recounted ten glories thereof. Wherefore we baptize infants, 
 although they have no [actual] sins, that holiness, righteousness, adop- 
 tion, inheritance, brotherhood with Christ, may be added to them, that 
 they may become Ids members." — >bY. Chrysostom, 
 
 L 
 
146 
 
 And again : — 
 
 " O blessed stream, 
 You taught the Book of Life my name." 
 
 When Bishop Andrewes would teach concerning the Holy 
 Ghost, he thus appeals to apostolic precedent : — 
 
 " All this he might, yet this he did not, but takes a plain course, 
 sends them to their Baptism, still supposing it to be Christ's Baptism 
 they were baptized with — the only true Baptism. And, seeing the 
 Apostle upon good advice took that for the best way, we cannot follow 
 a better direction ; and so let us take it. We mean not, I trust, to 
 renounce our Baptism. By it we are that we are. And at it we shall 
 not fail, but hear, There is a Holy Ghost. Express mention of Him 
 is directly given in charge in the set form of Baptism prescribed by 
 our Saviour, that all should be, as we all are, baptized ' in the name 
 of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.' 
 
 " Yea, I add further, he could no better refer them than to 
 Baptism. For a special prerogative hath the Holy Ghost in our 
 Baptism, above the two other Persons. That 'laver' is His ' laver,' 
 properly : where we are not only to be baptized into Him, as into the 
 other Two, but also even to be baptized with Him, which is proper to 
 Him alone. For, beside the water, we are there to be ' born anew of 
 the Holy Ghost' also; else is there no entering for us into the king- 
 dom of God." — Sermon V. On the Holy Ghost. Vol. iii. pp. 184, 185. 
 See also pp. 186, 191. 
 
 And again : — 
 
 " Now re hath in it two powers — re is ' again the second time ;' so 
 it suits well with secundum — it is the second. For two there be: — 1st. 
 That old creation ; 2nd. And the 'new creature' in Christ. And two 
 births, — we see it daily. A child is brought into the world, but it is 
 carried out again to the Church, there to be born and brought forth 
 anew by the Sacrament of Regeneration." — Ibia. vol. ii. serin, xi. p. 372. 
 
 So too the learned Bishop Cosin: — 
 
 " The water in Baptism, the bread and wine in the blessed Sacra- 
 ment, naturally they are no more than other such elements are ; but being 
 consecrate and set apart once to these holy uses, for which Christ hath 
 ordained and appointed them, guts cum non lapidibus obrueret, saith 
 St. Chrysostom, what punishment should not he deserve, that would 
 usurp them to common uses, and profane them at his pleasure ? As 
 the water in Baptism, as the bread and wine in the Eucharist, so is 
 this day consecrate and set apart by the Church for holy and Divine 
 uses.'" — Cosin's Works, vol. i. p. 17.3. 
 
 Yet one passage more from 
 
 Hooker. — If on all sides it be confessed that the grace of Baptism is 
 
147 
 
 poured into the soul of man — that by water we receive it, although it be 
 neither seated in the water, nor the water changed into it — what should 
 induce men to think that the grace of the Eucharist must needs be 
 in the Eucharist before it can be in us that receive it ? — Book V. 
 chap, lxvii. 6. 
 
 Thus wrote the Author of the Evening Hymn : — 
 
 " Glory be to Thee, O most indulgent Love, who in our Baptism 
 dost give us the Holy Spirit of Love to be the principle of a new life 
 and of love in us, to infuse into our souls a supernatural, habitual grace, 
 and ability to obey and love Thee ; for which all love, all glory be to 
 Thee. 
 
 " Glory be to Thee, O compassionate Love, who, when we were 
 conceived and ' born in sin,' of sinful parents, when we sprang from a 
 root wholly corrupt, and were all ' children of wrath,' hast in our 
 Baptism ' made us children' of thy own Heavenly Father by adoption 
 and grace : when we were heirs of hell hast made us heirs of heaven, 
 even joint heirs with thy own Self, of thy own glory ; for which, with 
 all the powers of my soul, I adore and love Thee." — Bishop Ken's 
 Exposition of Church Catechism, p. 136. 
 
 And thus Ins contemporary confessor, Kettlewell : — 
 
 " Ques. By the promise of the Gospel I see that this forgiveness is 
 assured to all Christians upon the terms which you described. But is 
 it in any signs and tokens outwardly dispensed to them ? 
 
 " Ans. Yes ; both in the Holy Sacraments and in the sacerdotal 
 Absolution. Which ways of ministering this forgiveness, as well as 
 the forgiveness itself, are noted in some ancient creeds : this article 
 being thus professed in St. Cyprian's Form at Baptism : ' I believe the 
 remission of sins by the Church.' 
 
 " Ques. Is this forgiveness dispensed to us in the Sacrament of 
 Baptism ? 
 
 " Ans. Yes, and that most amply ; the water of Baptism washing off 
 the stain of all former sins. ' Be baptized, and wash away thy sins,' 
 said Ananias to Saul : ' Repent, and be baptized for the remission of 
 sins,' said St. Peter to the Jews : and, ' He hath saved us by the 
 laver of regeneration,' i.e. the water of Baptism and the renewing of 
 the Holy Ghost. — (Tit. iii. 5.) So that, whatever pollutions men had 
 upon them, if they come to Baptism with true faith and repentance, 
 they are thereby made clean again." 
 
 The learned Dean Jackson, whose works were recently 
 reprinted at Oxford, with especial reference to their strong 
 Protestant teaching, and arc one instance among many how 
 very absurd it is to identify Catholicism and Popery, tes- 
 
148 
 
 titles abundantly to this truth, and he was in his grave 
 twenty years before the Prayer Book was finally settled by 
 the Laudian divines. And he is, in fact, one of our 
 strongest witnesses upon many points to which Mr. Goode 
 and his party give the nickname of Romanizing : — 
 
 Vol. x. p. 335. — " To compel all that come unto the sacred laver 
 to undertake that treble vow (which is and hath been always solemnly 
 made and undertaken, either by the parties themselves which are to be 
 baptized, in case they be of years, or by their sureties), were the part 
 rather of a cruel stepmother than the office of a loving mother, unless 
 the Church, our mother, which exacts this vow of all and every one, 
 could give full assurance to all and every one of her sons, that God in. 
 Baptism, for His part, never fails to give means sufficient for quelling the 
 reign of sin, for mortifying the deeds of the body : means (I mean) 
 sufficient not in themselves only, but sufficient to every one of us, 
 unless we will be defective unto ourselves." 
 
 Again : — 
 
 " That infants are by Baptism regenerated, we may not deny, unless 
 we will take upon us to put another sense upon the Articles of our 
 
 Church THAN THEY WILL NATURALLY BEAR." Vol. X. 
 
 And again : — 
 
 " They which deny any grace or talent to be always given in Bap- 
 tism, or affirm this talent to be given only to some few who are of the 
 number of the elect, either do not understand or do not call to mind 
 what Baptism is," etc. — Vol. x. 
 
 And yet once more : — 
 
 " It is a truth unquestionable (especially in the doctrine of the 
 Church of England) that as many as are bapiized, are, from their 
 Baptism and by their Baptism, translated from the estate or condition 
 of sons of wrath to the estate or privilege of the sous of God." — 
 Vol. ix. 
 
 To the like point are the following passages from 
 
 Dean Comber.— The words of which Divine institution were anciently 
 believed to consecrate the water, and to oblige the most holy Author to 
 join His Spirit to the water, to make it effectual to that regeneration 
 which is the inward part of this sacrament. — Comber's Discourses on the 
 Prayer ]>'<>u/:. 
 
149 
 
 There is an exhortation to the congregation grounded on the benefit 
 which this infant (who being guilty of no actual sin, could put no bar 
 to God's grace) hath received; so that we doubt not it is inwardly rege- 
 nerate, and hath obtained a near principle of grace which will always 
 guide it in holy ways (if it do not afterwards wickedly resist it). — Cum- 
 ber 's Discourses on the Prayer Booh. 
 
 " Our praises must look back on the grace ahead}' showed, and the 
 benefits which are already given to this infant, which are principally 
 two: 1st. Internally, it is regenerated ; externally, it is grafted into 
 Christ's Church : for which we must give hearty thanks to Almighty 
 God. To which we must add, 2nd. Our prayers, which must look 
 forward upon the grace which will be needful to enable it to live 
 answerable to this estate to which it is admitted ; and this we must 
 beg of Almighty God also, or else the former blessings will be alto- 
 gether in vain." — Part 3, sect. iii. p. 201. 
 
 And from 
 
 Bishop Patrick. — " The sum of all is, that hereby we are regene- 
 rated and born again. It is the Sacrament of the new birth by which 
 we are put into a new state, and change all our relations : so that 
 whereas before we were only children of Adam, we are now taken to 
 be the children of God, such of whom He will have a fatherly care, and 
 be indulgent and merciful unto. 
 
 " Yea, herein He grants remission of sin, and we are sanctified and 
 set apart to His uses. We being hereby given to Him, and He accept- 
 ing of u«, do become His possession and proper goods, and cannot, 
 without being guilty of the foulest robbery, sin against God. We are 
 made hereby the temples of the Holy Ghost, the place where He, and 
 nothing else, is to inhabit ; and being by this consecrated to Him, He 
 likewise then enters upon His possession ; and we are said thereby to 
 receive the Holy Ghost ; so that if we run into sin, we defile His house, 
 and commit the greatest profaneness and impiety, and may be said very 
 truly to do despite to the Spirit of God, whereby we were sanctified." 
 — Quoted in " Holy Baptism," pp. 181, 182. 
 
 And so Bishop Bull : — 
 
 " ' And besides this,' &c. (2 Peter i. 5.) As if he had said, You 
 have now, God be thanked, escaped the pollution of the world, and 
 are truly, I hope, converted to Christianity, and in Baptism have been 
 regenerated by the Holy Ghost (that he means by their being made 
 partakers of the Divine nature). This, indeed, is a very great achieve- 
 ment, and an invaluable mercy of God, vouchsafed to you ; yet, I 
 beseech you, rest not here : but, besides this, giving all diligence, add 
 to your faith virtue, &c." — Sermon vii. 
 
 And again : — 
 
150 
 
 " For Christ hath instituted two sacraments in Iris Church, Baptism and 
 his holy Supper, and both to seal the forgiveness of our sins. Of 
 
 Baptism, THAT IT IS INSTITUTED for the FORGIVENESS OF OUR SINS, 
 no one doubts." — Bull on Justification, Oxford edit., 1842. 
 
 And so 
 
 Bishop Beveridge. — Only we shall take notice of the doctrine and 
 practice of the Primitive Church in this particular ; and surely the nearer 
 to the fountain-head the clearer the streams. Whether the apostles 
 baptized children or no is nowhere expressly delivered in Scripture : for 
 certainly the apostles' successors durst never have done it unless they 
 had seen the apostles themselves doing it before them. 
 
 Now, Origen saith,* " Young children are baptized into the remission 
 of sins." And presently,! " And because that by the Sacrament of Bap- 
 tism the filth of our nativity is laid aside, therefore are little children 
 baptized." And elsewhere,}: " To this may also be added, that it should 
 be inquired into what is the cause, that seeing Baptism is given to the 
 Church for the remission of sins, according to the observance or custom 
 of the Church, Baptism is given also to little children ; whereas, if there 
 was nothing hi little children that ought to belong to pardon and forgive- 
 ness, the grace of Baptism would be superfluous." 
 
 In St. Cyprian's time there were some that thought, indeed, that chil- 
 dren ought not to be baptized till the eighth day, according to the time 
 appointed for circumcision; but none that held they ought not to be 
 baptized at all whilst children. And to one that supposed they ought 
 not to be baptized till the eighth day, St. Cyprian writes, saying,§ " But 
 as to the case of infants, which thou sayest, before the second or third 
 day after they are born ought not to be baptized, and that the law of the 
 ancient circumcision is to be observed, that thou shouldst think that any 
 one that is born ought not to be baptized or sanctified before the eighth 
 day, it seemed far otherwise to all in our council ; for in this which thou 
 thoughtest should be done none agreed ; but rather all of us judged that 
 the mercy and grace of God (in Baptism) should be denied to no one born 
 of men." So that it seems a whole council then determined that children 
 ought to be baptized."- — • Works, vol. vii. p. 464, Art. xxvii. On Baptism, 
 
 Mr. Goocle, in his larger work, sends us to Bishop 
 Wilson's " Maxims of Piety and Christianity." Let me give 
 him what comes under the title 
 
 * Origen in Luc. Horn. 14. (p. 948, vol. iii. ) 
 
 t Ibid. 
 
 } Id. in Lev. Horn. 8, [3 vol. ii.] 
 
 § Cyprian, Epistle 1-3, (Ep. 64 init.) 
 
151 
 
 BAPTISM. 
 
 The Holy Spirit, at Baptism, takes possession of us, and keeps posses- 
 sion till men grieve Him ; then He forsakes us, and an evil spirit 
 succeeds. 
 
 By Baptism we contract and oblige ourselves, all our life long, to 
 complete and perfect the image of Jesus Christ in ourselves. 
 
 The blessings and excellences of Baptism : — It separates us from 
 Adam, and engrafts us in Christ. It is a resurrection from sin to grace. 
 It discharges us from the debt owing to the justice of God by our sins, 
 now fully satisfied by faith in the sufferings and death of Christ. It cancels 
 the law of death and malediction which was against us. In Baptism our 
 sins did indeed die, and were buried ; but the seed and root remain in lis. 
 These we are to mortify all om lives long. 
 
 " Blessed are they that mown .■" — that is, who are troubled at every- 
 thing that they believe displeaseth God. — Works, Ed. 1771, vol. i. p. 318. 
 
 And I will also quote a Bishop to whom, as a Presb} r ter, 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury * bore honourable testimony 
 in a note to his first edition, which, however, has not appeared 
 in subsequent impressions. Bishop Mant says : — 
 
 " ' Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water 
 and the Spirit,' &c. It should appear, I say, that He was alluding by 
 anticipation to the Sacrament of Baptism, which He intended to ordain : 
 and to that supernatural grace which was thereby to be conferred 
 through the instrumentality of water and by the Holy Ghost ; adopting 
 not only the ceremony itself, which He meant to exalt to more noble 
 and spiritual purposes, but also the very term by which the Jews had 
 described the change wrought in the baptized ; although He undoubtedly 
 employed it in a similar sense, indeed, but in an infinitely more digni- 
 fied sense. To the proselyte from heathenism to the Jewish faith, 
 Baptism had been a death to his natural incapacities, and a new birth 
 to the civil privileges of a Jew : to him who should be admitted to a 
 profession of the Christian faith, and who should be born ' not of 
 blood, nor of the will of the flesh,' &c it was to be a death unto 
 
 * " If St. Paul does not teach final perseverance, d fortiori, he does 
 not teach assurance. This must be my apology for saying no more on 
 a tenet so little Scriptural, and so peculiarly liable to uphold in his 
 obduracy the • brother who walketh disorderly,' and to depress the 
 tender-hearted Christian. Botli this point, and final perseverance, and 
 regeneration, have been recently treated by Mr. Mant in a manner 
 which leaves little to be added." — Apostolical Preaching, p. 105, Edit. 
 1815. 
 
152 
 
 sin, and a new birth unto those spiritual privileges which should accom- 
 pany bis deliverance ' from the bondage of corruption iiito the glorious 
 liberty of the children of God.' " — Bampton Lectures, vi. 
 
 And with the following, from a living Bishop, I conclude 
 these quotations. The present Bishop of Bangor says : — 
 
 " From a review, then, of our Articles and Liturgy, we may derive the 
 following conclusions : — 
 
 1. They maintain the doctrine of Regeneration in Baptism in the most 
 decided manner, grounding it on the same texts of Scripture from which. 
 the ancient Christians had deduced it ; including under it forgiveness of 
 sins, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and the inheritance of the kingdom of 
 heaven ; [and never introducing the word itself except in conjunction 
 with Baptism. 
 
 2. They teach, in common with the writings of the ancient Christians, 
 the necessity of faith and repentance as qualifications for the salutary 
 effects of Baptism. But they never contemplate any person, however 
 qualified, as regenerate, till he is actually baptized. 
 
 3. They suppose that infants, who are necessarily free from actual sin, 
 are duly qualified for Baptism, and are looked on by God precisely in 
 the same light as penitents and believers ; and they unequivocally assert 
 that every baptized infant, without exception, is born again. 
 
 4. They suppose that all baptized persons, whether infants or adults, 
 contract a solemn engagement to holiness and newness of life : and that 
 their continuance in a state of salvation depends upon their future- 
 conduct. 
 
 5. They lay down a very plain and broad distinction between this 
 grace of regeneration, and conversion, repentance, renovation, and such 
 Christian virtues and changes of the inward frame as require the con- 
 currence of man's will and endeavours — imply degrees — and are capable 
 of increase." — Bethell on Regeneration, pp. 95, 96. 
 
 And now, to return to the argument which these references 
 have partially interrupted. Let it be noted that all the 
 earlier of these statements assume the doctrine as one 
 generally held and received within the Church ; and if, for 
 denying the doctrine of Transubstantiation, they are charged 
 with making the Sacraments bare, empty signs, their reply 
 is, that they hold that great things are done by Baptism, 
 that Chkist is present there with His grace, and that there- 
 
153 
 
 fore the fact of Christ's grace being present, and of union with 
 Him being the blessing vouchsafed, does not in any way 
 make for that bodily presence which it is, on similar 
 grounds, sought to establish in the other Sacrament. 
 
 Such, then, is the constructive evidence which we have 
 to this point. It is the only evidence the case affords, and 
 is more cogent than a library of controversial divinity. 
 Posterity will have no room to doubt whether the doctrine 
 was denied in the nineteenth century.* Mr. Gorham's 
 examination, and the ferment in all classes in the English 
 Church, will prove that clearly enough. But the very fact 
 that the question is raised now with respect to the sixteenth 
 century — seeing that the silence is not absolute, as Mr. Goode 
 says, but rather of the nature described by Mr. Maskell — 
 is a proof in the very opposite direction to that for which 
 it is adduced, a fact which stands against Mr. Goode, 
 though he has so adroitly claimed it in his favour. 
 
 What I maintain is, that though absolute silence may be 
 a proof of general indifference, comparative silence (as in 
 the present case) is an argument for general assent. Con- 
 troversy is an index to what is specifically denied at the 
 time — not to what is generally believed. The Creeds, in 
 their origin, were dogmatical statements of Church traditions, 
 thrown into that particular shape for the refutation of con- 
 
 * The extracts given by Mr. Maskell at pp. 23, 24, of his Second 
 Letter, appear to my mind most conclusive against his own theory. 
 They prove nothing as to anything like a thorough discussion of 
 tliese questions, but, on the contrary, they are unguarded or exaggerated 
 statements, such as might but too readily be found in every age of the 
 Chiuch in individual writers upon almost every dogma of the Catholic 
 Creed. The fact that they appeared previously to the settlement of 
 the Liturgy as we now have it, is proof that the framers of the Prayer 
 Book had no desire to alter its statements to suit their views ; and that 
 in fact such views have no countenance whatever from our public docu- 
 ments. The argument from the Irish Articles is too wide to enter upon 
 here ; and Mr. Maskell on this point is in very good hands. — See Irish 
 Ecclesiastical Journal, May 1 . 
 
154 
 
 tenrporaneous heresies. An individual Christian believes 
 much more than he is in the habit of talking about, and 
 the faith of the Church, at any given time, contains many 
 more articles than those which the gainsayers of the day 
 may be moved to deny. We are not now defending the 
 doctrine of the Trinity, or setting forth the evidences of 
 Christianity, for instance ; but this is because there is no 
 present question about them, and not (as Mr. Goode's 
 theory would drive us to conclude) because we do not hold 
 them. The Church holds all truth. Her teaching is one 
 and the same through all advancing time; not a different 
 "creed for every clime and age;" but her catholicity is 
 herein shown forth, that under all and every circumstance, 
 what she holds and teaches in north and east, that she 
 teaches and maintains in west and south. But yet, for 
 all this, it becomes necessary from time to time to insist — 
 now here, and now there — upon this and that point with 
 more than general earnestness. Certain particulars of the 
 faith are called in question, and though they have not an 
 importance greater than that which belongs to the re- 
 mainder, yet the}' must be more closely denned, more 
 firmly settled, and enunciated with the greater distinctness, 
 because they are called in question, and the others are not. 
 The man in the parable did not value his one missing sheep 
 more than all the other ninety and nine; yet he left them, 
 in order to seek it, because they were in safet}^, and that 
 one was in danger of being lost. And so in like manner 
 the Church may be inainry concerned with one particular 
 Article of the Creed ; but because she directs all her energies 
 to the defence of the particular truths which are assailed, 
 she is not to be supposed to ignore or betray the remainder 
 of her sacred deposit. 
 
 The subjects of controversy after the Reformation were 
 not the grace of Baptism. If that had been specifically 
 denied, it would doubtless have been dogmatically defended. 
 
155 
 
 Other points were fiercely disputed — the sign of the cross : 
 the Divine right of episcopacy, the vestments and specialities 
 of Divine service : and matters of ecclesiastical polity gene- 
 rally. And these matters, thus called in question, were 
 powerfully and successfully argued on the side of the 
 Church, to the discomfiture of all opponents. And is it 
 to be pretended, that because other points were not con- 
 troversially defended, that therefore nothing else was surely 
 believed ? Does the Church never hold a doctrine but 
 when it is attacked ? Doubtless, one great end why here* 
 sies are permitted to disturb the harmony of the Divine 
 kingdom is, that they which are approved may be made 
 manifest. But there is a more or less conscious hold of 
 Divine things without this afflictive discipline, and an un- 
 questioned dogma is as much an article of faith as one 
 that is ever in dispute. The doctrine of the Trinity is as 
 firmly held and taught now as in the days when it was Atha- 
 nasius contra mundum. And thus the offices of the Book 
 of Common Prayer — our opponents being witnesses — do in 
 their plain and obvious sense expressly assert the reception 
 of grace, by the title of Regeneration, in Holy Baptism.* 
 
 * Mr. Goode has indulged in some of the most offensive of his lan- 
 guage in reference to this matter — Letter, pp. 87, 88. His allusion to 
 the trial, Bishop of Exeter v. Latimer, will require a more specific 
 answer : but I may as well notice here the assertion that the Bishop 
 of Exeter has " quoted certain words in order to show that the party 
 opposed to him is ijuilty of perjury ," (sic !) — Letter, p. 88. Now, how 
 stands the fact ? The Bishop of Exeter finds a distinction drawn be- 
 tween assent and consent, to the use of a book — and assent and con- 
 sent to the actual statements of that book. In his Lordship's view, this 
 is dishonest ; and he sees in it a proof that those who resort to it feel 
 *• That the plain, (sz'c/) the direct meaning of the Book of Common Prayer 
 is opposed to some of those tenets." — Bishop of Exeter^ 's Letter, p. 74. 
 And by bringing two statements together, which have no connexion in 
 the Bishop's Letter, Mr. Goode calls this a charge of wilful perjury. Why, 
 the Bishop expressly guards himself against charging conscious depar- 
 ture from their obligations upon the parties in question, and by putting 
 the word plain in italics, evidently allows to them that they may escape 
 the feeling of having violated their vows by the introduction of that 
 
156 
 
 The writings of the Reformers, and of those who are styled 
 " our standard divines," so explain that office. The office 
 was repeatedly accepted, and on this point never diluted. 
 The Articles which Mr. Goode tells us were framed pur- 
 posely to disclaim the sacramental theory, and which Bishop 
 Burnet tells us were designed by means of " express 
 statements " to disavow those points of Romish doctrine 
 which we deiry, do yet contain no single statement which 
 denies that part of Romish positive doctrine which asserts 
 that all infants are regenerate in Baptism ; but on the 
 
 " hypothetical" instead of a 'plain and direct' sense, which is the very 
 ohject of the Judgment to establish, and which Mr. Goode defends 
 them for maintaining. Mr. Goode has in different places throughout 
 his letter converted statements which, as they stand in the Bishop's let- 
 ter, are perfectly consistent with the charity which hopeth all things, 
 and thinketh no evil, into broad and railing accusations which the 
 Bishop never uttered. This is singularly the case at pp. 19, 
 and 57. A collation of these passages with the originals in the Bishop's 
 letter would show that hardly one of the charges alleged by Mr. 
 Goode to have been made by the Bishop of Exeter was so made by him. 
 What the Bishop has said in regard to the difficulty of subscription to 
 the Prayer Book, as compatible with a denial of Baptismal Regenera- 
 tion, has been said over and over again, without the least intention 
 of imputing " wilful perjury " to those who have persuaded themselves 
 into compliances which others could not do, and yet feel that they were 
 honest men. No one has stated this more forcibly than the present 
 eloquent Incumbent of the Golden Lectureship, upon whom such over- 
 flowing audiences wait each Tuesday morning, not very far from Mr. 
 Goode's own parish. The Reverend Henry Melvill thus writes: — 
 
 "That the Church of England does hold and does teach Baptismal 
 Regeneration would never, we must venture to think, have been disputed, 
 had not men been anxious to remain in her communion, and yet to make 
 her formularies square with their own private opinions. * * * * 
 
 " We really think that no fair, no straightforward dealing can 
 get rid of the conclusion that the Church holds what is called Bap- 
 tismal Regeneration. You may dislike the doctrine ; you may wish it 
 expunged from the Prayer Book ; but so long as I officiate according 
 to the forms of that Prayer Book, I do not see how I can be com- 
 monly honest and yet deny that every baptized person is ON 
 THAT ACCOUNT regenerate." — Sertnons, Vol. ii., pp. 237, 238. 
 Mr. Baptist Noel's secession is a commentary in confirmation that he 
 so felt also. 
 
157 
 
 contrary, as lias been shown again and again, expressly 
 allow of that as the orthodox doctrine. 
 
 Our Church's standard of orthodoxy, set up at the Reform- 
 ation — viz., Catholic Fathers and ancient Bishops, and the 
 first four General Councils,* abundantly affirms the doctrine. 
 There never has been a time, since the Reformation, when it 
 has not been, according to the circumstances of the times, 
 either incidentally alluded to as a received article of faith or 
 boldly maintained against those who denied it. "With this 
 doctrine, all the offices of the Prayer Book unite into one 
 harmonious whole — suited to all the various stages of human 
 life, and without it they stand apart, incoherent and unin- 
 telligible, asserting in words what they do not hold in fact, and 
 teaching the unlearned what their framers are now said to 
 have disbelieved. Can we then, dare we, as knowing how we 
 have received our heir-loom of faith — with what many tears 
 and much blood it has been sanctified and blessed — can we, 
 dare we, because evil men by their evil lives make the doc- 
 trine apparently a contradiction — can we, dare we, because 
 the teachers of Calvinism ask it of us to enable them to teach 
 their harsh dogmas with the Church's seal upon them — can 
 we, dare we, as those who minister at the same altars at which 
 ministered Cranmer and Jewell, and Hooker and Andrewes, 
 and Jackson and Patrick, Beveridge and Barrow, and Bull and 
 the apostolic Wilson — can we, dare we, as those who have it 
 in trust to hand on the faith to generations yet unborn — can 
 we, as those who have little ones to bring to God and to train 
 for Him — can we, and dare we, as those who have souls to 
 
 * See the Canon entitled " Concionatores." Jewell says of the 
 Articles and the Book of Common Prayer — " We have approached, as 
 much as possibly we could, the Church of the Apostles and ancient 
 Catholic Bishops and Fathers. Neither have we only reformed the 
 doctrine of our Church and made it like theirs in all things, but we 
 have also brought the celebration of the sacraments and the forms of our 
 public rites and prayers to an exact resemblance with their institutions 
 or customs."' — ApoL, G - 1 5. 
 
158 
 
 be saved, doubt of God's loving mercy at the font where 
 infants are bedewed with heavenly water ? No ! we cannot, 
 and we will not surrender the faith of the Church from the 
 beginning, nor by act or deed of ours write down the mother 
 in whom we were new born to God, alien from the College 
 of the Apostles, and false to her Lord and Master. 
 
 We have it in trust, Laity and Clergy alike, to hold, to 
 practise, to hand on the transmitted faith. We cannot 
 accept a theory which tells us the Church has no faith. We 
 will not, because we dare not, change faith into opinion ; nor 
 can we suspend the immutable law of God upon the fluctu- 
 ating perceptions of the human understanding. If the 
 Church have no doctrine of Baptism, on what has she a 
 doctrine ? Clearly, any may deny the inspiration of Holy 
 Scripture and be blameless, if they may deny Baptismal 
 Regeneration and not be treacherous. Nay, does the Church 
 teach man's accountability and the importance of prayer, 
 and reading, and meditation of God's Word, with anything 
 like the dogmatic certainty that she teaches that in Baptism 
 we acquire the filial relation which gives us ground to hope 
 in a Father's clemency, to address Him in prayer in the Son's 
 own form of words, and to find hi Holy Scripture the title- 
 deeds of our great inheritance ? Let us cling to this doc- 
 trine as one on which all our hopes depend. What is it to 
 us that there is a Saviour, if in Him we have no assured 
 interest ? How dreadful the feelings with which parents 
 must regard each new-born child, if from them is taken 
 away the true and solid knowledge, that Christ is at the font 
 ready to take them in his arms and bless them ! How 
 miserable the hesitancy which must be ours, if on each 
 occasion that evil example, or the overmastering force of 
 unsubdued and unmortified concupiscence, lead our children 
 astray, we are to be in doubt, whether in very truth they 
 have been regenerated! Is each Ml to make us tremble 
 lest we are fondlin" in our arms those still outcasts— still 
 
159 
 
 children of wrath ? May we have no assured conviction, 
 that we have not cast pearls before swine, when we have 
 taught our baptized ones the prayer which is the utterance 
 of the regenerate ? Ay, is [it a mockery when we put upon 
 the lisping tongues of our loved ones, the words which tell 
 them of a Father in heaven, Who is theirs through their 
 interest in Jesus' out-poured blood? Unless they be regene- 
 rate it is a mockery, for what saith St. Augustin : — 
 
 " I ask thee, O man, righteous and holy man, ' not having spot or 
 wrinkle,' I ask thee, I say, that prayer, is it the prayer of the Church? 
 The prayer of believers or of catechumens? Most undoubtedly it is 
 
 the PRAYER OF THE REGENERATE, i.e. OF THE BAPTIZED, ill fine and 
 
 above all, of sons. For if not of sons, what assurance have we when 
 we say, 'Our Father, which art in heaven?'" &c. Aug. Serm. xxix. 
 de Verbis Apostoli, cap. v. de Verbis Epistola;, 1 Joh. cap. i. : torn. i. 
 col. 808.] 
 
 And so to the like purpose, he whom the Homilies so 
 approvingly quote, St. John Chrysostom, speaks of the 
 Lord's Prayer as tijv zv)<j]v t<x>v ttlcttuv — the prayer of 
 believers or of the faithful ; * and yet more plainly in his 
 Second Homily on the 2 Cor., he asserts, that to those not 
 baptized " belongs not the prayer which was commanded 
 and taught us by Christ. "f 
 
 Let us not then consent to rob ourselves and our chil- 
 dren of the assured confidence, that all their little falls 
 and shortcomings are forgiven them, when the sobs of 
 their tearful sorrow are hushed in the still, calm utterance 
 of this absolving prayer. Deny Regeneration in Baptism, 
 and hope there is none for the immediate pardon of 
 the unpremeditated disobedience ; but all faults must be 
 supposed to prove that God's mercy reached not to our 
 offspring, that they left the font as they were brought to it, 
 and that all their future depends upon that sudden and 
 agonising remorse which need never be theirs, if, by God's 
 
 * Chrys. Horn. 10, in Coloss. 
 f Chrys. Horn. 2, in 2 Cor. 
 
160 
 
 blessing on the teaching which springs out of a living hold 
 on Baptismal Grace, they are kept from adding sin to sin, 
 hy the thought, that each sin takes them further from the 
 home in which alone there is safety. Whereas the opposite 
 view practically makes light of youthful holiness in its 
 highest aspect of implicit obedience, and rests all upon a 
 future conversion, rather than upon a past regeneration. 
 Well would it be, if we all realised more fully St. Augustin's 
 teaching, in respect of the absolving power of this prayer 
 of the Begenerate : 
 
 " But for daily sins of a lesser and lighter character — without which 
 none live in the world — the daily prayer of believers sufficeth. For it 
 is their privilege to say, ' Onr Father, which art in heaven,' who have 
 been already born again, to such a Father, of water and of the Spirit. 
 This prayer entirely blots out sins of the lighter and daily sort."* 
 
 May it be of God's great mercy, that it is a doctrine which 
 thus touches us all in our tenderest and dearest affections, that 
 the trial is come upon us to decide, whether we will be a 
 Church with opinions only, where they of old had strong 
 and living faith, where we, too, have, in our public documents, 
 a sound and unequivocal teaching. Let but the fathers and 
 mothers of England realise what it is which they are called 
 upon to make an open question. Even the grounds on which 
 they may hope for the salvation of those of their offspring 
 who have passed the age in which they were incapable of 
 actual sin ; let them realise, that it is the interest which the 
 little ones whom they entrust into another's care for in- 
 struction and for discipline, have in Christ's purchased 
 salvation, which is hereby made a matter of question and of 
 possibilhy, and they will feel that here, at least, they must 
 have certainty and affirmation. Yes ! great as the anxiety 
 must ever be with which parents part with their children 
 into the care of another, that anxiety will become painful 
 and overwhelming, if you rob them of the thought, that 
 
 * Aug. Enchir. c. 71 . 
 
161 
 
 their loved ones go forth from their guardianship with 
 a real and assured interest in that spiritual economy of 
 which there is in the ascended Saviour the m} r stical 
 incorporation, and of which guardian angels are the 
 ministering spirits. Let us feel that our little ones are 
 heirs of salvation, and we dare trust them amid the 
 world, assured that they are in covenanted alliance with 
 God. The hatred of evil spirits will not scare us, because 
 we shall have faith to pierce the clouds, and see the 
 spiritual ranks of holy angels ; the very many for us 
 who are more than the many that are against us. Had God 
 seen fit to try our stedfastness on any less practical point 
 than this, — had he taken us upon one on which the Church 
 spoke less plainly, or in which our affections were less 
 concerned, we may well fear, whether much might not have 
 been done to destroy the faith of the masses in the pro- 
 priety of a Church holding unalterable opinions. 
 
 As it is, we have not yet come to the fearful state of the 
 German Protestants, who have long since relinquished all 
 belief in the Divine origin of Christianity in a true and real 
 sense, and who, therefore, have no real hold on its positive 
 and peculiar doctrines. But we are told that it is Popish and 
 it is bigoted to think that theology does not admit of many 
 opinions, and that it is of the very essence of Protestantism 
 to grant license of debate on sacred subjects; that unity of 
 perception in respect of truth is impracticable ; and that his 
 religion is the best which has fewest points in which it 
 condemns the opinions of his neighbour. We seem to have 
 fallen on da} T s in which men think Faith to be not that 
 which God has revealed, but that which each man for him- 
 self accepts. Of such a persuasion I will only sa} r , in the 
 truthful words of one who " being dead yet speaketh," — 
 
 "If this be Protestantism — if it be Protestantism to doubt of every 
 sacred truth, or, at least, to receive none with confidence, may 
 
 M 
 
162 
 
 that gracious Providence, which has ever yet preserved our Church, 
 preserve her still from the curse of Protestantism ; may it teach 
 her, that He who has given her Scripture as a guide, has given 
 her also the power of understanding the truths it contains, that she 
 has not been in past times, that she is not now left to wander in 
 uncertainty and error, but possesses a light which will guide her to truth 
 and to peace."* 
 
 And here I might be well content to leave Mr. Goode 
 and this whole subject, but there yet remain some startling 
 inaccuracies, unfounded assertions, and painful misrepre- 
 sentations, to winch, notwithstanding the alreadj^ uninten- 
 tional length of this reply, I am bound to allude. When I 
 first took in hand my present task, I was not prepared to 
 expect the amount of labour in matter of detail which has 
 been imposed upon me. I had read Mr. Goode's Letter ; — I 
 felt that it had more of calling names than of argument, and 
 to what it had of the latter, I felt it would not require much 
 time to reply. And, had I confined myself to Mr. Goode's 
 arguments, my work would soon have been done ; but false 
 premises met me at every turn, in a shape such that the 
 cause of truth seemed to call for exposures, which could only 
 be made at considerable cost of time and labour, and I 
 will add of private feeling also. That time and that labour, 
 however, will not, (ill as I have been able to find it, from 
 the remainders left by duties of daily stated recurrence, 
 admitting of no postponement), I trust, have been mis- 
 spent, inasmuch as I think the public, who have not books 
 at their command, will not depend upon statements the 
 authenticity of which rests upon evidence (to winch I am 
 sorely tempted to apply his own terra. " manufactured ;" but 
 having hitherto steered clear of imputing motives, I will 
 only say) adduced in a prepared form by the advocates of 
 the theory they are called upon to adopt ; and some good 
 
 * " Protestantism in Germany," by the late Rev. H. J. Rose, B.D. 
 London, 1829, p. 29. 
 
163 
 
 will have been clone, if only some are induced to examine 
 more for themselves, ere they write down the faith of ages 
 a cheat and an imposture. 
 
 Mr. Goode has sought to affix the stigma of calumny 
 upon an aged Bishop, not only for instituting a comparison 
 which the Primate's own reference justified him in making ; 
 but, on account of inferences arising out of that comparison, 
 which would, if anything, have been even stronger had his 
 Lordship been carried by His Grace's Preface, as we have 
 been taken by Mr. Goode's Letter, to the Edition of 1817. 
 But, in seeking to brand a Bishop with calumny, I have 
 shown that he has convicted himself of a degree of ignorance 
 hardly less culpable than falsehood, and only to be distin- 
 guished morally from falsehood by the amende which he has 
 it now in his power to make, by retracting his oft repeated 
 and unfounded charges. 
 
 Mr. Goode has declared the Archbishop could not hold 
 opinions which those who have had official intercourse with 
 him in later years have always understood him to hold, and 
 which his own charge of 1844 clearly proves him to hold, — 
 and upon that Mr. Goode has made personal charges which 
 may only prove him hasty and mistaken if he now withdraw 
 them, but which will stand against him as calumnies if he 
 persist in them. Mr. Goode has been equally unguarded in 
 respect of the Council of Carthage, and the passage from 
 St. Paul's Epistle to Titus, hi. 5.;* and if he have scarcely 
 exceeded a fail' controversial use of an error in respect of Bul- 
 linger, what, after all, is his claim for its " authority " worth ? 
 
 But Mr. Goode has cited St. Cyril of Jerusalem, St. Cle- 
 ment of Alexandria, Hooker, Pearson, Ta} r lor; — they are his 
 witnesses, — they have been allowed to speak for themselves, 
 
 * Mr. Goode will find the same translation a^ain in Calvin, Lib. IV. 
 e. xv. s. 5. p. 111., ed. 1561, and possibly in other places ; but where 
 will be, in the Bisbop of Exeter's Letter, find such a gloss as his own 
 at p. 28 ? — " Precisely so," &c. 
 
 M 2 
 
164 
 
 and they have repudiated all sanction of the views they have 
 heen called to maintain. 
 
 Mr. Goode has appealed to the silence of the Post-Refor- 
 mation Century: it has been made to speak, and to speak 
 against him. He has denied to our doctrine any better 
 parentage than the Laudian divines. They are " Reviewers," 
 from whose hands came our present Prayer Book, which 
 they received in its main features from Cranmer, and 
 Ridley, and others. He has reminded us of Cranmer's 
 controversy with Gardyner. From that able treatise we 
 have strongly enunciated the Church's doctrine, incident- 
 ally set forth, concerning Holy Baptism. Of Jewell he has 
 said but little, but Mr. Gorham has extolled him ; and 
 Jewell bears witness for the catholic verity that in Baptism 
 we are new-born. Bucer is cited, to show that our formu- 
 laries must speak hypothetical doctrine, and lo ! Bucer held 
 it not. Peter Martyr is referred to as evidence that our 
 formularies were such as he liked not, and that he thought 
 he should be able to have them remodelled. His testimony 
 is taken ; and all that it proves is, that he wished what he 
 could not get — that he sought that which he did not obtain, 
 — and that, though a guest at Lambeth, he was not enough 
 in Cranmer's confidence to know how far hopes, which proved 
 unreal, were likely to be fulfilled. And the Prayer Book 
 turns out to be just what Peter Martyr wished it not to be. 
 The Cologne Liturgy is triumphantly quoted as the Liturgy 
 of Melancthon and of Bucer, and it belies not its own pa- 
 rentage ; but it will not adopt Zwinglian doctrine, nor nullify 
 Christ's Sacrament of Baptism. 
 
 But enough. Let us examine what yet remains, and take 
 our leave of Mr. Goode as best we may. 
 
 I have already shown that it w r as not an after thought of 
 the Bishop's to connect Mr. Gorham's heresy with Original 
 Sin; but I may just allude here to a claim which Mr. 
 Goode makes for Mr. Gorham's doctrine, that it shall be 
 
165 
 
 regarded in conformity with his " explicit disavowal " in 
 both courts. With this disavowal we have no concern. The 
 Bishop refused Mr. Gorhani institution on his examination. 
 If Mr. Gorham denied what that examination proves — in fifty 
 courts — it would be all nihil ad rem. The question is, what did 
 Mr. Gorham say in his examination? Let that be ascer- 
 tained by reference to that examination itself : from its plain 
 statements no subsequent disavowals can release Mr. Gor- 
 ham. By what he then said he must abide, so far as the 
 present issue is concerned. He ma} r retract, if he have aught 
 to retract; or he may add, if he have aught to add, as regards 
 the future ; but no disavowals made before the courts can 
 invalidate just and legitimate inferences made from his exa- 
 mination by the Bishop, and acted upon in reference to that 
 examination. In matters of opinion, disavowals of mere 
 inferences are admissible ; but in matters of faith, the lan- 
 guage used must be such as will bear strict comparison with 
 received formularies and authorized dogmatic statements. 
 
 I now come to Mr. Goode's reply to the Bishop, on the 
 subject of the Articles. Mr. Goode quotes the sentence of 
 the Judgment, in which the law of legal interpretation is laid 
 down in general terms, made applicable to this particular 
 case. This part of the Judgment has been so well dealt with 
 by a Lawyer,* that I shall not care to notice it, but proceed 
 to consider the conclusion at which the Judges arrived, 
 avowedly upon the principle Mr. Goode claims to be so 
 excellent. 
 
 At pp. 7 and 8 of Seeleys' edition of the " Judgment," we 
 find the following : — 
 
 " But if the case be, as undoubtedly it is, that in the Church of 
 England many points of theological doctrine have not been decided. 
 then the first and great question which arises in such cases as the pre- 
 sent, is, Whether the disputed point is, or was, meant to be settled at all, 
 
 * Chambers' Letter to the Bishop of Salisbury, pp. 14 — 99. 
 
166 
 
 or whether it is left open for each member of the Church to decide for 
 himself according to his own conscientious opinion. If there be any 
 doctrine on which the Articles are s'lent or ambiguously expressed, so 
 as to be capable of two meanings, we must suppose that it was intended 
 to leave that doctrine to private judgment, unless the Rubrics and For- 
 mularies clearly and distinctly decide it. If they do, we must conclude 
 that the doctrine so decided is the doctrine of the Church. But, on 
 the other hand, if the expressions used in the Rubrics and Formularies 
 are ambiguous, it is not to be concluded that the Church meant to 
 establish indirectly as a doctrine that which it did not establish directly 
 as such by the Articles of faith — the code avowedly made for Ihe avoid- 
 ing of diversities of opinions, and for the establishing of consent touching 
 true religion." 
 
 This is the ground on which the Court decided that the 
 Articles do not condemn Mr. Gorhani. Let us examine it. 
 First, we deny that the Church of England has left many- 
 points undecided ; but, even supposing it were true that she 
 had so left other points of theology, she certainly has not left 
 us without a doctrine on Baptism. And in a legal decision, 
 the judgment of grave and learned men, one would expect 
 proof of a fact about which they express not even one doubt.* 
 Yet we find nothing of the kind ; it is simply an assumption, 
 without one single witness brought to prove it. Nor can 
 anything be more futile than the assertion, that the Articles 
 contemplated doctrines being left to private judgment. The 
 very title declares that the said "Articles" were "agreed" 
 upon by the Archbishops and Bishops, and Clergy, "for the 
 avoiding diversities of opinions, and for the establishing consent 
 touching true religion;" and it is further declared, that the 
 Articles of the Church of England elo contain the true doc- 
 
 * " Nor may we believe that the Church intends to represent this 
 Sacrament as a type and symbol of Spiritual Regeneration, without pos- 
 sessing infused into it the very grace itself. Because the words employed 
 on the occasion are not merely such as imply that the sacrament and 
 the grace are combined together, hut thoy are such as have been stu- 
 diously selected to express that idea, and such as do most emphatically 
 express it. They even show an anxiety that nothing less may be sup- 
 posed." — Remarks on Baptismal Regeneration, by the lute Rev. John 
 Davison, B.D., Author of Discourses on Prophecy. 
 
167 
 
 trine of the Church of England, agreeable to God's Word ; 
 and, although permission is granted to the Bishops and 
 Clergy, in Convocation, from time to time to deliberate 
 about the "settled continuance " of the doctrine and discipline 
 of the Church of England now established, yet it further 
 declares that there must be " no varying or departing in the 
 least degree ;" and plainly for these reasons, that the doctrine 
 as set forth is plain and without doubt, being the true doc- 
 trine, agreeable to God's Word. And therefore it was that 
 the Judge in the Church Court laid down this rule : — 
 
 " He came to the conclusion, therefore, that the Court would 
 have to determine upon the acts of the Church publicly declared as the 
 act of the whole body of Reformers, and not upon the opinions of indi- 
 viduals. Private opinions must not be taken as authority. They could 
 have no weight unless the words themselves were incapable of being 
 construed in a plain and literal sense. If the words were ambiguous, 
 then it might be right and proper to revert to those private opinions ; 
 but as long as the Articles and Services of the Church were reconcil- 
 able, — and not only reconcilable, but necessarily consistent with the 
 general and literal interpretation of the words, — they were not at liberty 
 to put any new interpretation upon them. They must take those doc- 
 trines and expressions in their true and literal sense, and not construe 
 them by resorting to the private opinions of individuals. This would, 
 therefore, dispose of that part of the question so far as the Court was 
 concerned. Now he was not aware that it was necessary for the Court 
 to occupy much more time upon the question which had arisen here." 
 
 And, in applying this rule, so far from admitting (as Mr. 
 Goode asserts) that Mr. Gorham's doctrine was not con- 
 demned by the Articles, Sir H. J. Fust expressly allowed : — 
 
 " Prima facie, then, the Thirty-nine Articles were the standard of 
 doctrine ; they were framed for the express purpose of preventing 
 diversity of opinion ; and certainly they were first to be considered and 
 applied to in endeavouring to ascertain the doctrine of the Church." 
 
 And allowing this, he thus rules : — 
 
 " And then the question was, Had the Bishop shown sufficient reason 
 for not instituting Mr. Gorham to the benefice ? Now, he was of opinion 
 that Mr. Gorham had maintained a doctrine that was opposed to the 
 doctrines of the Church of England ; that the Bishop had shown suffi- 
 
108 
 
 rient cause why he had not instil uted Mr. Gorham to the benefice ; 
 and that, therefore, the Bishop must be dismissed, and dismissed with 
 costs." 
 
 That this special point was not considered ambiguous or 
 doubtful at the time of the last revision, we have the further 
 evidence of Calamy, who, in his Nonconformist Memorials, 
 adopts the abridged "Life of Baxter" as an introduction to 
 his work. In this we find the Nonconformists objected to the 
 Common Prayer Book, because — 
 
 " that it teaches the doctrine of real Baptismal Regeneration and 
 certain salvation thereupon : ' We yield thee hearty thanks that it hath 
 pleased thee to regenerate this infant,' &c. It is certain by God's 
 word, &c. to be saved, whereas the Word of God says nothing about it. 
 The sense ok the Church as to the efficacy of Baptism, is clear from 
 the office of Confirmation. Almighty God, who has vouchsafed to 
 regenerate, &c, to their sins.' This was a thing that appeared to our 
 ministers of such dangerous consequence, that they dur>t not concur in 
 it," &c. — Calamy, vol. i. p. 39. 
 
 But as regards the comparison of these Articles in respect 
 to the salvation of infants dying without Baptism, quo tcndit ! 
 Mr. Goode tells us that it is " admitted by Archbishop Lau- 
 rence himself that there was a change in respect of the sal- 
 vation of non-baptized infants." Granted, that the Church 
 Avisely omitted any determination as to the case of those who 
 could not get Baptism — granted, that she wisely refused to 
 confine God to the ordinances to which, nevertheless, He 
 confines us — does this in any way indicate a doubt or a 
 change as to the effect of Baptism where it can be had ? 
 Assuredly not. But on this point the authority to which Mr. 
 Goode sends us as avouching the weight to be attached to 
 the inference from the Reformatio Legum shall inform us. 
 Archbishop Laurence, alluding to this very same matter, in 
 another part of his work, shows that the omission of the 
 " else not" in no way justifies Mr. Gorham in the notion 
 that the salvation of baptized infants dying before they com- 
 mit actual sin is not to be " ascribed to their Baptism." — 
 Goode s Letter, p. 70. 
 
169 
 
 Archbishop Laurence (like Baxter, see p. 120, supra) holds 
 that the insertion of the terms, "it is certain by God's word," 
 
 "altogether excludes the notion tliat salvation is to he ascribed 
 to Predestination, and not to Baptism, since they speak * only of 
 that which the lips of truth have revealed and placed beyond conjec- 
 ture — the covenanted mercy of Almighty God.'" — Pages 166 — 181. 
 Ed. 1805. 
 
 If any alteration in the Church's doctrine had been in- 
 tended by this change in the Article on this subject, surely 
 that change would have been perceptible in the public offices ; 
 but nothing of the kind is to be found. An awkward and 
 inconsecutive mode of statement was got rid of, and some 
 questionable assertions were omitted, but no substantial 
 change was made in the doctrine itself. On the contrary, 
 the doctrine of the offices of Baptism and Confirmation is 
 exactly that of the Articles of 1536 on this very point. 
 
 I have so fully entered into the question of the dogmatic 
 authority of our Liturgical offices, that it seems almost un- 
 necessary to recur to it ; but there is something so extraor- 
 dinary in Mr. Goode's interpretation of the 57th canon, that 
 it must be noticed. The Bishop complained very justly that 
 the Judges should ignore the bearing of this canon upon 
 their assertion that the Church has no definite doctrine of 
 Holy Baptism. Mr. Goode endeavours to get rid of the 
 force of the canon by connecting it with the wish of the 
 Puritans to make preaching thereat, the condition of the 
 validity of the Sacraments. Be it that this was the object of 
 the canon, does this alter the fact that the Church alleges 
 that there is teaching enough on the subject of Baptism to 
 enable all to know what is " material and necessary" con- 
 cerning that Holy Sacrament? And if not, can we not learn 
 the "necessary" doctrine of Baptism from the office of Bap- 
 tism ? 
 
 Mr. Goode's allusions to the Burial Service require but 
 few remarks from me. It is hardly necessary to add to the 
 
170 
 
 Bishop's proofs, that wherever a charitable construction is 
 necessary, the language of hope is used to convey the feeling 
 of hope. But as Mr. Goode affects to doubt the validity of 
 his Lordship's citation of " The Preacher," because the 
 phrase, " His great mercy," ties the death of which mention 
 is made to that of the righteous, since God is said to slay 
 certain wicked, in Iris wrath, I will just observe that the 
 passages from the Psalms which he quotes, do not show that 
 whenever wicked men die, they are taken away from life 
 through the withholding of God's mercy ; but that there are 
 particular cases when a judgment, such as our Lord forbade 
 in the case of those slain by the falling of the Tower of 
 Siloam, is one which the facts require. God does show His 
 vengeance by slaying, but the death of every wicked man is 
 not as to its time and circumstance of necessity less a proof 
 of His mercy than of His wrath. All death is a sign of 
 God's wrath. It is the unrepealed penalty of Adam's sin. 
 It is the portion of the curse from which the second Adam 
 has taken the sting, and the ultimate victory, but not the 
 present power; and so, meanwhile, wheresoever there is death, 
 there is a token of God's wrath. But even where it is most 
 in wrath to the individual, it may be most in mercy to sur- 
 vivors ; and as a fact of God's Providence, who ordereth all 
 things in heaven and earth according to rules of love and 
 goodness, a fit object of our devout thanksgiving. Mr. 
 Goode may disbelieve the reality of our blessed Lord's dis- 
 tinction of " few stripes " and " many stripes ;" he may not 
 believe that the agonies of woe in the world unseen will be 
 in degrees of intenseness ; and that as there is the prophet's 
 reward, and the righteous man's reward, so his doom shall be 
 blacker whose sins have been the occasion of others' trans- 
 gressions, than his whose crimes have lured but few to their 
 fall. But these considerations will point to mercy and to 
 cause of thanksgiving, even in cases where death seems to 
 overtake in the very midst of sin. And Mr. Goode may, 
 
171 
 
 perhaps, remember the fate of the disobedient prophet whom 
 the lion slew, though it harmed not the ass, and devoured 
 not the carcase it had deprived of life. Interpreters of 
 Scripture, not less sound nor less charitable than Mr. Goode, 
 have seen in that fact the witness of the probable future 
 salvation of that prophet ; but Mr. Goode's mode of reason- 
 ing would prevent our using our Burial Service over such 
 an one. 
 
 And thus Mr. Goode's sneer about playing " fast and 
 loose" (p. 81) with the Prayer Book, is out of place, and 
 his allusions to the consistency of the Puritans singularly 
 Unhappy. The Dissenters, at the Restoration, did object to 
 applying a charitable construction where words were explicit, 
 and they were held to be justified in their objections ; so, 
 where it was a hypothetical sense which the Church intended, 
 she made her words lrypothetical too ; and thus she altered 
 the Burial Service to meet the scruples of the objectors. 
 But, inasmuch as she had no doubts in respect of her Bap- 
 tismal office, she declined to use doubtful language ; and by 
 so refusing to allege hope when she felt certainty, she ex- 
 cludes a hypothetical sense where her language admits of a 
 " plain sense." 
 
 Mr. Goode seems uneasy at the plain and manifest teach- 
 ing of the Catechism, and does little more than praise the 
 Judgment, for its construction of this document. 
 
 Now what says the Judgment ? — 
 
 " The whole Catechism requires a charitable construction such as 
 must be given to the expression, ' God the Holy Ghost, who sanctifieth 
 me, and all the elect people of God.' " 
 
 " Requires a charitable construction !" Why? To make 
 the Catechism intelligible ? No. To make it consistent 
 with itself, with the other offices of the Church of England, 
 or with the teaching of the Church Catholic ? No. Why, 
 then? Simply this — To make it consistent with the opinions 
 held by Mr. Gorham ! What are we to understand by this 
 
172 
 
 charitable construction '? Fairly represented, it seems to be 
 this : — That we may hope, in a judgment of charity, that 
 what the Catechism positively asserts, is true, hnt that we 
 have no certain assurance of its truth. And this construc- 
 tion "the whole Catechism requires." Try it: — "What dost 
 thou chiefly learn in these articles of thy belief?" "First, I 
 learn to believe in God the Father, who hath made me and 
 all the world ;" i. c. we may charitably hope that God the 
 Father made the particular child answering, but can have no 
 assurance of it. Why, this will bring us to the Gnostic 
 heresies of Saturninus and Basilides. Will the Privy Council 
 allow this ? If not, it is plain, that, even in their own judg- 
 ment, " the whole Catechism" does not mean the whole 
 Catechism; and we shall need some further "judgment" 
 enlightening us as to what parts are to be understood with 
 this " charitable construction." Let plain minds judge what 
 a state of confusion we are brought to by such non-natural 
 principles of interpretation. And this in a Catechism for 
 the use of children ! 
 
 But what is the plain meaning of the words quoted in the 
 Judgment ? The doctrine of the Church is, that by Baptism 
 a person becomes a " child of God" — one of the elect people 
 of God ; and therefore, in the Baptismal Service, the Church 
 calls upon us to pray that the child now to be baptized 
 " may ever remain in the number of God's faithful and elect 
 children." This being so, each baptized person is truly, 
 and without any land of hypothesis, sanctified ; and this 
 sanctification is the work of the Holy Ghost. Sanctification 
 is a process that admits of degrees, and is only perfected in 
 eternity; but its commencement is in Baptism. This is the 
 teaching of the Church, and therefore she requires her 
 members to confess, each one, " The Holy Ghost sanctifleth 
 me, and all the elect people of God." This she teaches as a 
 positive truth ; and to say that it requires a charitable con- 
 struction, is mere assertion, without an attempt at proof. If 
 
173 
 
 the Church had not meant to make a positive assertion, the 
 language might easily have been qualified so as to express 
 the required meaning; and truth and honesty would require 
 that it should be so qualified. To teach one thing, and not 
 only to mean another, but to leave that hidden meaning to 
 be supplied according to the private fancies of each indi- 
 vidual minister, would be a piece of reckless dishonesty, 
 unsurpassed in the annals of grave deceit. Let us hear the 
 great and learned Dean Jackson on this point : — 
 
 " Some in our times, there are, therefore (and more I think than have 
 been in all the former), which deny all Baptismal grace ; others there be 
 which grant some grace to be conferred by Baptism, even unto infants ; 
 but jet these restrain it only to infants elect. And this they take to be 
 the meaning of our Church's Catechism, wherein children are taught to 
 believe, that as Christ, the second Person in the Trinity, did redeem 
 them and all mankind, so the Holy Ghost (the third Person) doth 
 sanctify them and all the elect people of God. 
 
 " Hut can any man be persuaded that it was any part of our Church's 
 meaning to teach children, when they first make profession of their 
 Faith, to believe that they arc of the number of the elect, that is, of 
 such as cannot finally perish? This were to teach them their Faith 
 backwards, and to seek the kingdom of heaven, not ascendendo, by as- 
 cending, but descendendo, by descending. For higher than this, St. Paul 
 himself in his greatest perfection did not possibly reach ; no, nor the 
 blessed angels which have kept their first station almost these 6000 
 years : yet certain it is, that our Church would have every one at the 
 very firtt profession of his faith to believe that he is one of the elect 
 people of God. But those reverend fathers which did compo-e that 
 Catechism, and the Church our Mother, which did approve and author- 
 ize, did in charity presume, that every one which would take upon 
 him to expound this Catechism, or other principles of Faith, should 
 first know the distinction between the elect — i. e. such persons as cannot 
 perish, and the elect people of God — or between elective unto God's 
 ordinary grace or means of salvation, and election unto eternal glory. 
 Every people or nation, every company of men, when they are first 
 converted from Gentileism to Christianity, become an elect people, a 
 chosen generation or company of men ; that is, they, and their seed 
 after them, are made capable of baptism, receive an interest in God's 
 promises made unto us in Christ, which the heathens, while they con- 
 tinue heathens, cannot have. 
 
 " And all of us are in Baptism thus far sanctified, that we are made 
 true members of the visible Church, qualified for hearing the Word, for 
 receiving the Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood, and whatsoever 
 benefits of Christ's priestly function are committed to the dispensation 
 
174 
 
 of His ministers. And thus far sanctified by Baptism no man can be 
 but by the Holy Ghost. 
 
 "Our Apostle saith (1 Cor. vii. 14), that the unbelieving husband is 
 sanctified by the believing wife,' &c, to, ' But now are they holy.' So that 
 he attributes an holiness unto the children of believing parents, by 
 which they are more capable of Baptism than the children of unbeliev- 
 ing parents are. And of this holiness by which they are capable of 
 Baptism all children are partakers, although but one of their parents, 
 whether father or mother, do believe : much more are the children of 
 believing parents reputed holy or sanctified after Baptism, by which, 
 also, some gift of the Holy Ghost is conferred upon them. For even 
 that holiness which was communicated or desired unto them from their 
 parents before they are baptized, or by which they became capable of 
 Baptism, was conferred by Baptism." 
 
 "With respect to the argument drawn from the question 
 framed on the sponsions, I will content myself with referring 
 to a very able letter in the Irish "Ecclesiastical Journal" of 
 November, 1849, towards the conclusion of which we read : — 
 
 Again, the beginning of the Catechism itself demonstrates that the 
 design of sponsors is altogether prospective, and for the satisfaction of 
 the congregation ; and that to the efficacy of the Sacrament itself they 
 are wholly unprofitable. After the child replies that in Baptism he 
 " ivas made a member of Christ, a child of God, and an inheritor of the 
 kingdom of heaven," he is asked, ' What did your godfathers and god- 
 mothers then for you ?' He answers, ' They did promise and vow three 
 things in my name : — first, that I should renounce the devil, &c. ; second, 
 that I should believe all the articles, &c. ; third, that I should keep 
 God's holy will and commandments, and walk in the same all the days 
 of my life' And to the question, ' Dost thou not think that thou art 
 hound to believe and to do as they have promised for thee ? ' the child 
 replies, 'Yes, verily; and by God's help so I will.' The present 
 efficacy of Baptism is nowhere here stated to depend on the sponsions 
 in any conceivable sense ; but on the other hand, those sponsions are 
 represented (in consequence of the tense used throughout) as having a 
 subsequent effect of a different description, dependent on the subse- 
 quent will of the child. It is not renunciation, faith, and obedience, 
 existing at the time of the Baptism, to which allusion is made ; but 
 renunciation, faith, and obedience, to take place at a future period. 
 Connect these remarks with the passage which we have here considered, 
 and the conclusion is, that although infants are incapable of repentance 
 and faith, and although, consequently, those duties cannot in such case 
 be required, yet engagements are made for the future performance of 
 them, not to suspend the present efficacy, but to secure the subsequent 
 benefit of baptism, " because," as it is said, " infants promise them both 
 
175 
 
 by their sureties : which promise, when they come to age, themselves 
 are bound to perform." 
 
 Mr. Goode's assertions in respect of the Act of Uniformity 
 are so peculiar as to require a few words of notice, but they 
 shall be very few. And first, I will say, that this Act was 
 felt to apply to the interpretation of the Prayer Book, when 
 it was first passed. 
 
 Speaking of the scruples of the Nonconformists, the 
 Puritan Apologist says : — 
 
 " It is not to be supposed they had all the same scruples. Bishop 
 Kennet says, that renouncing the covenant was the greatest obstacle of 
 conformity with the Presbyterians. But his Lordship is mistaken ; for 
 if abjuring the covenant had been omitted, they could not have taken 
 the corporation oath. Some could not, in conscience, comply with the 
 very form of the hierarchy. Great numbers scrupled ordination, which 
 implied a renouncing the validity of their former ministrations. But 
 that which the Dissenters of all denominations refused, was giving their 
 
 ASSENT AND CONSENT TO ALL AND EVERY THING CONTAINED IN THE 
 BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER, (sic.) 
 
 " This they apprehended to be more than was due to any human com- 
 posure." — Neat's History of the Puritans, Abridged. By Edward 
 Parsons. Baines, Leeds, p. 318. 
 
 Now, if the feeling was merely that the book was to be 
 received in each man's interpretation of it, then, in good 
 sooth, it would have been less distasteful. Nor indeed was 
 the age in which the Act of Uniformity passed wanting in 
 some preachers of the Gospel, who possessed the same 
 astuteness of intellect and the same exemplary strictness of 
 conscience as is indicated in a letter in the " Plymouth 
 Herald," of I3th May, 1848, signed by a "Lover of Justice," 
 which claims for the clergy of that town this view of sub- 
 scription, viz. : that " every conscientious man," " of course" 
 subscribes "in the sense in which he himself understood it." 
 Now this subscribing to the Book of Common Prayer is near 
 akin to consent to its use as meaning less than consent to 
 its obvious and received teaching, according to a definite 
 
176 
 
 interpretation, i. e. its plain sense. We learn from Baxter 
 that some such there were in his own day. He thus states 
 their arguments, with his own comments : — ■ 
 
 " For the Latitudinarians and unwilling Conformists, their plea is 
 that the use of the forms and ceremonies is lawful, and that is all they 
 are required to subscribe to. But this is so gross, that the Nonconform- 
 ists cannot stretch so far. The words are as express to exclude such 
 stretching as could well be devised. For, 1. It is assent, as well as con- 
 sent, which is declared,— 2. It is to all and everything, which includeth 
 every word, — 3. It is to everything contained in it, as well as prescribed 
 by it, and the doctrinals are contained in it. To put all out of doubt, 
 since this Act, the Parliament made another Act, to which, while provisos, 
 were offered, the whole House of Lords sent it back with this proviso — 
 ' that those that declared assent and consent to all and everything, &c., 
 should be obliged to understand it only as to the use of what was required 
 of them, and not as to the things in themselves considered !' The Com- 
 mons refused this proviso, and the House had a meeting about it, in 
 which the Commons delivered their reasons against the exposition of the 
 Declaration, and in the end, the Lords did acquiesce in their reasons, and 
 consented to cast out the proviso — so that now the Parliament hath ex- 
 pounded their own words, and there is no more pretence left for the 
 LATITUMNAMAN EQUIVOCATION. ''■ — Baxter's Life and Times. Part ii. 427. 
 
 It is at this point that Mr. Goode's abuse breaks out 
 beyond all bounds, within which hitherto it had been more 
 or less kept. Having adduced a passage of the Bishop's 
 Letter, the sense of which he alters by the double gloss of 
 interlarded words and capitals, which wholly change the 
 emphasis and point of the Bishop's own argument and 
 charge, (see note p. 155, supra) Mr. Goode launches out into 
 the following apparently vindictive matter, which even if it 
 had truth for its basis, would, I venture to say, still be 
 unexampled in the annals of controversy, — bitter as the 
 odium tlieologicum has too often proved itself to be : — 
 
 " That you have quoted certain words ' in order to show' that the 
 party opposed to you is guilty of perjury, is beyond all question ; pre- 
 cisely as but I will let such language speak for itself. 
 
 " My Lord, when I first entered into controversy with your Lordship, I 
 was quite aware of the consequences to which I was exposing myself in 
 
177 
 
 the character of the language which I should he called to encounter. 
 But there are some occasions on which duty demands a sacrifice of per- 
 sonal feeling. The position in which you have been placed, gives a 
 publicity to your statements which requires that their real nature should 
 be exposed. Otherwise I need not inform you, that a ' Charge' or a 
 ' Letter' from the Plaintiff in the Cause of the Bishop of Exeter v. 
 Latimer, would have needed no reply. 
 
 "That one, of whom a jury of his countrymen, in his own Cathedral 
 town, have pronounced, — that language speaking of him (in terms which 
 I shall not repeat) as unworthy of belief, is proper and justifiable, — 
 should fling around him, with a profuse hand, similar accusations against 
 others, is not more than was to be expected. It is not wonderful that 
 you should seek relief in branding others with the same imputation ; 
 conscious as you must justly feel, that you may give vent to the most 
 unlimited abuse with the most perfect impunity. "Whatever it might 
 be, no cause of action could he against you for it. I quite grant that 
 you would be triumphantly acquitted, if charged with libelling. For the 
 question would be, "What damage has it inflicted ? And the incredulity 
 of any jury that could be selected, on such a point, would, beyond all 
 question, be insuperable." — Letter, p. 88. 
 
 It is most painful to be forced to one of two conclusions 
 in respect of this passage : either that Mr. Goode has written 
 what he has written without the slightest knowledge of the 
 facts of the case beyond this, that in a cause, The Queen v. 
 Latimer, some kind of verdict was returned for the defend- 
 ant; or that he has knowingly mis-stated the whole matter. 
 I should have left unnoticed language so gross, knowing 
 that all candid persons would inquire into the circumstances 
 before receiving such wholesale slander ; but that the facts 
 connected with the exposure of its grossness throw no little 
 light upon other pertinent matters. 
 
 The cause originated in some disputes respecting a chapel 
 at Bridgetown, licensed by the Bishop of Exeter on the 
 petition of the Duke of Somerset. The sort of engagement 
 into which his Grace really entered, we shall see presently. 
 In the Bishop's licence (whose receipt was acknowledged by ihr 
 Duke himself), we find it laid down that '"it is the intention 
 of his Grace to provide a permanent endowment for a minis- 
 
 N 
 
178 
 
 ter of the said chapel. And as soon as such endowment can 
 be settled to our satisfaction, to give and grant the site of the 
 said building, for the purpose of the same being consecrated as 
 and for a chapel for religious worship, according to the rites 
 and ceremonies of the United Church of England and Ire- 
 hind." We find also that his Grace "engaged, that if ice 
 should think ft to grant such our licence, tlte said intended 
 chapel should, be set apart and appropriated exclusively for 
 that purpose." And once more, that Divine service shall 
 he celebrated " by a Priest or Minister in Holy Orders, to be 
 for that p>urpose licensed by us, until we shall be enabled and 
 shall think fit to consecrate the said chapel, or make some 
 other order in this behalf." This licence was granted in the 
 year 1882. During* eleven years the Duke did not carry 
 out these intentions, which the Bishop had accepted as his 
 justification in granting the licence. 
 
 In 1843, the vicarage of Berry Pomeroy (in which parish 
 Bridgetown is situate) became vacant, and the new Incum- 
 bent declined to renew the nomination of Mr. Shore, who 
 had hitherto officiated in the chapel, and he was therefore 
 prohibited from officiating there. In the following February 
 (1844), without any previous notice to the Bishop, the agent 
 of the Duke of Somerset certified, under the provisions of 
 52 Geo. III., chap. 155, to the Archdeacon of Totnes,Jthat 
 this chapel was intended to be used as a " place of meeting 
 of a congregation or assembly for religious worship, of 
 Protestants." And after this, notwithstanding the Bishop's 
 prohibition, Mr. Shore continued to officiate, and actually 
 petitioned the House of Lords as a Protestant Dissenting 
 Minister. On the presentation of this petition, the Bishop 
 is reported, among other things, to have said that the noble 
 Duke had undertaken to endow the chapel, in order to its 
 being consecrated. About a month after, Lord Seymour 
 (the eldest son of the Duke), in the course of a speech to 
 certain of his constituents at Totnes, is reported to have 
 
179 
 
 directly charged the Bishop with falsehood, in stating that 
 the Duke had ever engaged or agreed to endow the chapel. 
 Lord Seymour was invited to put this matter in a train for 
 being fairly investigated by a jury of his countrymen, but 
 from this course his Lordship seems to have been advised 
 to shrink. He did not embrace the opportunity offered him 
 of avowing himself the author of the speech. And at this 
 point we are first introduced to Mr. Latimer, the Editor of 
 the Western Times Newspaper, who published this supposed 
 speech of Lord Seymour's, and added some observations of 
 his own, also imputing to the Bishop falsehood in his 
 observations in the House of Lords. According to the 
 existing state of the law, Lord Seymour was not amenable 
 to the law, and therefore the Bishop could only prefer a 
 bill of indictment against Mr. Latimer, which he did, and 
 the cause was tried before Mr. Baron Piatt and a special 
 jury for the City of Exeter, on the 27th March, 1848. I 
 have before me the whole evidence and the speech of counsel. 
 The defendant had justified, under Lord Campbell's Act, to a 
 jxirt of the libel — and that part was, that the Duke of Somer- 
 set had not undertaken to endow the chapel. On that issue 
 the jury found for the defendant ; but there was not, in the 
 whole case, a single feature justifying Mr. Goode's assertion, 
 that the Bishop is 
 
 " one of whom, a jury of his countrymen, in his own Cathedral town, 
 have pronounced, — that language, speaking of him (in terms which I 
 shall not repeat) as unworthy of belief, is proper and justifiable." 
 
 The only opinion they pronounced upon the language to 
 which Mr. Goode alludes is, that it was libellous. But be- 
 cause, as it seems to me, the word undertake did not appear 
 in the correspondence between the Duke and the Bishop, they 
 found that the Duke had not undertaken, and that therefore 
 the Bishop was in error in what he stated in the House of 
 Lords. This finding of the jury was wholly against the 
 
 n 2 
 
180 
 
 summing up of the Judge, and was pronounced b} r him a 
 verdict he could not understand. 
 
 In his summing up, his Lordship said, amid much more 
 to the same purpose : — 
 
 " ' There does not seem to be much doubt that the offer respecting 
 this Chapel, was made to the Bishop, and that he was ready to conse- 
 crate it, provided it was endowed, the land of the Chapel conveyed to 
 the Church, and that the Chapel should be used for Divine Service, 
 according to the ritual of the Church of England. You will have to 
 consider whether he did grant the licence, upon the Duke's entering 
 into that engagement, for the endowment and consecration of this 
 Chapel. If he granted the licence, having obtained that engagement, 
 why, then he was perfectly right, in what he stated in the House of 
 Lords, and this issue also must be found for the Crown (the basis of 
 the libel being the iaisehood of the allegation in the House of Lords.') 
 
 " The letters were then read by the Judge, observing on them as he 
 went on, and commenting on the following passage in Mr. Maberly's 
 letter to Mr. Barnes, of the 22nd September, 1832, in which he 
 states, — " It is his Grace s most serious and determined intention to do 
 his best, through the medium of the Church Commissioners and other- 
 wise, to procure the Consecration of this Chapel, and to make fur it a 
 permanent regular endowment of proper amount ; with the expression 
 of this intention, the Bishop will, I doubt not, Inlawing his Grace's at- 
 tachment to the Establishment, feel satisfied and rest content" 
 
 •' And the Judge observed — ' Are these things to be treated as a 
 matter of form? ' it never can be intended that an individual in the 
 rank of life of the Duke of Somerset shall not be bound by what his 
 agents state on his behalf. That can hardly be conceived for a 
 moment. Mr. Maberly's duty it was to see that the Duke did not 
 enter into an engagement which he never intended to fulfil.' The 
 Judge then remarked on the Petition for the Licence, on which he 
 sdd, — 'The Diocesan would desert his duty, if he granted the Licence, 
 without having a declaration on the part of the person signing it, hold- 
 ing out certain events intended to take place, and which alone formed 
 the inducement on which the Bishop would grant the Licence.' 
 
 " Do you suppose that the Duke, if he told the Bishop that he would 
 not endow this Chapel, would have obtained this Licence ? The Bishop 
 certainly would never have issued the Licence." 
 
 " His Lordship next read Mr. Barnes' letter to Mr. Maberly, of 
 
 September 25th, and bis answer of the 26th September, showing the 
 
 Duke's title to the property and inclosing plans &c, and proceeded, — 
 
 ' What teas the use of ascertaining the Duke's title, which had been 
 
 alluded to in the preceding letter of Mr. Barnes, unless it was for the 
 
 purpose of making over the Chapel and endowing itf ,, ' 
 
 ***** 
 
 '• The Judge, in referring to the Petition of the Duke for a licence, 
 
181 
 
 said, ' If yon think that this was not an undertaking on the part of the 
 noble Duke, you will say so, but it seems to me, that the literal 
 meaning of the language would convey to a reasonable man, to 
 whom this Petition was addressed, that the Duke entered into 
 the engagement which is alleged, although the word " under- 
 TAKE " is not actually used. If this was an agreement proved be- 
 tween the parties, it would be my duty to state to you the legal effects 
 of the terms which it contained. But this is a question between the 
 Duke and the Prelate as to what they meant between each other at 
 the time ; whether the former did not enter into a solemn engagement 
 with the latter upon this correspondence. If he did not, the Bishop 
 is wrong ; if he did, the Bishop is right — you will say, looking at the 
 whole, whether you collect that the Duke did hold out to the Bishop 
 an expectation that he would endow this Chapel. 
 
 " ' If you think that he did hold out that intention in such a manner 
 as amounted to an undertaking, then it seems to me that the Bishop 
 was perfectly right in saying that the pledge had been given, and that 
 it had been violated. 
 
 " ' We cannot respect persons here .... If the party states 
 that from which he afterwards departs, it is for us to judge the trans- 
 action according to the principles of justice, and to state what the 
 evidence brings home to our minds as to the justice of the case ; after 
 finding first whether the matter charged in the indictment is libellous, 
 you will in the second place say, whether the Duke did not undertake 
 to endow this Chapel. That it has not been endowed is quite certain. 
 If you collect, from the nature of the correspondence, and no man to 
 whom that Petition was addressed but must have concluded that the 
 Duke undertook to endow that Chapel, the verdict must be for the 
 Crown on that issue also, because the Bishop stated in the House of 
 Lords that which he was justified in stating, and which was perfectly 
 consistent with the truth, and the libel in that respect will he false. 
 
 " ' If, however, you think that the undertaking was not given, you will 
 give the verdict for the defendant on that issue.'" 
 
 Notwithstanding these facts, and these observations from 
 the Judge, the jury found, on the second issue, that verdict 
 for the defendant to which Mr. Goode has thought it right 
 exultingly to refer ! ! It is not my province to discuss 
 its merits or observe further upon it. I leave that to the 
 public, on this statement of the facts, which may well 
 be concluded with the observation of the learned Judge 
 (who tried the case) to the defendant's counsel, when an 
 application was made to him respecting the costs of the 
 trial : — 
 
182 
 
 " I do not think you would like a new trial ; you were exceedingly 
 lucky in getting the verdict — how it was given I do not understand 
 quite ; I thought it was a very wrong verdict, I assure you. Un- 
 less the Jury were misled, one cannot understand it. You have 
 a right to keep all you got, and no more." 
 
 I am bound to believe Mr. Goode had been misled by 
 others, as to this trial. Let him, if this be so, come for- 
 ward as a Christian, and own it ; let him apologise, at least, 
 for this part of his attack, and I will gladly cancel all allu- 
 sion to it from this work with the same speed that he 
 shows in putting himself right with those who love fair 
 speaking. I have reason to know that Mr. Goode alleges 
 himself unwilling to continue this controversy in a personal 
 tone : it rests with himself to purge himself from this 
 melancholy outbreak. He may rely upon it, there never 
 was a case in which an action would be more readily at- 
 tested as good by the convictions of an approving conscience, 
 than were he now to put in practice the teaching of the 
 old copy-slip — 
 
 " An error gracefully acknowledged is a victory won." 
 
 I own to indignation, deep and burning indignation, at 
 the language and tone Mr. Goode has introduced into this 
 controversy. I may hardly hope to have succeeded to the 
 full of my wishes in respect of the utterance I have given 
 to that indignation (see pp. 2, 3, supra) ; but this I will say, 
 I have not, knowingly, imputed motives to Mr. Goode ;* I 
 
 * In correcting these sheets for the press, it occurs to me that I had 
 forgotten, when I wrote the above, my allusion to the Cologne Liturgy 
 at p. 30, where there is an implied imputation in respect of Mr. 
 Goode's motives in printing that Liturgy in Latin. It was called forth 
 by one or two preceding foreign Liturgies being given in English ; but, 
 as this may be because of there being an authorised Latin, — no less 
 than a German copy of the Cologne Liturgy, I beg to withdraw my 
 allusion to " the wisdom of the serpent ;" and will only express a hope 
 that Mr. Goode will favour u«, at any rate, with an English version of 
 the Definition " Be Baptismo" in that Liturgy, beginning, " Bap- 
 tismus est sacramentum regenerationis, quo Christo Domino inseri- 
 
183 
 
 have not gone elsewhere than he has referred me for his 
 own views; I have, I believe with hardly an exception, fully 
 quoted his own words, whenever I have had occasion to 
 refute them; and until I see how he acts, now that his inac- 
 curacies are brought under his notice, I will not give up 
 the hope, that his perversions have come rather from an 
 over-heated anxiety to vindicate what he believed to be truth, 
 than from a wilful determination to misstate and mislead. 
 The very accessibleness of the exposure, in many cases, as, 
 ex. gr., in the charges against Mr. Badeley and Archdeacon 
 "Wilberforce, make us bound to try and believe, that haste and 
 partisanship have had more to do with it than persistence in 
 preconceived notions, at all risks and at all costs. 
 
 We are now brought to Mr. G-oode's rejoinder to the 
 Bishop's account of the bearing of the Savo}* - Conference on 
 our present Prayer-Book. I will not insult my readers' 
 knowledge of history, or their common sense, b}' arguing 
 that the fact of questions having been discussed at so much 
 length, and with such nicety, by certain parties, as Members 
 of the Savoy Conference, must, of necessity, affect their 
 conduct in reference to these very same questions as Mem- 
 bers of Convocation, empowered to review the very book 
 about which all their previous discussions had been. How 
 could it be otherwise, when we remember the part that the 
 learned and temperate Dr. Pearson had taken in respect of 
 the Savoy Conference, when the commission was just about 
 to expire ? 
 
 Mr. Goode, however, in capital letters, denies the Bishop's 
 facts. He denies that these Resolutions were presented to 
 the King, nay, more, denies that there were any Resolutions 
 
 mur, incorporamur, sepelimur in mortem ejus, induimur eo atque 
 efficimur per eum filii et hteredes Dei," &c. 
 
 This is a very different account of Holy Baptism from that given by 
 Mr. Goode, pp. 24, 25 of his Letter; and be it remembered it is 
 Mr. Goode's own authority, Bucer, from whom we receive it. 
 
184 
 
 to present. To this part of the charge, I shall reply in the 
 words of one of Baxter's biographers — but I must first point 
 out that the Bishop does not allege that presenting of the 
 Resolutions to the King was the act of the Conference qua 
 a Conference — as Mr. Goode represents his Lordship to 
 have done when he says : — 
 
 " So far from the ' resolutions and determinations' of the Savoy 
 Conference being presented to the King, as found in the document 
 called ' the Savoy Conference,' no report at all of the kind was pre- 
 sented to the King from the Savoy Conference ; and for the very best 
 possible reason, namely, that there were no ' resolutions and deter- 
 minations' to present, because nothing was agreed upon there ; and the 
 alterations and additions in the Prayer Book are expressly mentioned 
 in the Act as having been presented to the King by Convocation ; and 
 the document called the Savoy Conference is only an unauthorised 
 and anonymous account of its proceedings.'"* 
 
 Let it be remembered what was one main object of the 
 Savoy Conference. It was to see "whether any, and what 
 concessions could be made to the Presbyterian party." Their 
 demands were so outrageous, that they failed in obtaining 
 what they sought. The Bishops refused to make the alter- 
 ations demanded. The rest shall be told in Neal's words : — 
 
 " The ministers prayed them to consider the ill consequences that 
 might follow upon a separation. But all was to no purpose; their 
 Lordships were in the saddle, and would not abate the smallest 
 ceremony, nor correct the grossest error, for the peace of the Church. 
 Thus the King's Commission expired, and the Conferences ended 
 without any prospect of accommodation. 
 
 " It was agreed at the conclusion that each party might repre- 
 sent to his Majesty that they were all agreed upon the ends of the 
 Conference, which were the Church's welfare, unity and peace, but 
 still disagreed as to the means of procuring them. The Bishops 
 
 THOUGHT THEY HAD NO OCCASION TO REPRESENT THEIR CASE IN WRITING ; 
 
 but the Presbyteuian COMMISSIONERS met by themselves and 
 
 * " An Account of all the Proceedings of the Commissioners, &c. 
 London: Printed for R. H. 166i. 4to. The Nonconformists presented 
 a Petition to the King, complaining of what took place in the Con- 
 ference ; but the Episcopalians do not seem to have made any report 
 to the King of (aiy land." 
 
185 
 
 drew up and presented an account of their proceedings, with a 
 petition for the relief which they could not obtain from the Bishops. - ' — 
 NeaVs History of Puritans. Abridged. Vol. II. p. 505. 
 
 • 
 I wait not to answer the injustice of this charge of perti- 
 nacity in trifles made against the Bishops, when these same 
 parties in the Convocation — which was, indeed, almost con- 
 temporaneous with the Conference — made six hundred alter- 
 ations in the Prayer-Book, many of them on the points 
 ventilated in this very Conference — for I rememher that it is 
 a Puritan historian I am quoting ; but what shall be said 
 for Mr. Goode's accuracy, and, alas ! what for the charges 
 he grounds on the Bishop's alleged inaccuracy, which even 
 Neal shows to be not an inaccuracy, a point in which he is 
 confirmed by Baxter's biographer already alluded to. At 
 pp. 212, 213, of the first volume of Mr. Orme's Edition of 
 Baxter's Works, I find the following account of this same 
 matter : — 
 
 " The affair having thus ended in a kind of farce, and the ministers 
 having totally failed, as they conceived, in the great object of the 
 Conference, they drew up a correct account of the whole affair, 
 and presented it to the King in the form of a petition. 
 
 " It was written by Baxter, and with a few alterations and amend- 
 ments, was at last laid before his Majesty, with a fair copy of all 
 the papers, by Dr. Manton, Dr. Reynolds, Dr. Bates, and Mr. 
 Baxter. It gives a short history of the Conference, and its unsuc- 
 cessful issue, and concludes by praying that the benefits of the King's 
 declaration might be continued to the people, and that the additions 
 promised in it might be bestowed. It does not appear that Charles 
 said anything particular at the winding-up of the affair. 
 
 " He parted with the ministers civilly, but with a full determination to 
 pursue such measures as, to adopt the expression of his grandfather 
 respecting the Puritans, would ' drive them out of the kingdom, or do 
 worse.' The failure offers one of many illustrations of the folly of 
 attempting to reconcile the principles of this woild with the laws and 
 government of the kingdom of Christ. It is true, in regard to such 
 transactions as the Savoy Conference, as well as of other things, ' that 
 no man can serve two masters.' " — The Life and Times of Richard 
 Baxter, Chap. VI. p. 212. 
 
 As all Mr. Goode's reasoning depends upon the denial of 
 the facts here proved, I shall, with this matter, dismiss the 
 
186 
 
 Savoy Conference, as entitled to all the weight the Bishop 
 justly claims for it, and which Mr. Goode's own citation of 
 Dr. Cardwell's account of what took place in Parliament 
 abundantly proves ; merely further premising, that when, in 
 the passage cited by Mr. Goode, at page 89, the Bishop 
 speaks of the " meaning of the Legislature," his Lordship 
 evidently has in his mind — though Mr. Goode sees it not — 
 the only Legislature competent to act for the Church in 
 such matters — namely, her Convocation in its two houses ; 
 and that they must have known of, and cared for, the Con- 
 ference of the Savoy, is clear from the names of the parties 
 engaged in the one and the other : and then the ratification 
 of the Book imposed by the Convocation by the vote of 
 Parliament, makes the determination of the Convocation 
 in re binding on the Church to this hour. 
 
 There is yet one other Charge which Mr. Goode makes 
 against the Bishop of Exeter, and as it is the solitary one of 
 inconsistency with his Lordship's former self in respect of 
 the importance of this doctrine, and is accompanied with 
 a very offensive comparison, it may be well just to allude 
 to it. 
 
 Mr. Goode quotes a long passage from the conclusion of 
 the Bishop's primary Charge, in which his Lordship makes 
 an earnest appeal to the brethren of the Separation, calling 
 upon them to renounce their schism, and to return into the 
 fold from which they remain volimtaiy, and not expelled, 
 wanderers. 
 
 He makes a careful distinction between those " who call 
 themselves Unitarians" and other Dissenters of a " much 
 more evangelical description;" and in respect of the 
 " Wesleyans " in particular, he grieves to be obliged to 
 call them Separatists, because Separatists is only another 
 name for Schismatics : " And Dissenters," his Lordship 
 says, " they scarcely are." 
 
187 
 
 His Lordship states of his own knowledge, that in one 
 instance, which he terms, however, a " signal instance," 
 " an Independent minister," who, " with almost the whole 
 of his large congregation," " returned to the bosom of the 
 Church" — the result of a " very close inquiry" was to find 
 that " their doctrines and worship were before their union 
 with us sound and irreproachable." I have no knowledge of 
 these circumstances, but I know that there is a meeting- 
 house in this town, at which, for many years, the Liturgy 
 of the Church of England was used ; and, as I am informed, 
 parties used to attend its services in the then dearth of 
 church room, who were not Dissenters, either by training or 
 in affection. Had the minister of that congregation taken 
 the step pointed out above, is it not possible that a similar 
 statement might have been truly made respecting him ? 
 
 It is no part of my concern to defend the Wesley an 
 Methodists, but this I do know, that the Wesleyans, as distin- 
 guished from other Methodists, do profess a strong doctrinal 
 adherence to the Church of England; and the principles 
 and strong remonstrances of their founder witness against 
 them as being under present circumstances in needless 
 separation. Be this as it may, the passage from the Charge 
 of 18-33 is quoted, to shoAv that the Bishop of Exeter felt 
 and taught differently then to what he does in 1850: — 
 
 " Thus spoke Dr. Henry Phillpotts, Bishop of Exeter, at his 
 Primary Visitation in 1833 :— My Lord, the Catholic spirit which that 
 passage breathes, the solemn words that form its conclusion — alas! 
 what a contrast do they present to the sounds that are now escaping 
 from the same lips! Talk you of change, my Lord, in our venerated 
 Primate ? of the teaching of his later, contradicting the sounder 
 teaching of his earlier, years? Alas! what a change is here! Could 
 the prophetic spirit that forewarned Hazael of his future acts, have 
 whispered in your ear the circumstances in which the close of your 
 course would find you, how would the same indignant exclamation 
 have betrayed the horror-stricken incredulity with which you received 
 the startling premonition!" — Goode's Letter, p. 106. 
 
 Mr. Goode does not seem to be able to understand the 
 
188 
 
 difference between earnestly entreating Separatists to give 
 up their schism and allowing the ministers of a church to 
 teach doctrines which that church does not hold — he does 
 not seem to be aware how the exclusive truths of the 
 Catholic faith can be exclusively maintained, and yet no 
 breach be made in charity towards the persons of those 
 who are separate from the Catholic fold. Let liim learn 
 how this is from the following extract from the Bishop of 
 Exeter s Second Charge, that for 1886: — 
 
 " Before I conclude, I should not satisfy either your feelings or my 
 own, if, in meeting you in this solemn way, I did not address to you 
 some observations respecting the duties of our ministerial and pastoral 
 charge. But without launching on a general exposition of those 
 duties, I think it may be more useful to confine my observations to a 
 single, but very important particular — a particular, however, of which, 
 important as it is (peculiarly so, I deem it, in the present state of 
 religious sentiment in this country), we have all, I fear, been too 
 neglectful. I mean, the obligation of instructing the people in the 
 real nature of Christ's Church, and the duties resulting from it both to 
 the ministers and to the people. 
 
 " That the notions of many good men and sincere Christians are, on 
 this subject, extremely lax — caused, in the great majority of instances, 
 by ignorance or want of due consideration — is too notorious to need 
 any proof. Let me entreat you, therefore, to turn your thoughts, and 
 occasionally your exhortations, in this direction. 
 
 " Remind your people that salvation, being deliverance from the 
 natural state of man, man has not only no natural claim, but no natural 
 power of attaining to it. It is, throughout, a gift of grace, a free gift 
 of God, to be received from God, in the way of God's own appointment. 
 Now Christ has declared himself to be 'the way,' and He instituted a 
 body, His Church, of which He is the Head, that they who are 'found 
 in Him,' members of his body, the Church, might be in ' the way of 
 salvation.' 
 
 " Remind your people, that it is to this body that the promises of the 
 gospel are made ; and therefore it is of incalculable moment to every 
 one who hopes for a share in these promises, to ascertain whether he 
 belongs and is faithful to the body to which they are made : — whether, 
 too, he seeks them in the ordinances to which they are annexed, and 
 from the appointed ministers of those ordinances. 
 
 " In order to this, remind them, that the Church is a visible body, 
 into which its members are admitted by a visible sign, the sacrament 
 
 OF THE NEW LIFE ; that IN BAPTISM IS REGENERATION ; Without it, We 
 
189 
 
 have no warrant of Scripture to affirm that the new birth takes 
 
 PEACE AT ALL : WITHOUT IT, WE ARE YET IN OUR SINS — it) a State of 
 
 spiritual death, of enmity with God, and of fellowship with the arch- 
 enemy in his hatred, and in its everlasting punishment. 
 
 " And not only is the entrance into the Church by a visible sign, but 
 that body is visible also in the appointed means of sustaining the new 
 life, especially in that most sacred and sublime mystery of our religion, 
 the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper." * * * * * 
 
 " And not only is the Church visible in this its highest act of wor- 
 ship, but also in common and public prayer ; for we are commanded 
 'with one mind and one mouth to glorify God.' * * * 
 
 " Remind your people that the Church is visible in its rulers and its 
 ministers ; for they only can claim to rule over the Lord's household 
 whom He has himself placed over it ; they only are able to minister the 
 means of grace, — above all, to present that great commemorative 
 sacrifice — whom Christ has appointed, and whom he has in all gene- 
 rations appointed in unbroken succession from those, and through those, 
 whom He first ordained. ' Ambassadors from Christ' must, by the very 
 force of the term, receive credentials from Christ : ' Stewards of the 
 mysteries of God' must be entrusted with those mysteries by Him. 
 
 ' Remind them, that in the Church only is the promise of forgive- 
 ness of sins ; and, though to all who truly repent, and sincerely believe, 
 Christ mercifully grants forgiveness ; yet He has, in an especial manner, 
 empowered his ministers to declare and pronounce to His people the 
 absolution and remission of their sins. 
 
 " Having shown to the people your commission, show to them how 
 our own Church has framed its services in accordance with that com- 
 mission ; show this to them not only in the Ordinal, but also in the 
 Collects, in the Communion Service, in the Office of Visitation of the 
 Sick ; show it, especially, in that which continually presents itself to 
 their notice, but is commonly little regarded by them ; show it in 
 the very commencement of Morning and Evening Prayer, and make 
 them understand the full blessedness of that service, in which the 
 Church thus calls on them to join. 
 
 " If, when you thus state the nature of the visible Church, and the 
 privileges and blessings which are assured to those who are admitted 
 into it — if you are asked, as doubtless you will be asked, — What then 
 becomes of those who are not, or continue not, members of that 
 
 Church? TELL YOUR INQUIRERS THAT YOU ' JUDGE NOT THEM THAT ARE 
 
 without' — that to their own Master they stand or fall — that God's 
 
 ARM IS NOT SHORTENED, NOR HIS MERCY STRAITENED, NO, NOT BY MINIS- 
 TRIES OR ORDINANCES WHICH He HAS HIMSELF APPOINTED. Bllt tell 
 
 them, too, that he who wilfully, and in despite of due warning, or 
 through recklessness and worldly-mindedness, sets at nought those 
 ordinances and despises those ministers, has no right to promise to 
 
190 
 
 himself any share in the grace which they are appointed to convey." — 
 Charge delivered to the Clergy of the Diocese of Exeter, by Right Rev. 
 Henry, Lord Bishop of Exeter, at his Triennial Visitation. 183G. 
 
 And now I have done. Almost do I need to ask the par- 
 don of that Right Reverend Prelate whom I have sought to 
 vindicate from Mr. Goode's aspersions — for the possible 
 inference which may be drawn as to his character needing to 
 be defended from such attacks as I have exposed. But Mr. 
 Goode's letter has been so extolled, and is alleged to be so 
 unanswerable, that I trust his Lordshij) will forgive me for 
 making their ignorance wilful, who shall still believe that 
 the accusations brought by Mr. Goode against the Bishop 
 of Exeter are just or true or reasonable. 
 
 I the less regret omitting that further statement of the 
 true doctrine upon this subject, with which I had intended 
 to conclude these remarks, because another has announced 
 his intention of replying to Mr. Goode, who will not leave 
 aught unsaid of that which the Church intends when in her 
 Catechism she states that there is requisite stedfast faith in 
 specific promises made by God in the Sacrament of Baptism. 
 
 Leaving Mr. Goode, who thinks the Article in the Nicene 
 Creed " One Baptism for the Remission of Sins" nihil ad rem 
 in establishing the Bishop's view, to settle Mr. Hobart 
 Seymour's claim for a new translation of that article (!!), 
 I am content to avow my belief in the language in which so 
 many have fought the good fight and won their crown : and 
 avowing " I acknowledge one Baptism foe, the Remission 
 of Sins." I will take my leave of this matter, with offering 
 my sincere gratitude to him who at so much personal sacri- 
 fice has stood forth to vindicate this portion of revealed 
 truth ; and declaring my earnest hope that this stirring of 
 men's minds and hearts may be overruled by Him whose 
 office it is to give us a right judgment in all things, to 
 
191 
 
 the more certain stedfastness in the faith of all who have 
 been by Baptism admitted within the sacred enclosure of 
 the last Revealed Name of God — To Father, Son, and 
 Holy Ghost, Three Glorious Persons in One Undivided 
 Godhead — I humbly desire to give all praise, if in any 
 way truth shall be set forth by what I have written. 
 And I sincerely hope and pray that jjeace shall be no 
 further postponed by aught I have done than is necessary 
 for the assertion of that truth which is never compromised, 
 but the law of love is thereby violated. For, assuredly, 
 mischievous as I believe their error to be who evacuate 
 Christ's Sacraments of their Grace, I trust I feel no bitter- 
 ness towards the persons of those who unhappily do so. 
 Much as I mourn over the thought that any can consider 
 there is room in One Church for Two Doctrines of the For- 
 giveness of Sins, and that neither the Faith is One, nor Bap- 
 tism One, yet I will remember that the Body is One ; and 
 through the One Faith I will hope to see the One Spirit 
 teach us to love one another in the One Lord, whose Incar- 
 nation has given us sonship to the One God and Father of 
 us all. But this I must hope after God's plan, and not after 
 man's, for the plan of the present age is to admit that all men, 
 however unfounded, however wild, and however extravagant 
 their schemes, are equally right or equally likely to be so 
 with ourselves— to fraternise with every class and every 
 opinion — and by the aid of unmeaning and indefinite ex- 
 pressions, to give to falsehood and disorder a participation 
 in the blessings and the honour of order and truth. And 
 this is termed charity ! — this is dignified by the specious and 
 imposing name of liberality ! — and the outcry is raised against 
 all who dissent from the practice ! 
 
 " A superficial liberality — a false and hollow charity ! For 
 Christian charity is something higher, oh ! far, far higher 
 than this. 
 
192 
 
 The first of all things in the eye of a Christian is Truth. 
 
 That is the jewel he seeks — the pearl of great price which 
 he gives all his treasure to buy. 
 
 That, and that only, must he taught plainly, simply, and 
 without fear of offence ; and, though with discretion, without 
 fear of consequences, or of imputations. It can make no 
 compromise with falsehood — it can invest her with no ray of 
 its own Divine splendour, hut must proclaim eternal and 
 irreconcilable war with all that bears her name. 
 
 But, because it so wars against falsehood, so detests and 
 so exposes it, does it therefore detest those who are deceived, 
 or feel any bitterness against those who are in conscientious 
 error ? God forbid. The Christian, while he regrets their 
 error, and seeks to avert its evil effects on the cause of the 
 Gospel, remembers ever that they who hold it are his bre- 
 thren — the children of the same Father, with one hope and 
 one home. He beholds them with sincere and unaffected 
 love — his earnest wish and desire is to reclaim them from 
 error, and to lead them into truth ; and when all his efforts 
 are vain, he sees their defeat with regret, but without bitter- 
 ness. He must still proclaim the truth, for that is a sacred 
 duty to Truth, and its eternal fountain, the holy and everlast- 
 ing God ; he must still speak the language of condemnation 
 to falsehood ; but he speaks the language of love and of kind- 
 ness to those whose opinions he condemns. He reverences 
 the conscientious, and prays for the perverse. He looks 
 forward to that day when truth shall shine forth and error 
 be reproved ; and while he believes his own humble trust for 
 acceptance in that day to rest on the sure and covenanted 
 mercy of God, he remembers that his God is a God of love 
 - — that with Him there is uncovenanted mercy; and that by 
 
 * I cannot resist referring the reader on this point to the Bishop of 
 Bipon'a " Examining Chaplain's Advice to Candidates for Orders,'' 
 pp. 1C, 17. Rivingtons, 1850. 
 
193 
 
 Himself we are assured, that it is His earnest desire to bring 
 all the children of His love to one heavenly fold, under one 
 Shepherd."* 
 
 * The Commission and consequent Duties of the Clergy, in a Series 
 of Discourses. By H. J. Rose, B.D. — Sermon I., p. 30. 
 
POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 While these sheets were passing through the press, a Re- 
 monstrance to the Bishop of Exeter, from the Rev. L. Vernon 
 Harcourt, M. A., came to hand. On the supposition that what 
 I have surmised in the opening page of this letter is correct, 
 that it is not likely that the Bishop will notice any other 
 opponent in respect of his letter than his Grace the Primate 
 to whom it was addressed, I would, while the pen is in my 
 hand, just call attention to one or two matters which, in my 
 opinion, take off the force of Mr. Harcourt's Remonstrance. 
 
 I. He tells us, (pp. 28, 29,) " I have not had the wish nor 
 the opportunity of winding through all the intricacies of his 
 [Mr. Gorham's] Examination. All that I know of it is from 
 passages produced by your Lordship, and selected, no doubt, 
 because they were the most to your purpose." II. He seems 
 altogether to ignore the very office of the creeds in their succes- 
 sive expansion of statement of the original faith, in the Nicene 
 and Constantinopolitan Councils, and to confound' the cogency 
 of a clause added upon individual authority, with those which 
 have QEcumenical sanction before the division of East and West, 
 (p. 40.) III. He seems also to ignore that distinction between 
 the definitions of faith published by the CEcumenical Councils, 
 or accepted by them, and which, on that account, the Church 
 receives as unquestionably true and authoritative — and those 
 canons of Ecclesiastical discipline, which of necessity owe 
 
195 
 
 their force and obligation to time and circumstance. It is 
 from this last oversight that all Mr. Harcourt's playful satire 
 about the effect of sundry canons of the Fourth Council of Car- 
 thage, (pp. 10, 11, 43,) has its pungency. Recollect this dis- 
 tinction familiar to the veriest tyro in Ecclesiastical history, 
 and it may still be peremptory that a Bishop's faith be sound, 
 though his clergy be not required to shut up Demosthenes and 
 Cicero. 
 
 That a writer of Mr. Harcourt's candour and learning should 
 gravely cite the case of the Jilioque as parallel to a denial of 
 the Remission of Sins in Baptism, is to me most marvellous. 
 Or that he should have found an argument in the difference 
 between the article " Forgiveness of Sins," and " One Baptism 
 for the Remission of Sins," as though the less fully enunciated 
 faith of early times did not include the latter in the former : 
 or that he should not see that, however the h> of the Constan- 
 tinopolitan article might aim at prevalent errors, the Baimo-^a 
 ds a<fiemv afxapnoiv could not become merely the insertion of 
 a new tenet, but the rather proves that it was a generally ad- 
 mitted fact, that Baptism is into the Forgiveness of sins ; all 
 this I confess does strike me as very strange in such a writer, 
 and will, I feel sure, do much to weaken whatever effect his 
 Remonstrance might otherwise have had. 
 
 The preceding pages will show that Mr. Harcourt's main 
 statements as to the manner in which Hooker, and Pearson, 
 and Taylor have been impressed into Mr. Gorham's service, 
 and as to the manner in which the doctrine of the Church will 
 be impugned, if Mr. Gorham be allowed to teach with her au- 
 thority — are not without an answer. Of his argument (!) from 
 the absurdities of the Marcionites, it might be well to say that 
 the Gnostics had other sources than Christian doctrine from 
 which to draw their vain conceits ; and then, I think, to dismiss 
 Mr. Harcourt's argument (as St. Chrysostom anticipated his 
 narration of the fact upon which that argument is founded, 
 would be received) with " laughter." would be fitting, but 
 
196 
 
 for the gravity of the subject. I will, however, adopt this 
 " godly" father's words. " Is it meet, then, to answer these 
 things ? I trow not " — though there is no room here for his 
 reason, " unless it were necessary to discourse with madmen of 
 what they in their frenzy utter." 
 
 But I will take my leave of Mr. Harcourt with one sugges- 
 tion — it is this — that when he next undertakes to censure a 
 Bishop, for misunderstanding the doctrine of a candidate whom 
 he has patiently examined, he will at least qualify himself by 
 having the uixh, and making the opportunity., "of winding 
 through all the intricacies of this examination." If he had 
 done so, he would have known why the Bishop who charged 
 Mr. Gorham with denying that God remits original sin to 
 all infants in Baptism, saw no assurance that " baptized 
 infants always have original sin remitted to them when they 
 are baptized," " in Mr. Gorham's avowal of his adhesion to the 
 doctrine of our Church, that infants who have been baptized, 
 and die before they commit actual sin, are undoubtedly saved," 
 (Remonstrance, pp. 32, 33 ) ; if, I say, Mr. Harcourt had 
 wound his way through the intricacies of this examination, he 
 would have known that the Bishop had elicited from Mr. 
 Gorham the following statement : — 
 
 Answer 58. 
 
 Scripture declares, that, as " the wind bloweth where it listeth, and 
 thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, 
 and whither it goeth ; so is every one that is born of the Spirit," (John 
 iii. 8.) Now, if the effects and blessings set forth in " naked ver- 
 bality,' - by the passage cited in Question V., were absolutely, uncon- 
 ditionally wrought in, and conferred on, " every infant,'* — the Spirit 
 would, of necessity, effect his operation in " every infant," at the moment 
 when man thinks fit to direct, He shall effect it ; — which is a conclusion 
 directly opposed to the declaration of the lip of truth in this Scripture. 
 
 Again : it is declared in Scripture (John i. 12, 13), that those who 
 are " the sons of God," " were born not of blood, nor of the will of the 
 flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God," and that they become his 
 sons by "belief on the name" of Jt sus Christ. But, if the nakedly 
 
197 
 
 verbal declaration of the spiritual filiation of " every infant"* were 
 unconditionally true, then there would be no place left for its regene- 
 ration, or of its being brought into the relation of a "child of God," by 
 the means of faith, as here stated in the Divine record ; and the spiri- 
 tual birth of 'every infant" would be by "the will of man" and at the 
 precise moment when man exercises his " will" that such new nature 
 shall be imparted. 
 
 I refer your Lordship, generally, to numerous other passages (of the 
 clas". " As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of 
 God," Rom. viii. 14, &c.) — which speak of the disposition, character, 
 and effects, wrought in the heart, and manifested in the life, as evi- 
 dences that Regeneration has actually taken place. All such passages 
 would be flatly contradicted by maintaining that Regeneration, or being 
 " made the child of God," absolutely, unconditionally, peremptorily, 
 takes place in " eveky {sic) infant baptized by a lawful minister with 
 water, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy 
 Ghost." — FACT {sic), overthrows the supposition. 
 
 * Namely, that " every infant, baptized by a lawful minister, in the 
 name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, is made by God, 
 in such Baptism, ' a member of Christ, a child of God, and an inheritor 
 of the kingdom of heaven.' " 
 
 Page 72, note, for resum, read rerum. 
 
 ,, occipiunt, read acciptunt. 
 
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